The Blog

Infamous hacking group Anonymous have declared an ‘electronic Holocaust’ on Israel for April 7th 2015 – whereby they wish to obliterate official Israeli websites – government, military and institutional sites. According to Daniel Cohen, a research associate at the Israel Institute for National Security Studies Cyber Warfare program most of the hackers are from within the Middle East – Gaza, Morocco and Syria – whom are generally induced by radicalised Islamic movements.

There are a few measures being taken to tackle this issue, such as the upcoming US-Israel Defensive Cyberspace Operations & Intelligence Conference in Washington DC. Additionally, official government offices are implementing precautions in advance of the planned hacking attack. It is important to implement safe-measures against hacking, particularly in preparation for April 7. Here is an example of what anonymous are capable of!

Continue Reading…

Take a look at the fascinating interview with Alex Libman, – CEO and founder of the “Fellow” app – the newest technology developed in order to monitor and communicate with your personal items – ranging from luggage to supermarket carts, and everything in between. Read on to find out how Alex established this idea from the ground up!

Hi Alex, how did you come up with the idea of ‘Fellow’?

Alex: In my final year of Hebrew University studying BSC there was a project to develop an idea, I came up with the concept of ‘fellow’ – a helpful and cool idea to allow a person to follow their luggage. I won the excellency award in 2014 and then developed this idea into a startup company.

How would you explain your product?

Alex: I developed a way for your things to follow and communicate with you. Can be used for and implemented for travellers leggie, supermarket carts, kids school bags, business travellers, the elderly, kids and people who suffer from disabilities.

Tell me about the team at Fellow.

Alex: I, Alex, am the CEO and founder, I am also a musician and have video clips on YouTube:

I own a music studio and a music gear company for festivals and concerts called blackwave. I graduated from Hebrew University with a degree in electrical engineering and applied physics. – enjoyed the projects. Then there is Liat Ackerman, she graduated from the same degree and has experience with robotics and electronics. We also have Adi Huri, she writes articles and has connections with media, she does CMO + marketing and social content for us. Finally, we have Vitali  Vyazovsky , he is in St Petersburg, he has twenty years with design and visual communications – he does our website, design and photos.

What were some challenges when you first started working on “Fellow”?

Alex: Being students at the start, finding financial support and learn about new things was challenging. Problem solving was important – both technologically and help from people.

What has been the response so far?

Alex: It is still in in prototype stage but we have taken the idea to various places and show them – the feedback from people is excitement and they are waiting for it to go to the market.

What has been your biggest challenge so far in developing ‘fellow’?

Alex: Finding the right investor that will not only support us financially but also who has connections and can make this vision come true.

Social media and storytelling are important for startups – what is your view on this?

Alex: It makes things come alive, to tell story that our company combines IOT and robotics, it makes things personal, and to tell our story that the product is something you can carry daily, to be able to follow and send us relevant data.

What advice to you have for people out there looking to create their own start-ups?

Alex: You need to believe in what you are doing, not just think of it as a craze. People will try to convince you it won’t work, you need to believe in what you are doing and think outside the box.

Lastly, what are your future goals for the company?

Alex: To come up with a wide range of solutions for variety of people with different products, pioneering in field of robotics and IOT. Find useful and great solutions for people and for people who want fellow and people who needs fellow.

What do you guys think about the innovative new app ‘fellow’?

Follow ‘fellow’s adventures on their website: http://gofellow.me/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/gofellowme
Instagram: https://instagram.com/go_fellow/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Fellow/1511742662447506

We research and bargain for days on the best deal for that Chanel purse or the brand new MAC notebook. Question is, why don’t we make sure our lungs get the same treatment? Why don’t we look into the best QUALITY of air our lungs intake?

Unfortunately, we tend to overlook the things that we physically can’t see even if it’s as fundamental as the air we breathe. Our respiratory system works 24/7 to make sure that all parts of our body get oxygen otherwise we literally won’t make it. Simply put, we as humans need air to survive.

A few Israeli environmental engineers decided that these questions needed to be answered and quickly because our future livelihood truly depended on them.

Several years ago, environmental engineer Ran Korber was house searching with his family and before making any final decision he wanted to check the eco-friendliness of the neighborhood. As he researched the air quality of a particular part of town he noticed that the information he was looking for was entirely scattered and that it was nearly impossible to get a quick idea of what exactly he and his children would be breathing in. He needed this information to be a lot more accessible and simplified and knew others need it too. He called his buddy, Ziv Lautman, fellow passionate environmental engineer and they started to develop one of the most promising apps of 2015 – Breezometer.

Breezometer (illustrated below) is a mobile application that tracks real-time air pollution on a street level basis.  What used to be invisible is now available to us in plain sight. What now Co-Founder and CMO, Ziv, describes as “the Waze of air pollution” – Breezometer tells you exactly the type of air quality (Air Quality Index rating) you’re surrounded by this minute and where you can go to surround yourself with better air quality. Additionally, the app tells you what to do (i.e.: whether to keep windows open or go for a run…) for each specific rating.

Athletes, children, health sensitive women (i.e.: pregnancy…) and everyone in between can benefit greatly from getting lighting speed reports about their current environment. Furthermore, while the eco-green population is growing all over the world, Real Estate brokers are now benefiting from this app due to its street based availability.

So how exactly does Breezometer track the air so accurately? Data collecting at its finest, the innovative team created an algorithm that collects data from thousands of government funded air monitor sensors that are located between streets.

Okay so it’s great that environmental engineers are zealous about air but why should we still track our air to the point of getting an actual app for it? Well according to the World Health Organization in 2012 around 7 million people died – one in eight of total global deaths – as a result of air pollution exposure (Source: World Health Organization [http://bit.ly/1jpGo4S])

The team CEO Ran Krober and co-founders Ziv Lautman, Emil Fisher and Revital Handler received the honor of representing Israel in the Global Entrepreneur Week GEW50 competition and they are currently prepping for their trip to the annual Web Summit in Ireland where they will pitch Breezometer on November 4^th 2014 and have their official U.S. launch!

In addition to currently being available on Google Play for Android and soon becoming available in the App Store, Breezometer is also accessible to all the smartwatch users out there (perfect for your daily jog).

Stay up to date with Breezometer’s exciting team and follow them on Facebook here!

The Breezometer Team

*This blog was brought to you by BOMAH’s “Empowerment” Strategy. Go ahead and click on that link and see the magical place it brings you too.

It’s 12am on a Tuesday night and you have a History final in 8 hours. You’re alone and on your 135th cat video on YouTube. Procrastination is once again the theme of the night.

Enter “Booster”. Inspired by “that one friend who’s never on time, anywhere”, the Tel-Aviv based Booster App allows your friends to be your personal alarm clock/task manager. Except, instead of pressing the snooze button you’re going to actually have to take a selfie of yourself doing the task and immediately send it back to your friend for verification in order to complete the task.

The founders of Booster, Eyal and David, came up with this procrastination crushing idea when a close friend of theirs had constant issues with getting to work on time. While both studying psychology they discovered the “Social Regulation Theory”. This theory states that people are much more prone to assertively getting things done faster when they are socially influenced.

With no experience in technology or app development they came across Tom and Gary whom were able to use their application development skills to bring Booster from a mere idea into reality. The four co-founders plus one employee will launch the app November 3rd, 2014 in Tel Aviv. It will be available both O/S and Android.

Their next project, “The Trainer App”, will be their first business-to-business venture that will get people physically moving at the gym by connecting personal trainers to their clients whilst using the Booster structure. They plan to launch the project sometime next year.

Much like the BOMAH Yalla! strategy, Booster empowers you get up from your seat and get things done!

Follow BOOSTER on Facebook to get live updates on their releases and new features here.

Below is a step to step illustration of Booster at work for someone who is trying to stay on track with their diet.

I got off the plane at Ben Gurion Airport and I thought to myself, what am I doing here? After hours of inching along in traffic from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, I finally arrived to the stone-floored Aish dorms situated in the heart of the Old City. I set my things down in the musty dormitory room, took a tour of the premises, and was positive the crusaders lived in better accommodations, over 900 years ago.

My friends that I study with pray together while I play the guitar. The bond we have developed is indescribable.

It’s been 3 months since I arrived in Israel to study at Aish HaTorah and work at an internship. Jinternship found me a position working at the Society For The Protection of Nature, where I would be traveling around Jerusalem and the West Bank to take surveys of gardens. You’d think coming from the Garden State I’d be a natural, but dodging traffic to count olive trees wasn’t exactly the internship experience I was looking for.  The next internship thankfully was a winner. I stumbled upon BOMAH-Brand Of Milk And Honey. A young Israeli named Itzik runs and founded the social media branding firm. He studied at Sapir College in Sderot, which at the time was under tremendous rocket attack from Gaza. He reported what was going on in Sderot via his Facebook and Twitter account and was able to get the word out when major news channels didn’t care about rockets hitting Sderot or Israel. It continues to impress me that Itzik was able to find a way of using the tragedy at Sderot to build himself a career.

Itzik and I on our way to give a presentation to one of BOMAH’s clients

This internship has been a win-win because I bettered my social media skills, while contributing to an organization that supports and fights for Israel. I was able to share the truth about the IDF and respond to enemies of Israel by a few clicks at a laptop. My Zionist beliefs have been strengthened during the war in Israel this summer, called ‘Operation Protective Edge,’ and my commitment to stand up for Israel in any arena that may exist has been vitalized.

Vacationing in Israel and donating to Jewish organizations are very helpful, no doubt. But moving to Israel and contributing to its society is the strongest act of Zionism in a world that needs Zionist leaders.  Anyone looking for a positive internship experience in social media, I highly recommend visiting BOMAH. Thank you Itzik Yarkoni and Rachel Jetter for your guidance and help during my time working here.

As a member of American, white, upper-middle class privileged society, I have engaged in many trips of what we call “voluntourism” – short-term opportunities where I paid to volunteer in a developing country or with disadvantaged communities overseas. I took pride in how I chose to spend my school breaks, how I challenged myself to immerse in and understand a culture not my own.  In order to remember the people I worked with and the relationships I built, I naturally took pictures on my I-phone and of course, I posted them to Facebook.

I recently read #InstagrammingAfrica: The Narcissism of Global Volunteerism and it made me look at these pictures on Facebook a little differently. I now saw myself purposefully posed in the center of a group of people, that I wouldn’t see or talk to again. I thought about the language barrier and the structured timeframe to get to know one another – how much change did I bring to this community. As I went back to my trendy classes, college parties, and JCrew outlets, was the trip really “life changing” for me? I couldn’t help thinking after posting these pictures on my Facebook and receiving many “likes” and comments with words of admiration, was I narcissistic? A fraud? Did I simply go on the trip for a picture and for all of the “likes” I would receive after it I made it my default?

Okay, maybe each experience wasn’t as life changing as my pictures pronounced and the poses in the picture were intentional, but these relationships, although fleeting, did form! And even if I didn’t enable permanent change within these communities, I still exposed them to other ways of life and broadened their knowledge. What I most disagree with from the article is the assumption that by posting these pictures on Facebook, I am narcissistic just looking for attention and admiration.

While my pictures may not represent all aspects of my experience, my posed pictures still captured a moment of reality and they reveal a lot about my character, my interests, and what I can offer to the world. To a friend, I have interesting and have unique stories to add to any dinner conversation. To my family, I am brave, curious, and someone my grandma can brag about to her friends at her weekly bridge game. To a future employer who will no doubt Google search my name before an interview, I am someone who steps out of her comfort zone, who is sensitive to others and willing to learn, who is adaptable and can offer a unique perspective to any brainstorming session.

The pictures we post on Facebook and Instagram are out there for the world to see and we wouldn’t post them if they didn’t reflect who we are or at least who we want to be.

So friends, family, colleagues, future employers – check out my pictures, check out my story, check out who I am and get a preview of the person I’m on my way to becoming.

Want to write a blog and actually reach people outside of your network?

Medium.com is a new and fresh blogging platform, designed by Twitter creators Evan Williams and Biz Stone.  It’s widely considered easy to use, futuristic, communal, supportive, and possessing high quality material for readers and writers.

What makes Medium stand out

• Spammers haven’t been able to jumble the site with blank posts and dummy advertisements.Your content in their editor looks exactly the same as when it gets published
• The M icon on the left opens the editing tools
• Write on a blank white page that helps your thoughts spill freely without distractions.

Have only a few minutes to read an article (VERY COOL)

Well, each article provides an estimated amount of time it will take to read. Now you know if it’ll take 2 minutes to read somethings or 20 minutes.  Time management – check!

Blogs on Medium are:

• personal views and suggestions on current events and general interests
• chosen for the site based on quality
• publicly shared on a wide scale with hundreds of thousands of readers who are a part of the Medium community

How to Use Medium:
Register with your Twitter account. You can even use your Twitter account to comment on headline articles right now! The Medium staff editors regularly invite users to write on the platform which keeps posts active and frequent.

Commenting is SO EASY:

You can comment on any paragraph however it’s ultimately up to the writer to allow those comments to be viewed (haters may hate… but at least they don’t have a place on Medium).

Drawbacks: If you write an article, that article belongs to Medium, which means you can’t incorporate your own logo or post it on your own social media forums.

It’s competitive to get your blog to get featured…the merit system is tough sometimes.

BOMAH wants to empower you to share YOUR story and Medium.com is a fantastic way to make that story viral. Join today or just experiment on Medium.  

For the past two months Onward Israel participants from Hillels and cities all over the United States have been living and interning in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem. Working in Israel during Operation Protective Edge and hearing sirens throughout the country was an especially impactful experience, and we at BOMAH have had the privilege of working with the selected Social Media Fellows from each group to help them share their personal stories and experiences.

As a result from participating in BOMAH workshops and consultations, the Fellows perfected our storytelling strategy and were able to put the reality into words, which at times was much different that what the media portrayed. By writing more impactful posts they were able to comfort their family, friends, and communities at home with their truths, while reaching and engaging new audiences.

Our work with the Onward Israel participants began at the beginning of May when the Fellows had an initial group conference call with Itzik Yarkoni, BOMAH’s Founder, discussing the logistics of the program and explaining the social media tool kit provided. Each Social Media Fellow also received personal consulting about fulfilling their summer goals and how to share their stories through the social media medium of their choice: blog, Twitter, Instagram, or YouTube etc.

Once in Israel, the Fellows attended BOMAH social media workshops throughout the summer. They learned about our storytelling strategy in depth, how to effectively share posts on their Facebook pages, and practiced their public speaking skills in order to prepare to give presentations about their time in Israel on their college campuses.

As most of the fellows’ programs are coming to an end this week, we are proud of what they have accomplished this summer and look forward to reading their stories in the future.

Interested in seeing more from the Onward Israel Social Media Fellows? See their posts featured from our Facebook page!

“Thanks to social media workshops and individual consultations, I’ve learned how to turn a good blog into a great blog. I’ve learned how to make my stories both innovative and interactive. Thanks to the Jewish Agency and Itzik Yarkoni, I’ve been able to share my Israel Experience with more than a thousand people in a dozen different countries.”

-Daniel, Cleveland Onward Israel
Intern at The Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies at Tel Aviv University

Read his blog here.

“With the increasing attacks on Israel I quickly learned the importance of sharing my experiences of living in Israel with my family and friends back home. Attending BOMAH’s social media workshops and having personal consultations with Itzik allowed me to organize my ideas and learn how to effectively and efficiently share my stories.”

-Allison, Hillel Onward Israel
Intern at BOMAH

Read her blog here.

“I think the social media consulting has been very helpful in generating inspiration and ideas. First of all, Itzik shares his knowledge with us, offering us important tools for making our posts more “viral”. Second of all, getting to see all of the other social media fellows’ work is inspiring and motivating.”

-Leah, Pittsburgh Onward Israel
Intern at BlogsRelease

Read her blog here.

“Social media is overwhelming, and I admit I never was able to utilize social media outlets to their fullest potential. The tips from training sessions also helped me create more intriguing blog posts that captured my audience’s attention. Since our final social media training, I have used Itzik’s suggestions for promoting my blog on Facebook and my views have more than doubled!”

-Shoshana, Boston Onward Israel
Intern at Tevel b’Tzedek

Read her blog here.

“Itzik pushed me to think more critically about social media and the ways I craft my own personal story. From him, I learned how to make my blog more visually interesting for my readers and expand my audience. I appreciate all his help, especially since I don’t have much experience blogging. Without his guidance, I wouldn’t have been able to share all of the incredible Israeli dishes that I’ve sampled during my time here and my love of food.”

-Ryan, Hillel Onward Israel
Intern at the Ethiopian National Project

Read his blog here.

“I think the social media consulting was great.  It gave great tips and tricks on explaining what we need to do to have a better social media following while still getting our story across.  It wasn’t too lengthy which was also nice because my attention tends to stray if a presentation is too long. Thank you!”

-Lisa, Pittsburgh Onward Israel
Intern at Ananey Communications

Read her blog here.

“I learned a lot of social media techniques from Itzik. He taught us how to reach our audience greatly through what time of the day to post and how to post a Facebook status that pulls the reader in, wanting more.”

-Camille, Boston Onward Israel
Intern at Finn Partners

Read her blog here.

“I have learned a lot in our sessions this summer. I think it is good to have the workshops where everyone can share what has and has not worked for them and build off of each other. I think the most important think that I have learned from you is to make sure that I am telling my story in my posts. I think that is what made my blog so successful, because people enjoyed reading my story.”

-Abby, Cincinnati Onward Israel
Intern at Batsheva Dance Company

Read her blog here.

What we learned trying to create an international holiday.

The Made in Jerusalem team learned a whole lot trying to create International Firgun Day.  “Firgun” is a Hebrew word of Yiddish origin that defines the selfless feeling of enjoying another person’s success.  Made in Jerusalem set out to create this holiday where people write compliments and selfless praise to each other on social media.

To create this viral holiday, we had an all-night marketing “hackathon” throughout the night before and into the morning of July 17th.  We invited hundreds of people from the community and categorized participants into teams that were formed around a list of marketing challenges that included getting celebrities to mention #FirgunDay or getting content far up on Reddit.

Along the way we experienced both success and some speed bumps.  In terms of getting people engaged with a project campaign, here’s what we learned:

What Doesn’t Work:

1.     Emailing People You Don’t Know

We emailed hundreds of organizations aligned with the themes of Firgun Day for sponsorship or advertising.  Just 5% responded with interest in helping, but half of that group did nothing after that. Instead of finding random organizations, we learned that entering networks where you know members personally gives you more leverage.

2.     Asking People to Invite Their Friends

Many people loved our idea and joined the event page, but few invited their friends. People are generally hesitant to invite their friends for fear of spamming, so even people who did want to help did little sharing. The best way to encourage people to engage their friends is to do so indirectly by framing it as “if you like this and want to help spread the word, feel free to share.”

What Works:

1.     Personal Engagement

The most effective social media strategy is engaging people you know. 90% of those contacted through Facebook joined our event, and they were far more likely to invite their friends. On Twitter, targeting small influencers was the best strategy: people and groups with fewer than 5000 followers more often responded or retweeted us than did celebrities and big corporations.

2.     Create an Event

MadeinJLM’s hackathon was a big event for people to network, collaborate, and showcase their skills and talents. People participated because they were dedicated to our cause of global optimism.  The night yielded apps, videos, and articles, and more. After the virtual dust cleared, #FirgunDay got many mentions online from people and groups that the MadeinJLM team had never heard of – even an Israeli military radio station mentioned Firgun Day!  Having an event with a variety of people expands your networks and increases the number of people you can inform.

3.     Something Fun

One of the biggest successes of our campaign was the Firgunator, a website app that generates hilarious compliments for users. The app is intelligently designed to share the content, as creator Uriel Shuraki created buttons for instantly Tweeting, Posting, or snapping a screenshot of the Firgun generation.  It was a success because people knew they’d see something new every time they clicked the button, and many users engaged with it repeatedly.

So there you have it.  May the force be with you, and we will see you on Firgun Day 2015.

Strategies like the hackathon are to use when looking to promote a bigger event, like Firgun Day. This strategy can be used by anyone, especially when trying to promote a good cause.

It is hard to ignore the news and it is even harder to engage with it

Over the last 2 weeks, these pictures and others like them have been all over the news, publications, and social media. With different news channels sharing opposing stories, newspapers vouching contradicting “facts”, and Facebook flooding with comments, what do YOU think about them? Do they invoke fear? Do they make you more confused? Maybe they even make you excited and more interested about what is going on in this part of the world?

Regardless of how these images make you feel, it is hard to ignore the current news and it is even harder to engage with it when as citizens, we don’t exactly have control over the situation.

What we CAN do is write.

Posting a Facebook status or writing a blog is one of most powerful ways to engage with these current events, or any other issues that you encounter. Writing enables you to articulate your own thoughts and sharing these thoughts allows those that care about you to begin to relate to your experience. Sharing these thoughts through social media is the quickest and more efficient way to reach masses.

Benefiting You

Writing is incredibly therapeutic. It allows you to pour out your thoughts and emotions, no matter how scattered or intense they are, without facing any opposition. By writing your unreserved feelings down, you will relieve yourself of the emotions that hold you back from accomplishing what you want to accomplish. Fill your writing with “I” statements and own your thoughts!

Benefiting Others

Blogs and personal stories are more powerful than a journalist’s report or a news article because of the personality that comes through in it’s content. The words in them are honest and emotional and it is that genuine voice, not a scripted dialogue that gets a reader to pay attention and to believe what you are writing. This is why personal storytelling is so important. Through blogs, statuses, and pictures, we can inform our communities about your life, about what is happening on the ground in Israel and about what is going on in your head. Writing provides information and comfort as well as lets people into our lives on a more intimate level.

Ways to most effectively share your story with your audience:

1) Be real –The news shows the missiles, the destruction, and the fear in people’s eyes over and over again. We write to let people see OUR sides of the story, not what is just on the news. Your story may include being in a bomb shelter but the thoughts, emotions, and discussions that occur during these experiences add a new layer to the story that a news report doesn’t provide. For example, sharing a story about a new person you met in a stairwell or talking about the pride you feel for your community can open your audience’s mind to a different side of the situation. Personal growth or positive experiences will captivate your audience and keep them reading as well as comfort them that you are not only safe but that you are also growing from the experience. Campaigns, such as #BOMAHStory, illustrate this storytelling strategy on social media and share people’s truth to the world.

2) Identify your audience and use terms that are trending –If your friends and family aren’t as engaged with the issue, chances are a lot of the terms and information you use will be hard to connect with. So, what do we do when we don’t know something? Search the internet! Use common words and phrases that are trending on Facebook and Twitter so that your community can easily look the correct information they seek. Terms like “Operation Protective Edge” and hashtags like #IsraelUnderFire, #IsraelStrong and #BomahStories are popular to search and will provide an abundance of relevant information. Take it a step further and add hyperlinks, suggested news sources, or links to another friend’s blog to connect your network with more even more sources!

3) Visuals – Adding pictures or videos to your writing allows the audience to see through your eyes. These images can also replace or add to the images seen on television. If you are not in Israel, adding a visual can help your reader bring your words to life and your opinion all of a sudden becomes a scene your audience can imagine! If you are in Israel, your images can be your readers’ ticket to your reality.

4) Make your Post Public – Whether you have a personal ongoing blog or are posting an isolated Facebook status, your thoughts have the power to strengthen community, educate those who are less informed, and even start a discussion with those who stand on a different side of the argument. However, to reach all of these people, this includes people outside of your list of Facebook friends, post your thoughts on as many social media forums as possible and make sure your settings are public so you can be heard!

5) Be social –Having people engage with your thoughts is the goal of using social media and leads to you having loyal readers. Your readers will undoubtedly respond with a “Stay safe!” or “Thank you for the update!” Make sure you reply with a “Thank you for reading! I’ll be posting more so keep checking my page” One way to proactively engage people is go give a shout out in your post such as “So family and friends, I’m hanging in there!” or tag someone directly.

Yalla – Help yourself and help others! Write a blog, post a status, share your thoughts! Message your stories with a picture on the BOMAH fan page to share it with the world!