Author: john

The NYTimes recently ran a piece titled “Venture Capitalists Are Investing in Educational Reform,” (sub. req.) which discusses John Doerr’s role in founding the New Schools Venture Fund in San Francisco. Although New Schools has been covered pretty well by the press, this article is a good piece about social entrepreneurship: Unlike Kleiner Perkins Caufield… Continue reading Social Entrepreneurship In The News- Venture Capitalists Are Investing in Educational Reform

Cnet reports that Xerox PARC, a technology research powerhouse, and Kleiner Perkins, a venture capital powerhouse have increased their commitment to “the emerging field of clean technologies.” Kleiner Perkins has created a $100 million fund dedicated to green technologies, and Xerox PARC announced a collaboration with a venture called SolFocus, to develop and improve solar… Continue reading Investment in Biofuels

It looks like Nicholas Negroponte has stepped down as Chairman of MIT’s Media Lab to pursue the $100 Laptop Initiative. I’ve covered the $100 Laptop Initiative fairly well on this blog– here are a collection of links to previous posts: Hal Varian Plugs the $100 Laptop In The NY Times Technology Review Defends the $100… Continue reading Negroponte Steps Down From MIT Media Lab to Pursue $100 Laptop Initiative

A few weeks ago, Google made an agreement with the Chinese government to remove specific websites from its search engine in return for getting unblocked access to China’s internet users. You can read more about it in this BBC News article from Jan 25th. Since the announcement, there has been significant “buzz” in the blogosphere… Continue reading Google and Social Responsibility in China

The NY Times published (sub. req.) a piece today by Hal Varian, a well known economist based out of the University of California at Berkeley. I can’t seem to get off this topic, because I think its an interesting case study on approaches in social entrepreneurship (I’ll go into more detail in a moment). But… Continue reading Hal Varian Plugs the $100 Laptop In The NY Times

Many investors have identified investment in water rights as the next big thing and it makes sense– as the population grows, we need more drinking water. More future demand means rise in price. Here is an article that shows us just exactly how much “waste” today’s bottled water market produces. Its an interesting read and… Continue reading Inefficiencies– The Bottled Water Industry

Last week in Davos, Microsoft’s Craig Mundie commented that using cell phones might be a more sustainable approach than the development and deployment of the $100 laptop project for solving the digital divide problem . A new Technology Review article defends the laptop, and offers some opinions of researchers and professors involved with the project.… Continue reading Technology Review Defends the $100 Laptop