PovNet: Building an online anti-poverty community
PovNet provides online tools that facilitate communication, community and access to information around poverty-related issues in British Columbia and Canada. We work to collect relevant news and resources of use to advocates, community workers, marginalized communities and the general public.
You can learn about every aspect of the work PovNet does and view community feedback and photos in this slideshow presentation.
If you are interested in our history and what our community has to say about us, make sure you check out:
Penny Goldsmith on PovNet at the University of Waterloo, February 2014
Penny Goldsmith on PovNet at the University of Waterloo from PovNet Society on Vimeo.
A PovNet Timeline: A Selective History of Poverty, Anti-poverty Organizing and Technology in BC
On the Line and Online: Anti-poverty organizing then and now
A graphic story on how anti-poverty organizing has changed.
Every Tool Shapes The Task
A graphic story on PovNet and building online communities.
Every Tool Shapes the Task: Digital Story
A digital story based on the graphic story.
PovNet's Digital Story
A digital story which shows how different advocates and their communities are linked through PovNet and online organizing.
"It just seems it was so long ago that most advocates didn't have computers never mind internet access and would spend hours on the telephone to get information needed to help people. Sometimes it would take days to get the necessary information.
Although there were anti-poverty communities back then and provincial organizations such as End Legislated Poverty and federated anti-poverty groups of bc, dialogue and information sharing among individual advocates and activists was cumbersome. PovNet facilitated those connections, enriching what some would call a virtual community.
PovNet has become more than a virtual community, in my view it is flesh and bones with a real heart, it is organic and if the internet failed tomorrow, connections that have been made provincially and nation-wide would endure."
— Alayne Keough, former PovNet board member and long-time advocate
