Throughout history and around the world, community members have come together to build places, be it settlers constructing log cabins in nineteenth-century Canada, an artist group creating a waterfront gathering place along the Danube in Budapest, or residents helping revive small-town main streets in the United States. What all these projects have in common is that they involve local volunteers in the construction of public and community places; they are community-built. Although much attention has been given to specific community-built movements such as public murals and community gardens, little has been given to defining community-built as a whole. This volume provides a preliminary description of community-built practices with examples from the disciplines of urban design, historic preservation, and community art. Taken as a whole, these community-built projects illustrate how the process of local involvement in adapting, building, and preserving a built environment can strengthen communities and create places that are intimately tied to local needs, culture, and community. The lessons learned from this volume can provide community planners, grassroots facilitators, and participants with an understanding of what can lead to successful community-built art, construction, preservation, and placemaking.

Throughout history and around the world, community members have come together to build places, be it settlers constructing log cabins in nineteenth-century Canada, an artist group creating a waterfront gathering place along the Danube in Budapest, or residents helping revive small-town main streets in the United States. What all these projects have in common is that they involve local volunteers in the construction of public and community places; they are community-built. Although much attention has been given to specific community-built movements such as public murals and community gardens, little has been given to defining community-built as a whole. This volume provides a preliminary description of community-built practices with examples from the disciplines of urban design, historic preservation, and community art. Taken as a whole, these community-built projects illustrate how the process of local involvement in adapting, building, and preserving a built environment can strengthen communities and create places that are intimately tied to local needs, culture, and community. The lessons learned from this volume can provide community planners, grassroots facilitators, and participants with an understanding of what can lead to successful community-built art, construction, preservation, and placemaking.

What's the point of creating a great Web site if no one goes there-or worse, if people come but never return? How do some sites, such as America Online, EBay, and GeoCities, develop into Internet communities with loyal followings and regular repeat traffic? How can Web page designers and developers create sites that are vibrant and rewarding? Amy Jo Kim, author of Community Building on the Web and consultant to some of the most successful Internet communities, is an expert at teaching how to design sites that succeed by making new visitors feel welcome, rewarding member participation, and building a sense of their own history. She discusses important design strategies, interviews influential Web community-builders, and provides the reader with templates and questionnaires to use in building their own communities.

Lois Wille's illustrated account provides behind-the-scenes insight into how a small number of Chicago business leaders transformed the dangerous and seedy South Loop into an integrated and thriving community in the heart of the central city. The obstacles to the evolution of Dearborn Park were quite formidable, including a succession of six mayors, huge economic impediments, policy disputes engendered among people used to making their own corporate decisions, the wretched reputation of the South Loop, problems with the Chicago public school system, and public mistrust of a project supported by the wealthy, no matter how altruistic the goal. It took twenty years and millions of dollars, but it will pay off and in fact is paying off right now. With Dearborn Park, Chicago left a formula that other cities can use to turn fallow land into vibrant neighborhoods--without big government subsidies. As Wille explains, the realization of this vision requires shared investment and shared risk on the part of local businesses, financial institutions, and government. It links private and public influence and capital. Wille explains how these elements worked together to build a neighborhood in a blighted tract of Chicago's Loop. She also describes how key decisions affecting the public interest were made during a time of profound change in the city's political life: Dearborn Park was conceived during the final years of the most powerful political machine in America and had to adapt as that machine crumbled and city government was reshaped

“Worth a read for anyone who cares about making change happen.”—Barack Obama A powerful new blueprint for how governments and nonprofits can harness the power of digital technology to help solve the most serious problems of the twenty-first century As the speed and complexity of the world increases, governments and nonprofit organizations need new ways to effectively tackle the critical challenges of our time—from pandemics and global warming to social media warfare. In Power to the Public, Tara Dawson McGuinness and Hana Schank describe a revolutionary new approach—public interest technology—that has the potential to transform the way governments and nonprofits around the world solve problems. Through inspiring stories about successful projects ranging from a texting service for teenagers in crisis to a streamlined foster care system, the authors show how public interest technology can make the delivery of services to the public more effective and efficient. At its heart, public interest technology means putting users at the center of the policymaking process, using data and metrics in a smart way, and running small experiments and pilot programs before scaling up. And while this approach may well involve the innovative use of digital technology, technology alone is no panacea—and some of the best solutions may even be decidedly low-tech. Clear-eyed yet profoundly optimistic, Power to the Public presents a powerful blueprint for how government and nonprofits can help solve society’s most serious problems.

The author of Men Explain Things to Me explores the moments of altruism and generosity that arise in the aftermath of disaster Why is it that in the aftermath of a disaster? whether manmade or natural?people suddenly become altruistic, resourceful, and brave? What makes the newfound communities and purpose many find in the ruins and crises after disaster so joyous? And what does this joy reveal about ordinarily unmet social desires and possibilities? In A Paradise Built in Hell, award-winning author Rebecca Solnit explores these phenomena, looking at major calamities from the 1906 earthquake in San Francisco through the 1917 explosion that tore up Halifax, Nova Scotia, the 1985 Mexico City earthquake, 9/11, and Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. She examines how disaster throws people into a temporary utopia of changed states of mind and social possibilities, as well as looking at the cost of the widespread myths and rarer real cases of social deterioration during crisis. This is a timely and important book from an acclaimed author whose work consistently locates unseen patterns and meanings in broad cultural histories.

Wikipedia, Flickr, You Tube, Facebook, LinkedIn are all examples of large community-built databases, although with quite diverse purposes and collaboration patterns. Their usage and dissemination will further grow introducing e.g. new semantics, personalization, or interactive media. Pardede delivers the first comprehensive research reference on community-built databases. The contributions discuss various technical and social aspects of research in and development in areas like in Web science, social networks, and collaborative information systems. Pardede delivers the first comprehensive research reference on community-built databases. The contributions discuss various technical and social aspects of research in and development in areas like in Web science, social networks, and collaborative information systems.