WebProNews

Pretty much any public discussion or conference held by Google is worth noting.  A recent one, held at the company's D.C. office, seemed even more important than usual; it involved "more than 80 technology decisionmakers from international development non-profits."

 Bob Boorstin - Director Of Policy Communications

We don't mean to imply that some groundbreaking technology was unveiled.  No partnerships or personnel changes were announced, either.  But in terms of "real world" applications, the get-together was significant.

On the Official Google Blog, Sonal Shah and Bob Boorstin wrote, "A representative from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum discussed how the Museum created a Darfur layer on Google Earth that gives 'publicly accessible evidence of destruction to help visually refute claims of minimal collateral damage from war.'"

Also, "The YouTube breakout session explored how cheap video cameras paired with an on-the-ground presence can help document and spread awareness of ongoing crises abroad.  Participants even made their own videos to talk about how the Internet is changing the development world."

Google and Google.org seem interested in holding more meetings like this in the future.  Non-profits with a presence in the D.C. area would do well to give the idea a nudge and get their name into the mix.