Sony now Open for Planet Ideas
By Steve Mullins. Sony Europe has joined forces with global conservation organisation WWF to light the Open Planet Ideas online community which aims to ‘harness the ingenuity and open innovation out there to help tackle environmental challenges’.
The idea is to get members of the public trying to imagine how current Sony tech can be repurposed to address problems such as climate change, biodiversity and water conservation. Projects can be collaborative, with online participants building on each other’s ideas, then evaluating and voting on which concepts should be developed further. Those collaborating on the winning notions will have the opportunity to work with Sony engineers and WWF specialists.
People can draw their inspiration from the content hosted on Open Planet Ideas, which will serve to provide a snapshot of current environmental challenges based on info assembled by WWF. Sony gear can be used either individually or in radical new combinations.
This crowdsourced mash-up approach to re-using current technologies was demonstrated by Sony last year in the Forest Guard project, which got a group of young people using cameras, wireless networks and photo-stitching software to create an online community of citizen firewatchers.
“Sony is committed to help create a more sustainable environment for current and future generations,” says Emily Nicoll at Sony Europe. “This project will harness the ingenuity and creativity that exists across the globe to show the positive role technology can play in bringing about positive environmental change.”
