I am always amazed at the impact we all have coming together, using our collective talents for good. Combining our collective brain power, skills, time, and resources produces stellar results – maybe it is better rendering management for films that entertain with mind-bending CGIs or improving automated software testing and deployment so developers can spend more time on innovation. Human ingenuity is amazing!
Imagine our impact when we come together for good. When we see communities who need a collective leg up in life, or when we see injustice and foresee ways to balance the scale, or when we see the devastation in the wake of natural disasters and know there is a better way. We want to make the lives of everyone better – it might seem daunting, but innovation is bred from not knowing what you can’t do.
Facilitating this drive to help is what the Call for Code® project is about. It is, “creating and deploying open source technologies to tackle some of the world’s greatest challenges.” It is about thinking beyond yourself – using your talents to help others.
Call for Code was created by David Clark Cause with Founding Partner IBM and in partnership with United Nations Human Rights and The Linux Foundation. The goal is to inspire “developers to create practical, effective, and high-quality applications that can have an immediate and lasting impact on humanitarian issues as sustainable open source projects.” The Linux Foundation helps take the raw innovation and put in place the right tools to enable an impact across the world: instill best practices, engage external partners, provide feedback, and test them in the real world.
Call for Code 2022
The Call for Code 2022 is now open for registration. The focus this year is on sustainability. Do you have an idea to improve sustainable production, consumption, and management of resources, reduce pollution creation, and protect biodiversity? Keep reading. You don’t have a world-changing idea. Keep reading – you just might light a spark of ingenuity.
For this year, specifically, your solution should address: carbon emissions; clean energy; supply chain transparency and traceability; water scarcity and quality; reducing waste footprints; biodiversity; food insecurity; and education access and job opportunities to further environmental justice. And, no, this isn’t just for software developers. Each well-rounded team needs builders, designers, communicators, and humanitarians.
There is a total of $285,000 in prizes, all winners will receive open source support from The Linux Foundation, and all participants will receive a variety of support, such as IBM Cloud services, accelerators, expert webinars, mentors, and more.
Registration opened April 26, 2022 and final submissions are due October 31, 2022. Visit callforcode.org for detailed information and requirements and to register.
Call for Code 2021 Winners
Do you still need some inspiration? Take a few minutes to read about the 2021 winners. Half of the projects focus on racial justice – and those are the ones I want to take a moment to highlight. If you see one that inspires you, click through to learn more and for ways you can contribute:
Fair Change allows people to easily record public safety incidents in a safe and secure way with a goal of more transparency, reeducation, and reform.
TakeTwo utilizes machine learning to highlight potentially racially insensitive language on websites you are browsing in Chrome.
Legit-Info provides information on policy proposals at various levels of government. It communicates the potential impact without legalese and facilities sharing opinions with policy makers. It also gives policy makers visibility into how diverse citizens will be impacted.
Open Sentencing helps public defenders understand and document any racial disparities in the judicial system.
Five Fifths Voter helps remove impediments to voting by providing information on voter registration, voter ID laws, restrictions, purging, gerrymandering, and tools that make it easier to vote, such as childcare at the voting stations.
Incident Accuracy Reporting System enables victims and witnesses to contribute to incident reports to help give law enforcement and the public a 360-degree view of events that took place at any incident. It utilizes Hyperledger blockchain to ensure transparency, trust, and that information can’t be altered.
Truth Loop is a mobile-friendly tool to see pending legislation, learn about it, record your own story related to the legislation and its impact, and share that with policy makers.
Call for Code also has seven other projects related to natural disasters and stemming the impact of climate change, including monitoring the real-time air health for wildland firefighters, democratizing earthquake monitoring, inspecting buildings, facilitating drone canvassing and delivery of supplies following a natural disaster, and helping farmers optimize water use. Finally – they have a project, Rend-o-Matic, that enables musicians to remotely record their individual track in a composition and stitches them all together into the final, virtual performance.
Join a Call for Code Project
Let’s show the world the impossible is possible.
Call for Code is making a difference! Are you experiencing some FOMO? Want to join in? Good news – fear no more. You can! And you don’t even have to be a technical person. Besides the need for a wide range of technical specialists, the projects can also utilize individuals for documentation, testing, design, UI/UX, legal, subject matter experts, advocacy, and community building. Just head over to our Call for Code page and help work on these projects.
Do you have another idea around sustainability? Register for the Call for Code 2022 now and pull together your team.
Let’s show the world the impossible is possible.
