TechRocks

TechRocks (now defunct)

Their mission statement noted that: "TechRocks accelerates social and political progress by building technological capacity for community collaboration and citizen engagement. TechRocks encourages and enables foundations, advocacy groups, and leading activists to use technology to achieve their mission goals, to increase participation from interested constituencies, and achieve change more quickly than by traditional organizing and advocacy methods alone."


 * Former Chief Operating Officer - Peter Crosby

History
"TechRocks was formed on January 1, 1999 from the merged operations of the Rockefeller Technology Project and Desktop Assistance. Both organizations had been long-time leaders in the nonprofit technical assistance provider community.

"The Rockefeller Technology Project was founded as a project of the Rockefeller Family Fund (RFF) in 1996 as a technology assistance program for its grantees, and as a foundation education program, helping foundations understand the value of technology for their grantees. Rob Stuart, the organization's founder, was one of the original Circuit Riders, working with nonprofits across the country to improve their use of technology for advocacy purposes. The organization grew to serve more than just RFF's grantees, and by 1998 it was funded largely by outside foundations.

"Marshall Mayer founded Desktop Assistance in 1990 to research cutting-edge information and communications technologies and adopt them for use by nonprofit organizations. One of Desktop Assistance's lasting legacies is ebase®, a relationship management database tool designed for nonprofit groups. The Rockefeller Technology Project and Desktop Assistance focused on building the human and technical capacity of social change organizations to succeed by using new tools.

"The two organizations merged into the Technology Project in 1999 as a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization and changed the name to TechRocks in 2000. TechRocks became a supporting organization to the Rockefeller Family Fund that same year.

"Chief Executive Office, Marshall Mayer with Peter S. Crosby as Chief Operations Officer, direct TechRocks."

Directors (2003)
Accessed October 2008:

Executive Committee
 * Donald K. Ross, Chair
 * Ryan Phelan, Vice-Chair
 * Lee Wasserman, Secretary / Treasurer

Board Members
 * Paul Growald
 * Jay R. Halfon
 * Jeff Hallett
 * Peter O'Neil
 * Ryan Phelan
 * Julie Robbins
 * Richard Rockefeller
 * Stuart Rockefeller
 * Donald K. Ross
 * Lee Wasserman

Contact

 * Web: www.techrocks.org