Daniel Lubetzky

Julian Brody wrote an interesting piece for IPF about US Govt’ envoy Fred Hoff’s innovative proposal on how to resolve the Golan Heights controversy between Israel and Syria.  What is insightful and creative about it is that it takes each party’s core priorities into consideration and not only addresses them but potentially even resolves the issue in a way that creates the foundations for a warmer peace, and a more vibrant & ecologically-sound economy.

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Listen to the first few minutes of this…all a cappella – you can close your eyes and feel the rain.  Toto should be proud!

Thx to Ileana for pointing me to this.

In an interesting note about the gap between knowledge and learning, Gidi Grinstein pointed me to this amazing video that highlights the quick pace at which information is growing.  This year, more information will be created than was generated in the prior 5,000 years.

Creative offer from Barnes & Noble, as described in this Washington Post article.  Download the B&N app to your iphone, flash it to a Barista at one of their in-store Starbucks, and get a free cup of coffee.

We want to do the same thing with KIND and KINDED.  And give participants a free KIND bar when they go to Starbucks and tell us how they KINDED someone.  Any good iphone App genius that wants to help us build it?

The holy grail for environmentally conscious manufacturers and consumers is truly bio-degradable effective packaging.  While the biggest threat is in plastic bottles and packaging materials that overwhelm our landfills, even small wrappers add up.

The challenge to manufacturers is that the very things that make wrappers good – impermeability, sealing out oxygen to prevent oxidation and decomposition – are also what makes the wrappers hard to decompose.  And if you try to use corn-based bio-degradable wrappers, exposure to moisture can make the wrapper protection degrade and be ineffective.  At KIND we keep looking for solutions that could enable us to use bio-degradable wrappers but have yet to find the answer (if anyone has any technology or ideas, please let me know).

Frito-Lay just announced that the outer layer of its Sun Chips will use compostable packaging.  That is nice, but what is really interesting is their commitment that within 1 year, they aim to also use compostable packaging for the bags’ interior.  If they really achieve it, that will be a remarkable step.

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There are some people in the world that you are just grateful for them being around.  Jeff Skoll is one of them.  He is the most unassuming, down-to-earth, self-effacing guy, and at the same time among the most accomplished, brilliant, strategic, successful and deeply committed to make this a better world.

I have been following him for a few years and wish we could clone him, or at least learn what in his upbringing made him into a person that is so truly committed to human betterment.  Is it Canadian education and society? Jewish family values? Parental role models? Genes? Childhood influences – positive or negative? Socio-cultural exposure?

In his TED talk, he mentions how his Father’s health challenges were a wake up call to him.  But there has to be more.

Anyway, Jeff has now created his next venture: the Urgent Threats Fund, designed to tackle the 5 greatest challenges facing humanity: Global Pandemics, Nuclear Proliferation, Mideast Conflict, Water Scarcity, and Climate Change.

The New York Times reports about it here.

Sally Osberg, President of the Skoll Foundation, shared a note with Skoll Social Entrepreneurs explaining:

I also write to let you know that we will announce today the launch of the Skoll Urgent Threats Fund, which will be led by our dear friend and an extraordinary human being, Larry Brilliant. Larry’s new role will be Senior Adviser to Jeff Skoll and President of the new organization, which Jeff will chair and on whose board both Larry and I will sit. This newest venture joins the portfolio of creations—including the Foundation, Capricorn, and Participant Media—that Jeff has founded to advance his vision of a more peaceful, prosperous and sustainable world. Together with the Foundation’s board and staff, I couldn’t be more excited about the opportunities ahead for us all!

You can learn more at the Skoll Foundation site.

Check out the below!

A while back I blogged about a hilarious controversy pitting two churches against each other – on the question whether Dogs go to heaven.  Each affirmed they did – or didn’t – in church signs.  I actually thought these were real – and I guess a few commentators did also.

Well, it turns out I was fooled by this ultra-cool website that can help you generate Church Signs!  http://www.churchsigngenerator.com/

How creative is that?!

Here is an article about a neat re-discovery of a "Miracle Fruit" that makes sour things sweet, and alters the taste buds to make things seem far sweeter.  It could have applications for cancer patients to regain appetite, for dieting, or just for fun.

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Often in life I am sure you wonder if you had met a person before. Have our lives crossed paths before a more recent episode? When was the first time we met? Where we together in a particular place – whether at school, or at a conference, or talk, or during our childhoods? Could you even rewind a part of your brain and see what you said to that person when you first met them? I daydreamed about a sci-fi future where the “grid” could keep all your information about every place you’ve been, and what your thoughts and experiences and interactions were like.

Then I realized that a lot of this could already be done rather easily NOW.

All you need is a GPS mapping device with a time-mapping database. Your iphone or blackberry could have an application that every 5 minutes or every hour or every day (depending on your preferred settings and subscription/storage capacity) could store your GPS location at that particular time.

Three or thirty years later, you could wonder openly with your date, or an employee or a colleague if you had met before, or where your lives had intersected before, and you’d just sync your databases to find the crossing points, if any, that exist. You could make some pieces private or public, open or closed. But you’d have the ability to trace back steps at important points, quite simply.

At a formative moment, you could even connect a blog journal or video entry to your geo-time-map.

This would not only be fun and functional, but also existentially transformative.

We always are “surprised” at how small this world is, and how enormous a coincidence it is that you find a friend in a far away random place.

In fact, I have always thought that the laws of numbers make these encounters quite probable, and most likely there are many more opportunities for interactions among people you know, whose paths you cross by milliseconds without knowing it. If you could look at your grid and compare it with a friend’s, or with all your universe of friends, how many amazing “coincidences” wouldn’t you find – when you opted to?

Perhaps Doppler or GoogleMaps or Facebook or a new web/business platform you have could take advantage of this idea.

Naif Al Mutawa is a dear friend who defines social entrepreneurship.  He is creating positive role models for young Muslims a la Hollywood. Like Marvel and Action Comics before him, Naif created a set of iconic super-heroes – but they each are Muslims who embody one powerful benevolent trait drawn from Islam’s 99 characteristics attributed to G’d.  One has extraordinary kindness.  The other exhibits exceptional creativity.  Beyond cartoons, they now just opened The 99 Entertainment Village!