Leo Burd

Leo Burd is a researcher with the MIT Center for Future Civic Media, where he develops innovative technologies to foster social empowerment and local community engagement.

Prior to joining the Center, Leo was part of Microsoft's Global Learning Research team, directed a non‐profit organization that built "computer and citizenship" schools in Sao Paulo slums, and led a variety of projects that used technology to improve quality of life in different parts of the world.

In his PhD work at the MIT Media Lab, Leo implemented What's Up, a telephone‐ and web‐based neighborhood news system that made Drupal sites accessible through regular touch tone phones and helped young people organize neighborhood events.

Leo and his colleagues are now improving on the original What's Up work and will make it available to the Drupal community as part of the Voip Drupal open source framework.