ifPeople Newsletter (aqui en Español)
May 2004 (Vol. 1, No. 2)

Thanks for subscribing to the ifPeople Newsletter! We bring you news and useful information each month about sustainability, systems thinking, and technology. If you missed April's newsletter, you can now find it in the newsletter archives on our Web site. As always, we welcome your comments and suggestions, and feel free to distribute this bulletin to your colleagues or invite them to sign up on our Web site: www.ifpeople.net.

Best wishes,
Chris Johnson and Tirza Hollenhorst
ifPeople Co-founders

ifPeople Workshop in Atlanta on Business Sustainability
"The Business Case for Sustainability" is an interactive workshop that will show how business can, and does, benefit from improving social and environmental impacts. The workshop, organized by ifPeople, will focus on case studies, strategies, and benefits generated by businesses. We look forward to seeing you on May 26, 2004 from 9am - 12pm at Southface (Atlanta, GA). For more info and to RSVP.

ResponsibleIT in Spanish
ResponsibleIT is a set of guidelines to help combine the performance and efficiency benefits of technology with socially responsible and environmentally sustainable practices. ifPeople has built the Guidelines for ResponsibleIT on best practices, industry research, and the extension of social responsibility to business processes that often fail to incorporate such practices. Now the guidelines are available in Spanish. To access the guide in English, or  Spanish.

Planetwork conference
A multidisciplinary community of social change agents and technologists will be gathering here to explore how social networks, information technologies and the Internet can play a key role in the 2004 election and social change. The program includes well-known speakers (from Ben Cohen to political organizers) and also features an innovative “InterActive” program to foster communities of practice. For more information.

Case Study: ifPeople Internet marketing strategies deliver results
If you put information on a Web site, the intended audience will come, right? There are billions of Web pages vying for search engine hits and other barriers to delivering your content to the intended public. So what do you do if you have something really special? In a new case study, ifPeople's ResponsibleIT team shows how the marketing strategies we developed and deployed created real results. The case example is a guide for small businesses to improve their environmental impact produced by ifPeople together with GreenBiz.com. To read the case study.

Web Sites: Study reveals overwhelming rate of inaccessibility
An investigation by the Disability Rights Commission reveals that more than 80% of Web sites are unusable by disabled people. The study shows that the Internet has become difficult or impossible for impaired users to access not because of technology shortcomings, but because of poor design and site construction. Moreover, the most common problems are likely to affect all users, not just those with disabilities. For more information and suggestions for site accessibility.

For information on ifPeople's accessible and usable Web site services.

Business Case: A new research report
High performing businesses show a strong correlation between CSR (corporate social responsibility) activities and stronger performance in terms of productivity and profitability than other businesses, according to the analysis conducted by The Work Foundation and The Virtuous Circle. The report, "Achieving High Performance: CSR at the Heart of Business," published on 25 March 2004, argues that there is now a sufficient weight of empirical evidence to indicate that building CSR activities into the heart of business strategy leads to higher productivity and profitability. Read more about the findings and access the report.

Briefs
* BALLE Annual Conference - BALLE, or Business Alliance for Local Living Economies, is a network of local groups across the conference whose annual conference is May 20-23. For more about the conference or ifPeople's participation.
* Seen & Heard at EnviroDesign8 - ifPeople's Chris Johnson reports on some of the major happenings and resources from this conference.
* New resource on implementing sustainability building - the City of Seattle's how-to tool allows navigation by project type and design aspect: http://www2.ci.seattle.wa.us/Implement/
* June 5 is World Environment Day: http://www.unep.org/wed/2004/