in the World This Week: Robot Cyberguards and Refugee Skateparks

September 21, 2015 · In The News

In the World This Week: Robot Cyberguards and Refugee Skateparks

This week, Anastasia Emmanuel, Marketing & Community Manager – UK (or Queen of the European Continent as I like to call her), was interviewed on CNBC about making crowdfunding mainstream and how the platform is evolving to give the best to our campaigners. And her eyebrows were flawless! Slava Rubin, CEO, also gave insight on Fox Business on how to slay a crowdfunding campaign, with examples of some of campaigns who have indeed slain by following his advice.

Tech News

The plethora of robot campaigns on Indiegogo would make me very concerned for an impending robot takeover if they weren’t all so friendly. A new telepresence robot called Yori Black is actually capable of interacting. Not only can you order it around in your home, you can also control it remotely, which can be helpful for people that use it for medical care. It can also be scary if your younger brother gets ahold of it and uses it to poke you in your most vulnerable moments. Also, any ideas where that extremely unique name came from?

And to mitigate that problem of connected home hackers/mean spirited siblings, CUJO’s elegant, minimalistic design alerts you to cyberthreats using simple facial expressions, and is the latest example of home technology designed to make your place pretty. Now we just need a 911 designated for cybersecurity and we’ll be all set up for a life that is only 50% not on the internet.

Film Crowdfunding News

Parvez Sharma, an openly gay Muslim, has been filming the struggles attached to homosexuality in Saudi Arabia for years. What’s the big deal? Homosexuality is punishable by death in Islam. As a devout Muslim he wants to shed light on the conflict caused within the religion by these strict interpretations of the Quran, so this year he filmed his pilgrimage to Mecca, or hajj. Sharma raised money on Indiegogo to distribute the film widely and continue the intense debate it has sparked.

Social Innovation News

Video games have a bad reputation for turning children into violent monsters when they grow up. I won’t argue with science (especially if if we’re talking Grand Theft Auto) but the folks at Bandura Games are using the power of the almighty controller to actually promote peace in conflict-ridden areas. The American, Israeli, and Palestinian founders are building a community by having players connect over a game entirely unrelated to the Israel/Palestine conflict.

The latest sk8r boi/grl/person renaissance is happening in a place you wouldn’t guess: Jordan. In a neighborhood largely populated by Syrian refugees, a young Jordanian decided to build a skatepark, where kids can can do a lot of ollies and ride a lot of halfpipes to take a break from their families’ worries. They can probably do other stuff too but I’m out of skateboarding words. It will be a self-sustaining park where the kids themselves are responsible for maintenance, and eventually will provide classes in conjunction with a school.

If you’ve traveled around the world and seen the juxtaposition between wealthy tourists and impoverished residents, you’ll be excited to hear how Onwards Travel is supporting sustainable development by providing microloans to businesses in your favorite tourist destinations. When you book travel through them, your money not only goes to loans, but also to providing training to local entrepreneurs. You’re free to zip-line with a purpose.

Where are they now? Indiegogo success story

Hardcore, a videogame-style POV film in which you are brought back to life by your wife who is subsequently kidnapped, find out you are a Cyborg, and have to fight your way through violence in the streets of Russia is being courted by Paramount, Lionsgate, and Dimension. That “DON’T GO IN THE HOUSE” thrill and frustration that you feel during horror movies will be at an all-time high.