Ushahidi is a crowdsourcing mapping platform created by Kenyan lawyer and blogger Ory Okolloh in the aftermath of the 2007 Kenyan general elections. The idea is that with enough input from users, the platform can use the aggregated information to monitor situations such as riots, or natural disasters and help to provide a useful overview of the situation, via a map. Ollokoh received $70,000 from the Knight News Challenge in 2009 to develop Ushahidi further.

Nieman Lab's Megan Garber spoke to Ushahidi's director of crisis mapping and strategic partnerships, Patrick Meier, about how media outlets can use the platform. Meier gave Al Jazeera's work in Gaza as an example: its journalists were texting and tweeting direct to an Ushahidi map and the news outlet directed its audience to the map as their "first stop." The map was then opened up to the public in Gaza to add their own information. Meier found this combination of professional and amateur coverage very interesting, particularly as comparing reports made it possible to start to detect who were the more credible members of the crowd.

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