I was delighted to read a familiar name in the current issue of Fast Company magazine. In an article entitled “Is TED the New Harvard?”, Meta-Activism Project Board of Advisers member Esra’a Al Shafei talks about the effect that being a TEDGlobal fellow had on her organization, Mideast Youth, and their new project, CrowdVoice (profiled here). From the article:

Esra’a Al Shafei is a 23-year-old from Bahrain who runs an online hub for journalism and free expression called MideastYouth.com. In 2009, she was made a TED Fellow at the TEDGlobal conference in Oxford. “TED gives you a sense of credibility,” she says. “I’ve been running Mideast Youth for four years, but before the fellowship, nobody talked about it.” TED connections have led her to sources of technical and moral support that helped her launch CrowdVoice, which tracks voices of protest around the world.

Image: Fast Company (with added cartoon image)