February 11, 2009 Clean water and the power of social organizing: Twestival Play video

(NECN: Ted McEnroe) - Once upon a time, if you wanted to organize a worldwide event to help people in Africa get the food and water they need to survive, you needed millions of dollars in marketing, month after month of planning, and it wouldn't hurt to be Bob Geldof.

Tomorrow night - people in 175 cities around the world will gather - in an event started by three bloggers, and most of it has come together in just the past few weeks. It's called 'Twestival' (combining the social media platform 'Twitter' and 'Festival'), and it will raise hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars in donations for charity: water, which drills wells to provide clean water to some of the one billion people on earth without it.

Boston's event in the Twestival is at Om Restaurant in Cambridge, Thursday night. Tickets are $25 and the proceeds go to Charity:Water. You should come. But it is the worldwide scope of the venture that is so incredible. Events are planned across the globe, hundreds of people have volunteered their organizing skills, and in a neat twist, hundreds of bands have donated music for free downloads, including artists like Imogen Heap, Bloc Party and Howard Jones at twestival.fm. They all ust ask that while you download free tunes, you make a small donation to Charity:Water.

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So find an event near you - make a donation - and maybe pause for a moment and realize you're part of something that was possible 20, 10, 5 or maybe even two years ago.

You can toast it with a glass of clean water.