SMS voting monitor for Sudan

People in Southern Sudan will vote next month on whether to become its own, independent country, and things are getting tense. Fareed Zein, who was born in Sudan and lives in Texas. He directs the technology committee of the Sudan Institute for Research and Policy and has partnered with Ushahidi to create the Sudan Vote Monitor. It’s the country’s first SMS-based voting monitor – people text to a given number things like “violence” or “intimidation” and this information gets placed on a map, verified and then people in positions of power, journalists and international bodies can do what they think is appropriate.