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Please vote for MobiChange at the NetSquared USAID Development 2.0 Challenge. Voting ends on December 12, and the fifteen most popular projects go on to the final round.

Here is the full text of MobiChange’s NetSquared USAID Development 2.0 Challenge application –

SHORT PROJECT DESCRIPTION

MobiChange will be an open-source, multi-lingual mobile social networking platform, accessible by voice and SMS, designed to support local communities and enable social change.

DETAILED PROJECT OVERVIEW

MobiChange will be an open-source, multi-lingual mobile social networking platform, accessible by voice and SMS, designed to support local communities and enable social change.

The MobiChange project will have three parts –

1. An open source code base for a multilingual mobile social network designed on the basis of extensive ethnographic research, to be accessed almost exclusively by voice and SMS (MobiChange).

2. A Drupal-based community website to discuss how such a platform may help non-profits engage local communities and mobilize social change (www.mobichange.org).

3. A hosted ad-supported consumer version of the mobile social network, built on the MobiChange platform, designed for mass market adoption (www.mobitalk.org).

www.mobitalk.org will be our main source of revenue.

Here is the big announcement on MobiChange I had promised earlier: I am delighted to welcome Ken Banks and Dina Mehta on the MobiChange team.

Ken Banks runs kiwanja.net, an organisation that helps grassroots non-profits around the world figure out how to use mobile technology in their social change work. Ken’s FrontlineSMS project has previously received grants from William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, MacArthur Foundation and the Open Society Institute.

Dina Mehta is a partner in Mosoci (research for web 2.0 strategy) and Explore Research & Consultancy (qualitative market research). Dina has contributed to building several communities on the internet, such as Worldchanging, Tsunami Help, KatrinaHelp, WorldwideHelp Group, SkypeJournal and Global Voices Online.

Both Ken and Dina are widely acknowledged as thought leaders in the mobile for development (Mobile4D) and social media space, write regularly on their blogs about these topics, and are frequently quoted in the media.

The MobiChange founding team now combines a rare set of skill and experiences: (1) expertise in the emerging markets in Asia and Africa, (2) understanding of the emerging mobile social networking space, and (3) experience in using mobile and social media applications to engage non-profits and grassroots communities.

As I work on my MobiChange application for the second round of Knight News Challenge 2009, my thoughts return to two recent posts on building social mobile applications.

Ken ‘Kiwanja’ Banks wrote a great post last week on the mistakes techies make in developing social mobile applications for the emerging world –

Progress in the social mobile field will come only when we think more about best practices in the thinking and design of mobile projects and applications, rather than obsessing over the end products themselves. By then most of the damage has usually already been done.

Ken gave some great advice, based on his own FrontlineSMS experience: understanding the need gap before entering development, learning from other tools/ players, prototyping early and cheap, partnering with grassroots non-profits, staying lean, being flexible, encouraging local customization, focusing on text and voice, starting small, working closely with early users, and building conversations and community over time. My own approach to MobiChange is similar and I’ll try to follow most of Ken’s advice in the months to come.

It reminded me of another great post in which Russel Southwood critiqued the social mobile space (via Katrin Verclas) and raised several important questions around usability, impact, scale and sustainability –