Drapetomaniac

Austin Time Exchange Network

The Austin Time Exchange Network (ATEN) is one of the many Time Banks in the United States and around the world which allows local communities to exchanges services without depending on cash for absolutely everything.  This has become more important as people find themselves with less cash, strained employment and crunched credit.

Boasting almost 300 members, the Austin Time Exchange is approaching four years of exchanges between members of the Austin community and surrounding cities. More »

Erik Mauck and others have been working for some time on a documentary about the Austin Time Exchange.  It took a lot of the early start and showed a lot of the ups and downs, evangelists and naysayers. I’m glad to see their work.

Time is Money (Documentary about the Austin Time Exchange Network) from Erik Mauck on Vimeo.

I came to the IT world largely via the call center world. Instead of finishing film school (my check to NYU wasn’t good for more than a bit), I found myself paying rent, being a grown up and being promoted quickly.  I started studying the field I was in (call center management) and quickly found there was something wrong in my urge to help people.  I was doing it in a people warehouse.

Between being a workaholic and call center mini-chief who couldn’t pay for or focus on film school, I started to think about being able to work and be fulfilled.  Finding the nonprofit world, I quickly came across other technologists who volunteered or got paid to use technology to help the common good.

The common theme was technology can help nonprofits, but they don’t know it or aren’t use to it and so dont’ think it’s valuable. That’s changed a lot in the past decade.

Now, I rewind a bit and go back to the world I was at before I went down the IT path. Film is more than 100 years old.  Have nonprofits and NGOs used new media and film to their advantage? I’ve seen a lot of experiments and movement forward, but some nonprofits are old and take a while to move.  Other, newer organizations are learning old traditions and need  to remember their youth.

Lights. Camera. Help. is a film festival that will focus on the use of film and new media for the advancement of nonprofit missions.  After a century, can film catch on and be appreciated as much as technology has in the past decade?