Zombies and Pinto Beans: A CrisisCamp Event Review
June 18, 2009 :: Joe LoongThis past weekend, I attended CrisisCamp, an unconference (where the attendees structure the event and agenda) with the goal of applying technology and technological principles to humanitarian and disaster relief and crisis preparation.
Map to CrisisCamp session rooms, which were named after various calamities.
The attendees came from a diverse range of public, private, and NGO entities, which is especially necessary because the topic is so all-encompassing and multifaceted. Not only are you talking about the whole range of disasters natural and non-natural, but you also have events where the precipitating action is over relatively quickly (tornado, earthquake) versus something more open-ended (pandemic flu).
And there’s the whole issue of working in the physical world, which can be challenging even when the infrastructure hasn’t been knocked out. Logistics is messy.
Now, I go to unconferences because they’re fun. I hope to be able to add my particular bits of insight and expertise, though in a context like CrisisCamp, it’s especially enlightening to be exposed to the viewpoints of people who have real world experience in managing things that I only have abstract notions of. I know it pushes me out of my comfort zone, and I can only hope that I can actually add something useful and not be a total git.
It’s especially interesting to be around technologists who have to noodle situations where the technology as we’re used to isn’t available, because the power is down, the telecom networks are overburdened or knocked out, and the tools that we take for granted are unavailable.
Another dose of reality came when we were reminded that transparency needs to be balanced with privacy, and just because it’s in a crisis context doesn’t change that. One particular example was privacy controls over survivor / evacuee lists, to protect battered spouses, a case that I know I hadn’t thought of, but which has come up in the real world.
One thing that was a little easier for me to wrap my head around was using social media tools to help raise awareness and improve personal disaster preparation before things actually hit the fan. Of course, here we run against inertia, and psychology — even if we have the means, disaster preparation makes us uncomfortable. And it has to be ongoing — 72-hour disaster kits need to be maintained, perishable supplies and medicines need to be restocked, contact information and plans need to be kept updated. It’s not something you can just set-and-forget.
Incidentally, this is where the pinto beans and zombies come into play. During one of the brainstorming sessions, someone suggested organizing a flash mob to make a run on disaster supplies (like bags of pinto beans) to help get attention and raise awareness. And zombies (and pirates, aliens and other monsters) made a recurring appearance, with the idea that while people may not like thinking about real world disasters, they don’t mind thinking about fictional disasters (note the various Zombie Preparedness Quizzes floating around), so why not figure out ways to leverage the fictional situations to help real-world preparations.
With any unconference, the challenge is to follow up all the great ideas into real world action. I, personally, am going to see what I can add to the idea of using games for education, simulation and preparation — there’s a gaming aspects initiative in the Crisis Commons wiki. There are also follow-on events planned, so if you’re interested in seeing what’s going on, check through the hashtag #crisiscamp, see what’s going on in the wiki and Ning group.
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