Collectively our community has a ton of potential economic muscle (as witnessed by the Spread Firefox NYTimes ad campaign). Wouldn't it be awesome if in coming together for WineCamp, we could also do some good and spread the love beyond our little collective?
So here's what we're going to do. Prior to WineCamp, we're going to kick off a distributed fundraiser in the style of the Get Firefox button campaign. The goal is to raise money to help sponsor a new foundation whose mission is to hook up underprivileged students with programs that teach the principles and practices of distributed, open source, DIY development.
Imagine: a way to teach kids how to build a Firefox extensions, WordPress plugins or Drupal modules (and so on) that actually help solve real world problems at the local level... in their schools, communities or clubs... that's the vision -- and by teaming up with non-profits for the event, we'll have the right connections to actually make this happen!