When visiting Beijing last summer in company of Ben Walker I met Liang Lu and learned the story of Bokee, and how Chinese blogspace, sparked by interest in a woman’s stories, exploded with exponential growth . I met a Chinese blogger and an interpreter who showed me passion.
I met Jeremy Goldkorn and, watched the documentary that he and his partner had made, telling the story of an amateur football team comprised of African men who had come to Beijing for work and found connection playing football, AFRIKA UNITED.
In Jamaica in October for our CyberStrategy conference, sitting in the conference room at Growth Facilitators, the company that put the conference together, talking with Norman, friend and chairman of Growth Facilitators advisory board, I pitched the cyberstrategy to him of inviting AFRIKA UNITED and a Chinese team from their league to come to Jamaica on a goodwill tour mixing, football, music and community development in venues around the island, with bloggers along, telling the stories of the trip and generating media for a global Chinese and Jamaican audience. Norman liked it. Here’s audio, NormanConquest.mp3.
Next I discussed the idea with Moneyede Martin of SSET, who expressed willingness to coordinate such a tour on the ground in Jamaica along with Kevin Wallen of Destiny Productions.
I met Ken Shaw at the South Camp Quiz Competition, who contributes equipment for the inmates at South Camp to play ball. He thought SSET could field a competitive team.
Then, in London, at Berkman’s Global Voices 2005 London Summit, I met Kevin, who founded Bokee, and Nart, who will host the domain of our JamaicaExpress group blog, and learned about PledgeBank as a means for raising funds for interesting ventures.
What are the pieces still needed to fall into place in order to make this idea for internet development come true? Can we set a budget, set a date, see if there are Jamaican and Chinese companies who might lend support?
