Social Innovation Camp has opened its call for ideas!

The next SI Camp will be in Scotland June 19th-21st.

Over one weekend at the Saltire Centre, Glasgow we're bringing together some of the best of the UK's software developers and designers with those at the sharp end of social problems.  Their mission will be to turn six back-of-the-envelope ideas that could change the world into social start-ups - complete with working software. And all in under 48 hours.

The six winning entries
There were an amazing 133 ideas submitted to come to Social Innovation Camp June 09.

The judges gathered to deliver their verdict and the results are in!

Citipedia

Google maps meets Sim City. Citipedia is an online public town planning tool: Derelict sites earmarked for development will be highlighted and made open to the public to suggest how they could be developed or to review proposed developments.

Community Investors Club

This idea helps people to form clubs to invest regular sums in small and micro-businesses in their own community. The judges thought this was hugely topical in the current recession and suggested that, rather than investment, it might focus on loans. Loans would be legally less complex than investment and there are already similar models to learn from - it's a kind of hyper-local Zopa or Kiva. It's also drawing on old ideas which provide an alternative to banking, such as credit unions. Community Investors Club was originally a closed submission, but it's now up our site with all the others here.

Ex-Changing Places

A user-generated map of all public loos - complete with data about how accessible they are - and a way for individuals (or perhaps companies, shops and restaurants) to make their toilets available and accessible to anyone. The judges felt this identified a really important need. There have been a number of offline campaigns in recent years for better public toilets - especially those that are accessible. Scope ran a ‘Free to pee' campaign in 2004, the British Toilet Association exists to campaign for better public loos and now Changing Places is pushing for better facilities for those with profound and multiple learning disabilities. However, there's currently no searchable map of public loos in the UK. There is a great example from Australia, but nothing similar exists here. The Social Innovation Camp judges wanted to see the Ex-Changing Places address this need.

Fix the Freakin Buses

The very simple idea behind this is to put all the bus timetable data into a searchable, accessible form and plot it on a map. It got the judges excited, however, because they saw its potential as a campaigning tool to highlight the places where's a real demand for transport but no provision - a particular problem in rural areas. So the next stage of Fix the Freakin Buses might be to get users uploading the journeys they make but are poorly served by existing transport links to surface demand for new routes. Finally, the idea could incorporate ways for people to solve the transport problem themselves through using tools like Liftshare.

MyPoliceService

We've sneakily changed the name of this one to explain the idea a little better - hopefully you can come up with an improved version at the Camp! It was originally entered as ‘My Public Service‘, but the idea is to create a feedback tool for the police service. The judges thought this had the potential to do what Patient Opinion is doing in the NHS for the police. And there's an American version already called RateMyCop.com.

Social Chain Gangs

Flash-mobbing with a purpose. This tools aims to get a bunch of people together to get something done, whether it's cleaning up a local park, helping your neighbours move in, a quick spot of gardening - fast.

Now all we need is the people who'd like to help.

If you fancy having a go at building any of these six ideas - whether you're a coder, a designer or you now about the need - you can sign up here. And you can find out more about how the weekend works here.

But be warned: places are limited. Please don't be disappointed if we can't fit you in this time around.

 Visit: www.sicamp.org for more details.