In March 2003 the Southern African NGO Network (SANGONeT) launched Thetha – the SANGONeT ICT Discussion Forum. The forums focus specifically on the ICT challenges facing the CSO sector, highlighting and promoting practical benefits, opportunities and lessons learned to date. Given the success and positive feedback received in response to previous Thetha forums, SANGONeT co-hosted its fourth provincial Thetha in the Northern Cape Province and the fifth forum in the Free State province.

‘Citizens Online’ (Cidadania na Internet), a Brazilian civil society information-sharing portal, celebrated one-year online on March 27. A multi-institution project managed by APC member in Brazil, RITS, ‘Citizens online’ started out life with twenty organisations on board. One year later, sixty people and groups work together daily to produce information to strengthen Brazilian citizenship in all its facets.

APC is delighted to announce that BlueLink’s project “Regional Environmental Content Sharing in the South Eastern European (SEE) Region” has made it to the final of the Stockholm Challenge Awards for pioneering IT projects worldwide. The platform designed for non-profit users became one of the nine finalists of the “Environment” category selected from over 900 applicants for the annual awards. Another APC member StrawberryNet is a partner in the successful project which is based on a content exchange replication process developed by APC and made possible using APC’s free software, the APC ActionApps.

See the finalists.

On October 19th, APC member in Rosario, Argentina celebrated the first anniversary of the launch of their community information portal Enredando. "Enredando" means "I’m part of a network" as well as "weaving a web". In addition, TAU has recently been honoured by their city government – their networking and ICT activities have been declared ‘of municipal interest’ in an official decree. APCNews covered Enredando’s launch last year and we spoke to coordinator, Luis “Pipo” Martinez about how Enredando has evolved since 2002.

At the beginning of October, Econnect launched a long-awaited internet project called "Kormidlo" – a directory-type comprehensive information source on the civic society sector, how it works, activities and topics of interest.