IBM's Call for Code Invites Developers to Create Natural Disasters Mitigation Apps

Key Take-Aways:

• IBM Call for Code invites developers to create new applications for preventing, responding to, and recovering from the chaos caused by natural disasters.
• For example, developers might create an application that alerts pharmacies to increase their stocks of antibiotics, insulin, bottled water, and vaccines based on predicted weather-related disruptions or use visual recognition to assess the impact of a seismic event or speed claims processing to reduce the time required for recovery and reconstruction.
• With 2017 as one of the worst years on record for catastrophic events -- fires, floods, earthquakes and storms -- the capacity and capability of traditional methods of response have been stretched. The United Nations has been searching for innovative ways to build resilience into the global response to these threats, while the international network of the American Red Cross brings heroic support on the ground to provide relief to disaster victims.
• Through the Call for Code, IBM and David Clark Cause are supporting the UN Human Rights Office’s human rights-based approach to humanitarian action, which focuses on securing the participation of affected groups in preparedness, response and recovery efforts. It brings attention to the most excluded and marginalized populations and those who are at risk of having their human rights violated.
• To raise awareness and interest in the Call for Code challenge, IBM is coordinating interactive educational events, hackathons and community support for developers around the world in more than 50 cities, including Amsterdam, Bengaluru, Berlin, Delhi, Dubai, London, New York, San Francisco, Sao Paulo and Tel Aviv. Additional details and a full schedule of in-person and virtual events is available at: developer.ibm.com/callforcode

Spokeperson :

• Ginni Rometty, IBM Chairman, CEO and President said IBM strives to benefit humanity through the power of technology.
• Laurent Sauveur, Head of External Relations of the UN Human Rights Office said technology can help to advance human rights and build more equitable societies.
• David Clark and Jim Zemlin, Executive Director of the Linux Foundation said Call for Code is a good opportunity for inspiring app developers to tackle the world's most pressing pressing natural disaster challenges.

Offerings:

How To Join the Call for Code

• Developers can register today at Callforcode.org as individuals and submit an application later as part of a team of up to five members. IBM will provide training and enablement at developer.ibm.com/callforcode to help developers get started.
• Projects can be submitted between June 18, 2018 and August 31, 2018.
• Thirty semi-finalists will be selected in September. A prominent jury including some of the most iconic technologists in the world will choose the winning solution from three finalists.
• The winner will be announced in October 2018 during a live-streamed concert and award event coordinated by David Clark Cause.
• Call for Code participants will use IBM Cloud, Data, Watson, Blockchain and IoT technologies, along with open source IBM Code Patterns – curated reusable packages of documentation, architecture diagrams, process flows, and access to underlying code on GitHub -- to innovate and build their submissions.

References:

IBM Leads ‘Call for Code’ Global Initiative to Better Prepare for Natural Disasters