Collaborative Problem-solving in a Crisis

Juliana Rotich works for Ushahidi, a non-profit software company that builds products to crowdsource information during a crisis.

It was born in Kenya in 2007 amidst the violence following a disputed presidential election. Rotich described on stage at Wired 2011how a small team created a disaster response platform that takes input from very simple sources -- predominantly SMS and email -- and geolocates it on a map.

A big focus was placed on verification -- international media, NGOs, and Kenyan journalists and bloggers were used to ensure that reports were accurate.