“The Original Trip”

In May of 2007, Johnny Long and his wife led a team to Jinja, Uganda to support AOET, an organization aimed at empowering widows and orphans left in the wake of the HIV/AIDS pandemic. The Hacker Foundation provided them with temporary 501(c)3 tax-exempt status. Syngress, Sensepost, and the Training Co stepped in as corporate sponsors, and the rest of the funds were provided by individual members of the hacker community. On that trip, the team did lots of things, but Johny and a few of the other guys primarily did much-needed basic computer work. They set up a network for the AOET office (which drastically improved productivity, thereby drastically speeding up the sponsorship process for children left orphaned by HIV/AIDS), repaired computers and performed general PC troubleshooting. See the photoblog.

“The Birth of an idea”

Blown away by how far basic computer skills could propel an organization in an underdeveloped country, Johnny returned from Africa with a vision: to connect the wealth and skills of the hacking community to charitable organizations in need. He stood up the Hackers For Charity website in July of 2007 (sporting the fun “I Hack Charities” tagline), and registered the organization as a 501(c)3 in early 2008.

“Swag For Charity”

In March of 2008, we traveled to Uganda where we distributed over a thousand pens and pencils and nearly fifty bags to the 387 students of Rehaboth school in Jinja, Uganda as part of our “Swag for Charity” program. The supplies were all donations of conference giveaways (”swag”) from various corporations and individuals. Read more about the distribution here.

“First classroom - Uganda”

In March 2008, we set up our first computer classroom at Rehaboth School in Jinja, Uganda as part of our “Classroom Initiative”. This classroom consisted of donated laptops from the community and support equipment (power strips, regulators, keyboards, mice), and window glass which was purchased using funds donated by the community. This portion of the classroom will serve children in grades P4-P7 and will be used by adults in the evenings for empowerment training, enabling them to learn job skills which will help them support their families. Read more about the classroom here.

“First Web Application”

In 2008, we released the AOET Child Sponsorship System. An online extension of the manual system streamlined during that May, 2007 trip, this online system matches the functionality of high-budget, high-profile systems like the one used by Compassion International, but this system was created by a single volunteer in 40 hours, and it cost AOET nothing. More importantly, it connects sponsors with children in desperate need.