As part of its Extraordinary Voices, Extraordinary Change series and as a follow up to last year’s conversation with writer Nick Kristoff, The International Museum of Women will be hosting a dialogue with Mahnaz Afkhami next Wednesday. The discussion is to be centered around the most pressing issues for Middle Eastern women, including human rights in Iran, the economic engagement of women in the Middle East and North Africa, and the growing use of technology in movement building.
Afkhami, the founder of Women’s Learning Partnership and director of the Foundation for Iranian Studies, has said that in the 21st century, “women’s status in society will become the standard by which to measure our progress toward civility and peace.” She was exiled from Iran under threat of death during the Iranian Revolution and has been an advocate for women’s rights internationally for the past three decades, and I’m most looking forward to hearing her thoughts on online engagement. If you’re interested in taking part in the talk on June 2 at 6 PM at the Omni Hotel on California Street, please leave a comment on what about the event is most intriguing to you.
Women 2.0 recently sat down with VidSF and Julia Hartz, co-founder of the online event registration company Eventbrite, in San Francisco to discuss the company’s approach to mobile and knowing when an idea is worth making sacrifices for. The former television network executive discusses building a quality product, growing a repeat user base and perfecting a divide and conquer co-founder strategy before seeking $7 million from Sequoia Capital.
I’ve long awaiting (well, long in Internet time) the launch of The Bay Citizen, a local news and culture publication that is promising to serve as an independent reporter of community issues. “In this historic time of flux in the news industry, we have an unprecedented opportunity to pioneer new ways of creating, distributing and sustaining quality local news,” say an editorial team that includes a Pulitzer Prize winner and alums of New America Media, Salon and The Washington Post. In addition to producing coverage for the Bay Area pages of The New York Times, the Citizen publishes arts and opinion content from a slew of community partners including Art Practical and SF Streetsblog. Founding memberships are available by donation through tonight following a launch party starting at 7:30 at the Great American Music Hall.
Katherine Priore was a stressed out school teacher when she heeded an instructor pal’s advice to bring yoga into her junior high, and the results have been most impressive. You can hear from KIPP students exposed to her Headstand program and the YogaEd phys ed curriculum in Jacob Klein’s video below about the effects that practicing yoga poses has had on their classroom concentration. But any admiration need not end there: a shopping event at Hello in Pacific Heights starting tonight at 6 PM will benefit the non-profit’s local work “providing access to yoga in the place where these students spend the most time: school.”
micro · hood - n. A piece of a neighborhood, perhaps only a block or two large, so glorious that it deserves its own name; i.e. FolSoMa is a shining example of a microhood.
The location that the team at SF experiential magazine The Bold Italicis referring to, that on Folsom Street between 7th and 8th, could welcome become your new favorite starting Tuesday night. The celebration of “FolSoMa” is to include $5 seasonal brews from City Beer Store, hand-crafted espresso at Sightglass Coffee, and bourbon at Bloodhound. But lest you think the event is only about beverages, new kid on the block–and great cafe and co-working space–Radius will be serving oysters while small plates are planned at Triptych. The Hubba Hubba Review and Bombshell Betty burlesque troop may be enough to have you going for seconds if you’re able to secure a spot.
After briefly taking part in last week’s Free Ruby on Rails workshop at Pivotal Labs (more on the very community-focused volunteers and participants taking part in the sessions to come), it’s good to hear that events aimed at increasing the diversity of local developers aren’t stopping with the weekend. Mighty Ruby Tuesday, a benefit for the RailsBridge Open Workshop Project, is open to programmers and supporters of female technologists alike and will kick off at (you guessed it) Club Mighty on Utah St. at 8 PM.
A wide range of women and a few of their male friends took part in this most recent workshop, which featured volunteer developers leading groups of beginner, intermediate, back end, and Windows programmers. “In creating these workshops, we wanted to do something by women, for women, with help from a lot of guys,” said Sarah Allen, founder of RailsBridge, an effort to bridge the gap between aspiring developers and contributing community members through mentoring, teaching and writing. “As an open source community effort, Ruby is a great first programming language, and Rails is practical for entrepreneurs seeking to build their own web apps and for software developers who want to update their skills.”
My current mental list of things that are most fantastic includes Fridays at 5 PM, Rosewood Bar, and $5 entry fees for entrepreneurial events. You’ll have to wait until next Wednesday for the last two but the promise of the opening of a local Grameen Bank could make it worthwhile. The non-profit microfinance organization, which works to combat poverty by offering small loans without requiring collateral, will be the second such bank to open in the US since founder Muhammad Yunus began offering loans to groups of Bangladeshi women in the ’70s. (Borrowers’ experiences with Grameen America in NY are highlighted in Gayle Ferraro’s film To Catch a Dollar, whose Sundance premier was reviewed here.)
A local Grameen branch is slated to launch in August to begin offering a few hundred loans on a monthly basis to Bay Area workers. The young professionals event starting at 6 PM on the 26th is intended to generate evangelism for and dialogue around the bank (and imbibing on Broadway is a good way to get ‘em talking).
Chalk the brevity up to the weekend, but Sunday’s Capsule Festival in Hayes Valley is worth sharing between the involvement of Combustion Glassworks, Gold Dust Studio, Nous Savons, and other crafty retailers. The bi-annual street fair will feature Ts, paper goods, “specialty clothing,” and more than a few caffeinated browsers. Let us know if you’re one of them.
I’m most looking forward to TEDxSOMA talks about interactivity and the digital future by the likes of XEO Design’s Nicole Lazzaro and BoingBoing’s David Pescovitz (as evidenced). If you aren’t Parisoma-bound this afternoon, the Justin.TV stream can be seen here and on the event site:
The lineup for the third iteration of the Chic Meets Geek series is slated for June 3 at Automattic (if you didn’t get enough of the Pier 38 space during Ignite Bay Area, a visit for this is in order). The lineup for brief talks by stylish and tech-inclined folks includes Charlie Ayers, former Google chef and author of “Food 2.0″; Victoria Ransom, co-founder & CEO of WildFire App; and Wendy Lea and Amy Muller, CEO and co-founder, respectively, of Get Satisfaction. Past speakers for the talks started by Carol Tran have included a principal dancer with SF Ballet and the creator of Guitar Hero–not shabby for an idea that’s six months old and that now benefits the Glide Foundation. Get thee to the online ticket sales and designer shoe salesperson.
As part of its Extraordinary Voices, Extraordinary Change series and as a follow up to last year’s conversation with writer Nick Kristoff, The International Museum of Women will be hosting a dialogue with Mahnaz Afkhami next Wednesday. The discussion is to be centered around the most pressing issues for Middle Eastern women, including human rights in Iran, the economic engagement of women in the Middle East and North Africa, and the growing use of technology in movement building.
