Mobilize.org: Empowering & energizing the millennial generation

1Mobilize.org promotes greater civic participation and political engagement among young people. The site’s organizers believe the millennial generation offers hope for social justice regardless of race, class, religion or partisan identification. Mobilize.org has hosted eight Democracy 2.0 Summits on financial literacy, money and politics, millennial veterans, the environment and unemployment — with an eye toward developing sustainable solutions to these challenges. Follow mob_org on Twitter.

Amazee: Powering social collaboration

2Amazee is a global, Zurich-based platform that enables social collaboration for individuals, nonprofits, organizations and businesses. You can start a group to promote a cause or idea, to find like-minded people and to raise funds. Follow Amazee on Twitter.

Wiser Earth: Connecting you to communities of action

3WiserEarth is a free online community space connecting people, nonprofits and businesses working toward a just and sustainable world. Communities include the Culture of Peace Initiaitve, the Story of Stuff Project and the Radical Inclusion group. Now that Ning will be charging for hosted communities, Wiser Earth is a good choice for nonprofits and cause organizations looking to create an instant social network. Follow Wiser Earth on Twitter. Also see: Zanby: Roll your own community.

Charity How To: Step-by-step tutorials

4Next to Socialbrite, we think Charity How To does one of the best jobs of teaching nonprofits how to take advantage of digital tools. It offers step by step video tutorials, webinars and lots more. Follow CharityHowTo on Twitter.

WeAreMedia: A wiki of resources for social good

5WeAreMedia, spearheaded by Beth Kanter, is a wiki that came out of a hands-on workshop sponsored by the Nonprofit Technology Network. The site provides pointers to slideshows, resources and how-tos, like these tips and tutorials about Twitter.

Also, don’t forget Social Actions, which connects you to the issues and causes you care about.

WordPress: Enabling citizen publishing

6WordPress.org, a self-hosted open source blogging platform, has become the software of choice for hundreds of thousands of blog publishers like Socialbrite or Syracuse’s University Lectures, while sites like Social Media Social Good use WordPress.com. You’ll want to take advantage of some of the thousands of free plug-ins that its global community of developers have created. Here’s our list of 10 WordPress plug-ins that rock, and here’s why we think WordPress is slicker than TypePad. Follow WordPress on Twitter.

OpenStreetMap: An open alternative to Google Maps

7OpenStreetMap is a free editable map of the nation and the world created by people like you. The service provides an open alternative to Google Maps by letting organizations embed maps and use geographical data in a collaborative way. Follow openstreetmap on Twitter.

BlogTalkRadio: Extend the reach of your nonprofit

8Want a keyturn solution for your nonprofit’s podcasting needs? BlogTalkRadio, the world’s largest social radio network, enables anyone to host an interactive audio broadcast and syndicate it with one click to Facebook, Twitter, iTunes and across the Web. See our full writeup. Follow BlogTalkRadio on Twitter.

Kodak Zi8: Capture life on the fly

9We do like Cisco System’s Flip hand recorders, but think the Kodak Zi8 is a bit better: Hi-def 1080i video recordings in a slick, easy-to-use gadget, now on sale for $130. So amazing it’s sick. Carry these around, interview interesting people you meet, capture authentic moments or newsworthy events, then upload the MPEG-4 or .MOV files to your favorite video hosting site. Follow Kodak on Twitter.

Spot.us & DocumentCloud: Collaborative journalism

10You want a powerful media creation tool? Head over to Spot.us, suggests Julie Crabill, founder of Inner Circle Labs. It’s an open source project designed to pioneer “community-powered reporting,” starting in the SF Bay Area and Los Angeles. Through Spot.us, nonprofits, NGOs and individuals can commission stories on important, often overlooked topics. Couple that with DocumentCloud, a site that will enhance investigative reporting by making source documents easy to find, share and read. DocumentCloud provides an online database of documents contributed by a consortium of news organizations, watchdog groups and bloggers, and shared with the public at large. Users will soon be able to search by topic, agency or location. Follow Spot.us or documentcloud on Twitter.