To think out of the box focusing on thinking about how to help people seems to be the guideline of this young company founded in 2011 as a new kind of social enterprise. The founders of The Uncharted Play, Jessica O. Matthews and Julia Silverman, met each other during their junior year at Harvard College in 2008. They worked together on a class project that gave life to Soccket, their first revolutionary invention. Have you ever heard about it?
The Soccket is the world's first eco-friendly portable generator in the form of a soccer ball. It produces and stores energy during game play. The way it works is extraordinary simple: it harnesses the kinetic energy generated during play with the ball, and stores it as electrical energy that can be used to power different appliances like lamps or water sterilizers, therefore reducing the need for fume-generating kerosene lamps.
Matthews and Silverman created the Soccket for resource-poor communities in the developing world because, when working on their class project, they realized that the world of play was truly 'uncharted' territory when it came to tangibly addressing real issues facing the masses, like it is in this case the need of power resources in developing countries. They took a practice widely popular in many countries of Africa as it is playing soccer, and made it useful. Indeed, it is possible to read on the website that the mission of Uncharted Play is «to create fun products and services that allow people to rethink the function of play both as a tool to address major issues facing society today and as a way to keep joy at the forefront of our lives.»
And so they did it again! But this time the ball is on the developed world. Uncharted Play has created Ludo, a new soccer ball that, in this case, racks up cash for the developing world as you play. How? The ball, made of the same ultra-durable shell from the Soccket, is powered by a chip that tracks pay time, which is wirelessly uploaded to Uncharted Play's online gaming platform, the Play Fund. When your play time has been uploaded, you can log onto the website and select a project that you think deserves your "play points." The expenses for the different projects are covered both by Ludo purchase price ($59.99) and money from corporate sponsors.
Ludo is the way that Uncharted Play has found to thank those who were part of the success of Soccket. In words of Matthews, "this is about re-engaging the people who were so amazing when we first launched Soccket and saying 'Hey, thank you for this, we've now taken the time to design something for you.'"
Don't you think the initiative is amazing? Creativity is at its best when it is used to help people and make of our world a better place.
Keep reading on:
http://unchartedplay.com/home.html
http://www.fastcoexist.com/1680562/the-ludo-a-soccer-ball-that-racks-up-cash-for-the-developing-world-as-you-play#2
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