Adam Curry

Behind the Mic

Adam Curry

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His first gig was on a Dutch in-hospital radio station, then as John Holden a motorcycle-riding African-American pirate-radio DJ. Most of us met Adam Curry as an early MTV host, but he actually got his start as a budding geek.

In this interview with IT Conversations' host Doug Kaye, you'll hear a very personal side of Adam's life: how he discovered the Internet and the web, registering the mtv.com domain, then being sued over it. He founded OnRamp, an early web-development company that grew through M&A to a $230 million public company. Adam has started many other ventures, not all successful. He's been to Iraq and even produced a reality-TV show about his own family.

Doug and Adam also discuss audio on the 'net. Here's your chance to hear the Behind the Mic side of the creator of iPodder and one of podcasting's leading evangelists.

Dave Winer

Behind the Mic

Dave Winer

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"Watch out for something that the users get better than the geeks," could be Dave Winer's mantra. Throughout his career, Dave has focused on making computers easier and more powerful for users.

Many of his creations are direct descendants of his early work with outliners that began a the University of Wisconsin. Dave took outliners to Personal Software, created a dual-view BBS in 1982, founded Living Videotext in 1983, released the MORE outliner for the Mac in 1986, merged with Symantec in 1987, then left a half year later to found Userland Software.

He has lent his hand to technologies and standards that have touched the lives of almost everyone online. They include OPML, XML-RPC, SOAP, RSS and podcasting in addition to his widely read blog, ScriptingNews.

Get to know one of the most influential personalities on the Internet from this interview with IT Conversations host/producer Doug Kaye.

Ourmedia.org

Marc Canter and JD Lasica, founders

Behind the Mic with Doug Kaye

Marc Canter and JD Lasica

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IT Conversations host Doug Kaye interviews Marc Canter and JD Lasica who have just launched Ourmedia.org. As JD wrote on his blog:

"Exactly nine months ago, Marc Canter and I met up at Supernova. I mentioned to him the idea I'd been kicking around with Brewster Kahle of the Internet Archive to create a grassroots media organization, site, and registry called Open Media.

"Turned out that Open Media was, ironically, a trademarked name. But Marc jumped at the chance to dive in as co-founder of this new entity -- he's been a multimedia pioneer for 15 years, and this is the culimination of what he's been striving toward all these years.

"Today, Ourmedia.org officially launched."

Philip Greenspun

Software Engineering

Philip Greenspun

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Philip Greenspun has had the same MIT email address since the age of 13, and he's had a profound yet subtle impact on many software developers. His 1999 book, Philip and Alex's Guide to Web Publishing, was an inspiration to many programmers writing server-side code on Unix/Linux platforms. It was one of the first to be published both as a free download and as a traditional book. (Filled with color photos, printed on high-quality coated stock, and weighing in at 3.5 pounds it was also the first computer coffee-table book.)

In this interview with IT Conversations' host Doug Kaye, Philip describes the evolution of his attitudes towards software engineering as manifested in Philip and Alex's Guide and his latest book, Software Engineering for Internet Applications, for a course at MIT where "the goal of the course is that the student finishes knowing how to build Amazon.com by him or herself." (That must be one heck of a semester!)

Oh, and by the way, Philip also built photo.net, which receives 10 million hits/day from 400,000 unique visitors each month, and co-founded and ran ArsDigita, a now-defunct website development shop using many of the tools Philip and his associates developed previously. You won't want to miss the story of how the venture capitalists to whom Philip relinquished control of this $20 million profitable company ran it into the ground. There are lessons there for any budding (or experienced) entrepreneur.

Bruce Schneier

founder & CTO, Counterpane

Beyond Fear

Bruce Schneier

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Host Doug Kaye says, "This is the one interview I hope everyone will hear."

In his lated book, Beyond Fear, security guru Bruce Schneier goes beyond cryptography and network security to challenge our post-9/11 national security practices. Here are some teasers:

• "We're seeing so much nonsense after 9/11, and so many people are saying things about security, about terrorism that just makes no sense."
• "Homeland security measures are an enormous waste of money."
• "If the goal of security is to protect against yesterday's attacks, we're really good at it."
• "The system didn't fail in the way the designers expected."
• "Attackers exploit the rarity of failures."
• "More people are killed every year by pigs than by sharks, which shows you how good we are at evaluating risk."
• "Did you ever wonder why tweezers were confiscated at security checkpoints, but matches and cigarette lighters--actual combustible materials--were not?...If the tweezers lobby had more power, I'm sure they would have been allowed on board as well."
• "When the U.S. Government says that security against terrorism is worth curtailing individual civil liberties, it's because the cost of that decision is not borne by those making it."
• "...people make bad security trade-offs when they're scared."

Read or listen to this terrific interview in which Bruce also says what he thinks of the 9/11 hearings and answers questions from listeners regarding spam and biometrics. This is one of our best.

Doc Searls

senior editor, Linux Journal

DIY-IT

Doc Searls

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Okay, so he's not really a doctor and doesn't even play one on TV, but Doc Searls has become one of the most-read blogger/journalists on the 'Net. He co-founded a successful ad agency during the dot-com boom only to discover that he hated advertising and marketing. He then teamed up with David Weinberger, Chris Locke and Rick Levine to co-author the classic, The Cluetrain Manifesto and then played the speakers' circuit until 9/11 shut that down.

In this conversation with host/producer Doug Kaye, Doc explains the vision he's been speaking and writing about since early 2003: do-it-yourself IT (DIY-IT). He suggests that we view the construction industry and its vendors as a model for commodity component-based application development. He says this is a "corner of the market you're not going to see when you look at vendor sports, the supply side...Really powerful things happen when the demand side starts to supply itself."

Doug and Doc explore the DIY-IT opportunity and the shift in the supply/demand ratio. Is it just due to the changes in our economy -- it's easier than it used to be to hire good people -- or has there been a permanent shift in power from vendors to customers? Open-source software is an enabler of DIY-IT, but they're not one and the same. (Unix/Linux is just a body of practices and methodologies, Doc says.) And DIY-IT isn't an open-source-only world. Doc sees roles for Microsoft and others if they get onto the bandwagon and deliver the building materials DIY'ers need.

His presentations are everywhere online, but this is a great opportunity to hear a full-length interview with Doc Searls.

Doc's many roles include:

• Senior editor for Linux Journal, the original (and still the leading) Linux publication.
• Proprietor of Doc Searls' IT Garage, a new group journal launched by Linux Journal's publisher, SSC.
• One of the four authors of The Cluetrain Manifesto, the iconoclastic web site that became the best-selling book.
• A talking source on The Linux Show, CNET Radio, ZDTV, CNBC, KOMO-TV, KING-TV, and ZDTV and whoever else wants to risk dispersing his opinions.
• A marketing, PR and advertising veteran. Most notably he co-founded Hodskins Simone and Searls, one of Silicon Valley's top advertising and public relations agencies. (HS&S was absorbed by Publicis Technology in early 1998.
• A lifelong writer whose byline has appeared in OMNI, Wired, PC Magazine, The Standard, The Sun, Upside, The Globe & Mail and lots of other places, including (of course) Linux Journal. Many of the older pieces are collected at Reality 2.0, which is at his personal portal, Searls.com, which is also home to his consultancy, The Searls Group.
• A frequent speaker on any and all the above subjects.
• On the advisory boards of Jabber, Inc., Ping Identity Corp. and Technorati. He holds stock in the first two of those three.

Paul Graham

Hackers and Painters

Paul Graham

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Unlike architects (who figure out what to build) and engineers (who figure out how), great hackers and painters do both. Who makes a good hacker and how can you identify a good hacker/programmer in a job interview? Why is empathy an important skill for programmers? As a hacker who also studied painting in Europe, Paul may be uniquely qualified to write a book entitled Hackers and Painters. If you leave your day programming job only to get home and write more code, this is a great book for you.

Speaking with IT Conversations host Doug Kaye, Paul explains some of issues explored in his new book including Why Nerds Are Unpopular--Paul gets email from all over the world about this essay--and Good Bad Attitude--Is there such a thing as a hacker ethic?

In 1995, working with Robert Morris, Paul built what was arguably the first major web-based application, Viaweb, which was acquired by Yahoo in 1998 and became Yahoo Stores. Regarding the stressfullness of those days, Paul wrote, "I remember sitting back in the dentist's chair, waiting for the drill, and feeling like I was on vacation."

And you won't want to miss Paul's comments on Java, which he says, like Cobol ("a Neanderthal language"), is an evolutionary dead end.

Paul Graham is currently working on a new programming language called Arc. In 1995 he developed with Robert Morris the first web-based application, Viaweb, which was acquired by Yahoo in 1998. In 2002 he described a simple but effective Bayesian spam filter that inspired most current filters.

Paul is the author of On Lisp (Prentice Hall, 1993), ANSI Common Lisp (Prentice Hall, 1995), and Hackers & Painters (O'Reilly, 2004). He has an AB from Cornell and a PhD in Computer Science from Harvard, and studied painting at RISD and the Accademia di Belle Arti in Florence.

Joel Spolsky

founder, Fog Creek Software

Joel on Software

Joel Spolsky

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IT Conversations' producer Doug Kaye interviews the author of Joel on Software, an online column initially inspired by Philip Greenspun and Dave Winer and now read by thousands of programmers and managers. To call him a former paratrooper would be accurate but misleading. He served in the Israeli army and co-founded a kibbutz, but he didn't jump out of airplanes, he was pushed.

Joel and his family bought the first IBM PC in Israel, and when he moved back to the U.S. and completed college, he went to work on Microsoft's Excel development team, still a strong influence on his opinions on software development.

Doug and Joel discuss extreme programming of which Joel has often been a critic. He makes his case for the importance of formal testing, particularly on large projects, and explains why, "customers don't know what they want." The Joel Test was one of his most-read essays. It's what job applicants should ask at the end of the interview to evaluate prospective employers.

And Joel has plenty to say about Microsoft: the impact of the cast-in-stone file formats for Word and Excel, the split between the so-called Raymond Chen and MSDN Magazine camps, why some developers may not move to Avalon/XAML/WinFX, and what will happen to Win32.

An entertaining oportunity to get to know one of today's most influential developer/authors.

Doug Kaye

Founder, IT Conversations

Tech Nation

Fearless Leader

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Dr. Moira Gunn interviews the founder, Executive Producer and Fearless Leader of IT Conversations, Doug Kaye. They talk about the history of IT Conversations and this new phenomenon of Podcasting.

Ron Gula

president and CTO, Tenable

Frontline Security

Ron Gula and Sondra Schneider

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As more reports surface of the theft of personal information, network security has become a topic that affects everyone, not just the IT departments of banks and governments. IT security is quickly becoming a field we all need to understand.

In this interview, Sondra Schneider of Security University speaks with Ron Gula, President and Chief Technical Officer of Tenable Security. Sondra and Ron discuss the convergence of security services and security products in large vulnerable enterprises, the history of network security and other hot topics in IT security.

This discussion highlight's Ron's insights into the technology security world. He talks about honeypots, network security and identity theft, and discusses issues like the tension between privacy and convenience. He also talks about "armchair security" and how we can identify full time security. This discussion includes topics for businesses large and small, as well an anyone concerned about security.

Devin Akin

CTO, Planet 3 Wireless

Wireless Security

Devin Akin

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Sondra Schneider, the host of Frontline Security, speaks with Devin Akin about wireless security.

In 2001, Peter Shipley and Matt Peterson moved around San Francisco with a WiFi-enabled laptop for a week with a program which detected unsecure wireless networks. The results of their study were shocking. They concluded that more than 80% of the wireless networks were not secured. In 2005, another study estimated that this number had grown to nearly 90%. With the adoption of wireless technology rising rapidly, security is likely to become a significant bottleneck while deploying enterprise wireless networks.

The 802.11i specification for wireless security is pretty good as it provides for better authentication and better encryption with AES (which is considered to be unbreakable at this point). Wireless IDS (Intrusion Detection Systems) have grown better over the last few years with capabilities like rogue device detection and device classification. While there is currently no metric for measuring wireless security, it is wise to follow industry-standard best practices, have a security checklist and do baseline and penetration testing periodically.

It is also important for wireless security professionals to update their knowledge regularly, get certifications on related technologies and practice real-life scenarios before actually doing any enterprise-level wireless infrastructure deployment.

Joe Whitley

Alston & Bird

Frontline Security

Joe Whitely

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How can the U.S.A. protect private data and improve security without blocking progress or harming the economy? As the first General Counsel to the Department of Homeland Security, a position he held for two years, Joe Whitely has valuable answers to these questions. In this interview with Sondra Schneider he discusses the pending legislation presently before Congress and the cybersecurity elements of the 2001 Patriot Act. Whitely also considers the differences between security and privacy, the issues facing commercial and infrastructural organizations, and the fallout from the penetration of the Atlanta-based ChoicePoint company. Although the focus here is on the U.S.A. the issues discussed will affect all nations.

Andrew Zolli

Z+ Partners

Globeshakers with Tim Zak

Andrew Zolli

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The guest of our Globeshakers debut is Andrew Zolli. A forecaster, design strategist and author, Andrew is working at the intersection of culture, creativity, technology, and futures research. Andrew specializes in helping people and institutions see, understand and act upon complex change. He runs Z+ Partners, a research, foresight and design thinktank.

For several years, Andrew has been chief curator for Pop!Tech, an annual conference taking place in Camden, Maine.

Tim spoke with Andrew about some of the grand challenges facing the globe, including mass urbanization, increased longevity in industrialized societies combined with a baby boom in the developing world.

They discuss emerging technologies that may offer solutions: new open source models for financial systems in Bangladesh and Brazil; the rise of the knowledge economy; and, the outsourcing of manufacturing--not to China, but to robots!

He also profiled some of the fascinating speakers at Pop!Tech 2005, including:

• Neil Gershenfeld Director of MIT's Center for Bits and Atoms, who is developing a personal desktop 3-D printer of physical objects;
• Bunker Roy, Founder and Director, Barefoot College;
• Jessie Sullivan, a former worker at a power company who lost his arms in an accident who is now the world's first bionic man.

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Andrew Zolli is a futures researcher who analyzes critical trends at the intersection of culture, technology, and global society. His firm, Z + Partners, helps a select number of global companies and institutions see, understand and respond to complex change.

Andrew serves as Futurist-in-Residence at both Popular Science and American Demographics magazines, as well as Public Radio's Marketplace. He is also the Curator of the annual Pop!Tech conference, an elite annual gathering of thought leaders which explores the social impact of technology and the shape of things to come.

Andrew was recently named one of the Emerging Explorers of the National Geographic Society. He is also a network member of the Global Business Network, and serves as a Visiting Fellow of the Woodrow Wilson Foundation. In early 2005 he was named to Fast Company's Fast 50, the magazine's annual compilation of emerging business leaders.

In 2002, Andrew compiled and edited the Catalog of Tomorrow, which explores 100 trend and technologies for the next 25 years. Andrew's work, writings and ideas have appeared in a wide array of media outlets, including PBS, National Public Radio, The New York Times, Wired, BusinessWeek, ID, Fast Company, The History Channel and many others.

Resources:

• View mindmap for an overview of the topics covered in this interview.
• Download PDF version here.

This program is from the Globeshakers series.

For Team ITC:

• Series producer and editor: Peter Durand
• Post-production audio engineering: Stuart Hunter

David Bornstein

Globeshakers

David Bornstein

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In his book How to Change the World: Social Entrepreneurs and the Power of New Ideas, author David Bornstein profiles several social entrepreneurs from around the world.

After extensive travels in Bangladesh, India, Brazil, North America and Eastern Europe, David Bornstein has emerged as a leading expert in the global rise of "social entrepreneurism." In this program, host Tim Zak asks how we would even know a social entrepreneur if we saw one on the street. More important, why should we care? Who invests in social enterprise and what is at stake for our world if we don't?

Bornstein draws parallels between the characteristics and styles of both the business entrepreneur and the social entrepreneur, while itemizing the qualitative differences. What types of investors will have the 20-year vision and the patience to see "social return on investment?" What are the vast entrepreneurial opportunities that emerge in the wake of disaster?

In light of the successes and failures of recovery efforts after hurricane Katrina and the tsunami, Bornstein calls for a change in the operating principles of traditional structures, such as government services and foundations. These changes include more transparency, easier communications, better performance metrics, and more accurate assessments of what the impact of those organizations have on us -- as individuals, as families, and as communities.

The author describes a compelling near-term future: "Far-thinking business people, who recognize that in order to have businesses that are going to continue to be successful twenty years from now, we can't have a generation of children grow up illiterate; we can't completely muck up the environment; we can't continue to have millions and millions of people who are unhealthy, living without health insurance, and so forth; we can't continue to have this kind of inequality that leads to a disillusion of the social fabric."

Ethan Zuckerman

Berkman Center for Internet and Society

Globeshakers with Tim Zak

Ethan Zuckerman

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Host Tim Zak discusses these topics and more with Ethan Zuckerman, a fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School, who takes on the direct question: "Why should we care about Africa?"

As a technologist, Ethan has spent much time on the ground working with the new generation of African entrepreneurs, programmers, organizers and young people who are hooking up the countinent to the web. These new netizens are changing the way that villagers and urban dwellers learn, organize, network and face the challenges of poverty, AIDS, political strife and making a living.

Natural catastrophes and their recovery efforts have overtaxed national and global organizations. In the void, Ethan Zuckerman sees networks of concerned private citizens self-organizing on the ground and on-line. As the patterns for collaboration form from the bottom-up, Ethan sees new possibilities in the application of IT to disaster recovery; these flexible models can also be replicated and evolved to address larger, more complex social dilemmas.

Ethan was intimately involved in leading some very interesting efforts combining online communities who used pretty simple technologies to address Hurricane Katrina and the disaster, namely the People Finders Project.

"What a lot of us are discovering in this open source and distributive-effort world," observes Zuckerman, "is that one of the most critical things one can do is hand off projects correctly."

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IT Conversations' publication of this program is underwritten by your donations and:

As one of the core team members at Tripod in the 1990s, Ethan Zuckerman was at the center of a web-based communitity, that served as an early development lab for the blognation phenomenon.

Currently, his main affiliation is with the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School. In a former life, he also lead a cadre of self-proclaimed geeks into the colorful chaos of West Africa, through Geekcorps. The organization transfers skills to the Third World, or -- in the words of Jim Moore -- the second superpower.

Geekcorps' early business model was very simple: (1) Geeks beget geeks; (2) Africa needs geeks; (3) Give a geeks money to go to Africa.

His blog is even titled, My Heart's in Accra.

One project in this area is BlogAfrica, a project to help Africans learn about weblogs and to aggregate content from African weblogs. Ethan also works with anonymous blogservers for use by people in the human rights community, allowing human rights workers to blog about situations in their countries without compromising their security.

Resources:

Ethan's blog - My Heart's in Accra
• BlogAfrica
• Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School
• Ethan speaking at Pop!Tech 2004

This program is from the Globeshakers series.

For Team ITC:

• Series Producer and Editor: Peter Durand
• Production support: Leah Silverman
• Post-production audio engineer: George Hawthorne

Darrell Hammond

KaBoom!

Globeshakers with Tim Zak

Darrell Hammond

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Too many kids are missing out on one of the most important childhood experiences. A childhood experience that can help kids grow up healthy, happy and successful. An experience chock full of creativity, exploration, imagination, physical activity, friendship and adventure. The experience is play.

Host Tim Zak speaks with Darrell Hammond, founder of KaBOOM!, who envisions a great place to play within walking distance of every child in America. Darrell gives a “State of the Union of Play” address regarding play in America, why it matters for the health of our children, and what it means for the future of the American workforce.

Since 1995, KaBOOM! has used its innovative community-build model to bring together business and community interests to construct more than 850 new playgrounds and skateparks and renovate 1,300 others nationwide.

Play is a crucial factor in the overall well-being of children. It affects the level of quality of life they will enjoy. Yet, play in many communities, schools, and families has been pushed to the back-burner. Unstructured (i.e. free, unplanned, unrestricted, spontaneous, self-motivated) play is on the decline, and so are the benefits and good habits that go with it. Fewer kids spend time every day at a park or playground, recess is disappearing from curriculums, and playgrounds are missing from community and neighborhood development plans.

There is a nationwide scarcity of play and we are beginning to see a stark difference between children who play and children who don't.

Some statistics:

• Less than half of American children have a playground within walking distance of their homes;
• Sixty-one percent of Americans say simple lack of access to a playground is a barrier to their children playing on one;
• One in three people feel there are not enough playgrounds in their community to serve the number of children who live there;
• One in four Americans say the location of the nearest playground was an important factor in their decision to choose where they currently live;
• Only one in two households believe the nearest playground is in very good condition and is well-maintained;
• Two of three surveyed agree that using a playground is a deterrent to watching television.

Don Gould

Ceramicist and Industrial Designer

Pure Water 4 All

Don Gould

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When people ask Don Gould how he knows that his product works, he answers: "Because babies stop dying." As part of a social enterprise consortium, Gould, who is both a product designer and ceramicist, helped to design and deploy simple, effective water filtration devices to the developing world. He talks with host Tim Zak about both the traditional production techniques and the new economy models for collaboration. Together, they deliver simple, life-saving solutions that are as robust as they are elegant.

Don Gould of Pure Water 4 All describes the design his consortium has developed to alleviate some of these issues.

These water filters can be used anywhere in the world, including domestic communities that have available clean water disrupted by natural disasters, war or other causes. Surprisingly, several communities in the US are afflicted by water borne disease at almost the level of third world countries.

Don's open source, for-profit process to design and deliver the filters directly to those populations most at risk is a model for any group hoping to bring technology to the developing world.

So, why is water such a problem?

Approximately 76% of earth is water, yet only 2.5% is fresh, and of that over 99% of fresh water is inaccessible (polar ice, etc.) Thus leaves only 0.3% of earth's water available for all living creatures to share. The Great Lakes in the United States contain almost 20% of all the fresh water on earth.And those resources are shrinking.

Why not turn ocean water into fresh water? Current desalinization projects to turn salt water into fresh water are expensive, cause environmental damage and can only benefit nearby populations that have delivery systems in place.

Over 1.1 billion people do not have access to safe drinking water (65% in Asia, 27% in Africa). Many have to devote several hours every day to retrieving water and water borne pathogens kill more children that any other cause, making unclean water the biggest threat to world health.

The 250 major watersheds worldwide cross political boundaries of at least two nations. Gould echoes the warning of many economists and scientists: The wars of the 21st century will be fought over water, not oil.

Alex Lindsay

Chief Architect, PixelCorps

The Next Generation of Digital Craftsman

Alex Lindsay

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Over 500 Years ago, craftsmen rarely worked for a company. They were contracted for a period time and then moved on to the next contract. To remain competitive in such an atmosphere, many formed “guilds” or organizations designed to provide networking, ongoing training, standards, certification, and even some social services among their members. Kings did not post jobs in the classifieds to find craftsmen, they contacted guilds who did not compel the employers to hire their members but simply were the only ones who could produce the work.

As “Chief Architect” of PixelCorps, Alex Lindsay merges the very old idea of a guild system made up of independent craftsman with the demands of mastering new and emerging media. PixelCorps serves as a guild for the next generation of craftsmen--digital craftsmen.

They are currently transfering skills in digital imaging and animation to regions in the developing world, so that those citizens may capitalize on the coming media revolution.

In order to survive as a craftsman in this new mediascape, PixelCorps believes companies and individuals must be able to solve the following challenges: inexpensive and on-going training, standardization, access to resources, true production experience and networking with other practitioners.

Globeshakers host Tim Zak talks to Alex about the PixelCorps goals and challenges. Tim wanted to know whether the model can broaden into other areas of technology (ex. medicine, infomatics, engineering, robotics)?

Tim asks: "As someone from the for-profit world of broadcast media, what changes did you have to make as a social entrepreneur?"

Alex shares his experience in working with corporate partners such as Apple, Adobe and others from the film and broadcast world. As the founder of a social-purpose company, he ends the conversation with advice to others who may have an equally audacious vision.

"For me, why bother doing anything else? When you're out there to make a difference for a lot of people--a profound difference--oftentimes many things pop up to help you move further down that path."

Zach Warren

Afghan Mobile Mini Circus for Children

Laughter in a Time of War

Zach Warren

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In the Fall of 2005, Zach Warren set the World’s Record for running the Philadelphia marathon--while juggling!

In 2006, he is gunning to set another world’s record for the fastest 100 miles on a unicycle, a record that has stood for almost 20 years. In the summer of 2005, Warren, a native of West Virginia, traveled to Afghanistan to work with children as part of the Afghan Mobile Mini Circus for Children. All this while a student (and "laugh researcher") at Harvard Divinity School.

In this second installment in his series on Play, Globeshakers host Tim Zak asks this World Record holder to describe what gives him the inspiration to pursue these feats of extreme endurance. What role does “play” have in the health of the planet? And ultimately, what has he learned about what it takes to re-build an entire country? "One of the first casualties of war" says Zach Warren, "is imagination."

In one of the most war torn regions in the world, the Afghan Mini Mobile Children's Circus (MMCC) serves as a child protection program to help Afghan children recover from the traumas of war. The MMCC, a Danish-registered NGO, is run by native Afghans. It helps children to be more self-directed in creating their own dreams for the future through theatre and the arts. So, what is the role of the jester in a time of extreme danger?

“If we’re really serious about building a democracy in this country," says Warren "then we need to protect their imagination. This is the seed of entrepreneurship.”