Crowdmap - getting started

This is my first post in my series on how to use the Crowdmap site to host your own Ushahidi map. Here I deal with the most basic account creation and configuration details. Future posts will describe an example implementation of a crowdmap.

Ushahidi

One of the most interesting mapping tools that I have seen in the last couple of years is that developed by the non-profit company Ushahidi. The name means "testimony" in Swahili, and the origin of Ushahidi comes from the website they developed to help monitor reports of violence in the aftermath of the Kenyan elections in 2008. The core idea was that anyone could submit a report to the site via internet or a mobile phone and this would then be mapped, together with some assessment of its reliability.