You might have seen an earlier post I wrote about this here, and I’ve essentially done the same thing this time, but with an important addition of code from Tom that properly stacks the characters (a critical feature often not available in an OS font library), and a new Tibetan font (actually Bhutanese) from Chris which is small, lightweight and efficient enough to be used on Android. All together this provides support for reading Tibetan text on web pages, and within full application user interfaces, eBooks and more.

With up to 32gb of storage possible via the tiny micro SD Card, this one device could probably store and serve up the majority of Tibetan Buddhist texts, not to mention literary, poetic and historic works, that exist, all in a lightweight, energy-efficient device. Since the device is also networked, you can use it to pull down the latest Tibetan language online news and blogs.

And yes, this is all possible because the Nook is based on the free, open-source Android operating system. Yay for freedom in all forms!

• Volunteerism has a problem. Most people don’t do it
• People have a problem with volunteerism.
• Volunteerism excludes most of us.
• We’re trying to woo “Last Mile” volunteers.
• Volunteerism is modeled for the Industrial Economy.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 74.6% of the U.S. population did not volunteer in 2007. Why? Because we’re too busy. We’re driving to work in bumper to bumper traffic, shuttling kids to after school sports, studying for class, and working at Starbucks to pay for college. We’re a nation with a lot to do. And when asked, we cite “lack of time” as the reason for not volunteering.

Fortunately, Ben’s got some ideas on how to improve the situation:

• Let’s find new ways to do volunteerism.
• Perspective shift experiment
• Support Information Era volunteerism

“In addition, we can start thinking about how we can use these inspired models to inform the field of volunteerism. The private sector is quickly coming up with brilliant new ideas that take advantage of the amateur’s passion for participation. Threadless, Innocentive, iStockPhoto. These are companies that have dominated their niches by relying on loosely structured peer production. These models work. Let’s explore them deeply.”

Make sure to read the post and check out the main theextraordinaries.org site as well for information on you can get contribute or get your organization involved in a new approach to getting people to help you get things done.

Introducing… the Functional About Card (fāc)!
The Functional About Card (fāc) is a business card format & template that prints on 3×5 index cards in the color of your choice (Office Depot 500 pack on Recycled Paper for $2.89). The goal was to create a business card that can be easily produced on demand with a home printer, and is actually useful and functional, as opposed to the usual dead tree spam you usually get that just collect dust.

The card design is two-sided, comprised of four 2.5×3″ quadrants:

• a read-only information quad providing your critical stats (name, title, email, charisma, hit points)
• a writeable, line-ruled quad where recipients of your card can take notes on things you’ve said, or perhaps what others have said about you. this area can also be torn off (see ‘scoring’ info later) and used for exchanging numbers or stock tips
• a visual quad for displaying geeky things like QRCodes, avatars, creative commons badgets and so on
• a blank “scratchpad” quad for brainstorming, mind mapping, UML sequence diagrams or maps for meeting up later in the evening

You could optionally replace the note-taking area on the right with a maze, crossword puzzle, madlib or other small format, amusing game. Anyone you give you a card to will be delighted later when they discover that you’ve actually given them something fun to pass the time.

I’ve chosen to use the back side to display a QRCode, but if that is just way too geeky for you, feel free to put a picture of yourself, your pet, your favorite flower or historical figure (Ben Franklin!). You might also expand the right “idea napkin” area to the whole card, because admittedly, 3×2.5″ isn’t much room for a great idea.

Make sure to lightly score (with a screw driver, razor blade or exact knife) and fold the card down the middle of the long length… this way it fits nicely into wallets, pockets and other places people typically put these things. This also makes the card a bit easier to tear evenly in half, in case it needs to be used as a part of a sneaker net data transmission.

Download the template in Apple Pages, PDF and MS Word formats: FunctionalAboutCard-1.0.zip

Oh, yeah, and this template has been released under the Creative Commons By Attribution 3.0 license.

Functional About Card by Nathanial Freitas is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
Based on a work at openideals.com.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at http://openideals.com.

So, there it is… I hope you love it, and if not, that you’ll provide some useful suggestions and improvements upon this flight of fancy.