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So I'm not the author of that but I am the SSF engineer in charge of that network and was present while that story was unfolding. Funding is in fact one of our

by trevore 14y ago

So I'm not the author of that but I am the SSF engineer in charge of that network and was present while that story was unfolding. Funding is in fact one of our biggest issue these days. We've discussed doing various fund raising efforts including Indiegogo but it does not solve the real needs. The problem is that our expenses for that network are all recurring. We can get occasional injections of money for things like gear and generators, but it is hard to find someone who is willing to pay for the bandwidth or Afghan salaries on an ongoing basis. All of us in SSF have no income from our work over there but we all continue to support our friends in Jalalabad in every way we can. For an indiegogo campaign to be successful it actually takes a fair amount of effort and is only a stop gap solution to the problem. So we are all focused on trying to sustain ourselves while actually solving problems. I can't speak for everyone in our crew but most of us don't have the time, energy or heart to do a full fund raising campaign that we know is only a temporary solution. What we really need is a sponsor to take over bandwidth costs and the salary of our fantastic Afghan crew who works on the ground over there. So on the off chance anyone reads that and knows of someone who might be interested in becoming a sponsor, I can be reached at trevor.ellermann@gmail.com Feel free to direct any inquiries my way. If there is any question of my identity and involvement in Synergy Strike Force, I have ways of authenticating I am who I say I am. Also, I would not ask for any money directly. There is a large, well known, non-profit that everyone knows that would be the entity dealing with any financial transactions. Also, if you just want to nerd out over a cool network we run outside the barbwire in afghanistan hit me up.

iskander 14y ago
Is anyone from the States still in Jalalabad or is the security situation too risky? Also, how did you guys get started?
- trevore 14y ago
  I hope you can appreciate that this is a little too public of a forum for discussing current operational details of our operation over there. I can say that we are still engaged and intend to stay that way. Hoever, with Mehrab's assassination everything has changed. On a personal note, his death is one of the hardest blows of my life. The group was founded by Dr. Dave Warner. He was hired by to go over there and help start several schools* in the area. While over there he ended up finding the Taj Mahal, taking over the lease one it and founding the Synergy Strike Force. SSF grew into much more then just schools and has been involved in many different humanitarian projects. We are all just freelancers trying to dodge the bureaucracy that get's in everyone else's way and make a difference for the people over there. * The schools have nothing to do with cups of tea in case anyone is curious about that.
  - trevore 14y ago
    Several people have pinged to ask what is with the name. I did not come up with it but I can tell you my take on it. The name is kind of a joke name and kind of an intentional name. It's bad enough that nobody is going to try to take over our name (which has happened), it sounds just official enough to appear legit to non-native English speakers and pretty aptly describes what we do. We spend a lot of time identifying problems and then finding the right people to solve them. When the most of the aid organizations are bound to their safe houses for security reasons they need people like us. We are outside the barbwire connecting the people who need help with the people who want to provide it. So we identify a problem and strike it with synergy to come up with solutions. We work with just about anyone on the ground in the country who is willing to work with us to solve problems and improve the lives of the Afghan people. We often just say the letters SSF.
- trevore 14y ago
  I must step away from the computer for a while. My email is above and I will be happy to continue discussing as much as I can here when I return in a few hours. I appreciate people's feedback thoughts on this.
- javajosh 14y ago
  The OP mentioned that there's a death sentence for two kids who were friends with Americans. I suspect that any Americans still in Jalalabad are keeping a rather low profile.
kanamekun 14y ago
<< The problem is that our expenses for that network are all recurring. We can get occasional injections of money for things like gear and generators, but it is hard to find someone who is willing to pay for the bandwidth or Afghan salaries on an ongoing basis. >> You could organize regular fundraisers in a systematic way to cover monthly recurring costs... although the feasibility depends on the amount of the costs. Can I ask how much (ballpark) the monthly costs are for bandwidth and Afghan salaries?
- trevore 14y ago
  We could keep the network alive indefinitely for probably $2K-$3K per month. This network provides free and open internet to dozens of sites all over east Afghanistan including hospitals and schools. This is way down from just two years ago when bandwidth was $5K per month for 1Mbps. I can only speak for myself and this is where I am at with this right now. I don't know if you have ever done fund raising but it is very time consuming and frankly unpleasant. Also, if you start including pay for yourself in the cost not only does the amount needed go up drastically, but people start questioning your motives. That makes it even harder to raise funds. So between working jobs and spending our free time trying to make a difference in a very difficult situation, I just don't have the cycles to spend raising funds. I think it boils down to the fact that I am an engineer and want to spend my time solving problems over there, not in endless meetings and hoping for little bits of money here and there. That is what we have been doing and for me personally it's starting to burn me out. At this point what we really need is bandwidth costs and a small salary for the Afghans keeping it running. And we need the money to be painless for us. It's a hard to find a sponsor like that.
  - kanamekun 14y ago
    I've fundraised for my own startups before (not fun). But a while ago, I headed up marketing for Kiva.org (a crowdfunding site for entrepreneurs, mostly in the developing world) and found crowdfunding to be a really powerful way to raise money. I also did a Kickstarter a while ago related to poverty alleviation that raised $21k... not a huge sum, but one that helped get the project going. It sounds like you guys are at a point where you'd like to raise a year's worth of funds upfront, or you're leaning towards burning out and canceling the entire project. This is an ideal situation for crowdfunding: people have a real incentive to donate, as they know their funds will truly make a difference. I would recommend doing an Indiegogo campaign for $25-30k to get things started. As part of it, you could promise regular updates on how things are going in Afghanistan. At Kiva, people really loved hearing from our entrepreneurs on how the loan was going. As for marketing the piece, Peretz is a really wonderful writer. Would he be willing to write 2-3 shorter stories about the network, and the impact that it's having in Afghanistan? Then we could share them here on HN (and elsewhere), and link to the crowdfunding campaign at the end of the piece. It also wouldn't be too hard to get an article or two written about this, either in HuffPo, TC or maybe PandoDaily (I haven't worked with Pando before, but it's probably similar to TC). That would definitely drive significant fundraising... plus there are poverty alleviation blogs and social media gurus who would definitely help out. If you're interested, I'd be glad to help you with the marketing and PR gratis... a project like this makes it incredibly easy to drive publicity and fundraising. Either way, I wish you all the best with this important project!!

by trevore 14y ago

iskander 14y ago

Is anyone from the States still in Jalalabad or is the security situation too risky? Also, how did you guys get started?

trevore 14y ago
I hope you can appreciate that this is a little too public of a forum for discussing current operational details of our operation over there. I can say that we are still engaged and intend to stay that way. Hoever, with Mehrab's assassination everything has changed. On a personal note, his death is one of the hardest blows of my life. The group was founded by Dr. Dave Warner. He was hired by to go over there and help start several schools* in the area. While over there he ended up finding the Taj Mahal, taking over the lease one it and founding the Synergy Strike Force. SSF grew into much more then just schools and has been involved in many different humanitarian projects. We are all just freelancers trying to dodge the bureaucracy that get's in everyone else's way and make a difference for the people over there. * The schools have nothing to do with cups of tea in case anyone is curious about that.
- trevore 14y ago
  Several people have pinged to ask what is with the name. I did not come up with it but I can tell you my take on it. The name is kind of a joke name and kind of an intentional name. It's bad enough that nobody is going to try to take over our name (which has happened), it sounds just official enough to appear legit to non-native English speakers and pretty aptly describes what we do. We spend a lot of time identifying problems and then finding the right people to solve them. When the most of the aid organizations are bound to their safe houses for security reasons they need people like us. We are outside the barbwire connecting the people who need help with the people who want to provide it. So we identify a problem and strike it with synergy to come up with solutions. We work with just about anyone on the ground in the country who is willing to work with us to solve problems and improve the lives of the Afghan people. We often just say the letters SSF.
trevore 14y ago
I must step away from the computer for a while. My email is above and I will be happy to continue discussing as much as I can here when I return in a few hours. I appreciate people's feedback thoughts on this.
javajosh 14y ago
The OP mentioned that there's a death sentence for two kids who were friends with Americans. I suspect that any Americans still in Jalalabad are keeping a rather low profile.

kanamekun 14y ago

<< The problem is that our expenses for that network are all recurring. We can get occasional injections of money for things like gear and generators, but it is hard to find someone who is willing to pay for the bandwidth or Afghan salaries on an ongoing basis. >> You could organize regular fundraisers in a systematic way to cover monthly recurring costs... although the feasibility depends on the amount of the costs. Can I ask how much (ballpark) the monthly costs are for bandwidth and Afghan salaries?

trevore 14y ago
We could keep the network alive indefinitely for probably $2K-$3K per month. This network provides free and open internet to dozens of sites all over east Afghanistan including hospitals and schools. This is way down from just two years ago when bandwidth was $5K per month for 1Mbps. I can only speak for myself and this is where I am at with this right now. I don't know if you have ever done fund raising but it is very time consuming and frankly unpleasant. Also, if you start including pay for yourself in the cost not only does the amount needed go up drastically, but people start questioning your motives. That makes it even harder to raise funds. So between working jobs and spending our free time trying to make a difference in a very difficult situation, I just don't have the cycles to spend raising funds. I think it boils down to the fact that I am an engineer and want to spend my time solving problems over there, not in endless meetings and hoping for little bits of money here and there. That is what we have been doing and for me personally it's starting to burn me out. At this point what we really need is bandwidth costs and a small salary for the Afghans keeping it running. And we need the money to be painless for us. It's a hard to find a sponsor like that.
- kanamekun 14y ago
  I've fundraised for my own startups before (not fun). But a while ago, I headed up marketing for Kiva.org (a crowdfunding site for entrepreneurs, mostly in the developing world) and found crowdfunding to be a really powerful way to raise money. I also did a Kickstarter a while ago related to poverty alleviation that raised $21k... not a huge sum, but one that helped get the project going. It sounds like you guys are at a point where you'd like to raise a year's worth of funds upfront, or you're leaning towards burning out and canceling the entire project. This is an ideal situation for crowdfunding: people have a real incentive to donate, as they know their funds will truly make a difference. I would recommend doing an Indiegogo campaign for $25-30k to get things started. As part of it, you could promise regular updates on how things are going in Afghanistan. At Kiva, people really loved hearing from our entrepreneurs on how the loan was going. As for marketing the piece, Peretz is a really wonderful writer. Would he be willing to write 2-3 shorter stories about the network, and the impact that it's having in Afghanistan? Then we could share them here on HN (and elsewhere), and link to the crowdfunding campaign at the end of the piece. It also wouldn't be too hard to get an article or two written about this, either in HuffPo, TC or maybe PandoDaily (I haven't worked with Pando before, but it's probably similar to TC). That would definitely drive significant fundraising... plus there are poverty alleviation blogs and social media gurus who would definitely help out. If you're interested, I'd be glad to help you with the marketing and PR gratis... a project like this makes it incredibly easy to drive publicity and fundraising. Either way, I wish you all the best with this important project!!