FON

Friends of Nature has taken an interesting approach to conducting a survey on energy conservation habits among middle-class Chinese. They plan to involve no less than 100 different survey companies in the study, including a number of online survey websites. For example, they have published the same questionnaire on taidu8.com, 1diaocha.com, and zdiao.com.

The study is not limited to the internet, however, with an "offline" component to begin in August. The questionnaire itself is well designed, consisting of ten straightforward multiple-choice questions.

This is an interesting example of how a project can "scale" across multiple competing web services.

Chinese Environmental NGOs Online is a website offering a host of information about environmental NGOs in China, including an NGO directory (with full-text search, as well as indexes by area of work and province), news and events, job and volunteer announcements, and over 150 electronic documents (link in Chinese) for download.

Most content is in Chinese, although the NGO directory provides English names and contact details for the organizations listed.

The website was established in 2006 by China Development Brief, and began as purely a directory of Chinese environmental NGOs. News and announcements were added to the site the following year. Currently, the website is managed by Friends of Nature, in Beijing.

This month Friends of Nature launched the Beijing Cycle Map as part of their Low-Carbon Transport inititive. David Jiang, a representative from FON's technology partner Silk Road (link in Chinese), spoke with us about the project:

"The application allows users to draw their cycle route on an interactive map and add descriptive information such as text and pictures. Once the path is saved, other users are able click on the path and vote for its safety, noise level, air quality, scenery, and right-of-way for cyclists. Eventually, the application will evaluate all the roads in Beijing to identify those most suitable for cycling, and provide this information to the public. Besides drawing their cycle route, users can easily mark places of interest the map, such as bicycle parking areas, scenic spots, parks, dangerous places, pollution sites, etc."

The interface is mainly in Chinese, although streets and landmarks are labelled on the map in both Chinese and English. The application was developed using the Google Maps API.

According to the job description (link in Chinese), responsibilities will include maintaining and promoting the organization's websites, conducting a needs analysis of the websites, and working with the web developer to implement improvements.

(The same position was advertised two months ago, as reported by China Nonprofit Technology Blog).

Friends of Nature is a Beijing-based environmental organization, founded in 1994. It operates a website, www.fon.org.cn, as well as a blog, fonchina.blog.sohu.com.

According to the job description (link in Chinese), responsibilities will include maintaining and promoting the organization's websites, conducting a needs analysis of the websites, and working with the web developer to implement improvements.

Friends of Nature is a Beijing-based environmental organization, founded in 1994. It operates a website, www.fon.org.cn, as well as a blog, fonchina.blog.sohu.com.