With all the talk of triple bottom lines, the Pop!Tech conference offered a refreshing blast of simplicity—in addition to the warm glow that comes from being near so many Echoing Green Fellows at once.

Mulago Foundation exec Kevin Starr offered this clear message to conference participants: "Whether you are a for-profit or not-for-profit should be determined by what will give you the biggest impact…My job is to buy impact. To get the biggest bang for my philanthropic buck."

2008 Echoing Green Fellow Taylor Thompson, who co-founded PharmaSecure with Nathan Sigworth, said that Starr’s talk inspired him to think more seriously about how to quantify impact effectively.

2007 Echoing Green Fellow Melanie Edwards, founder of Mobile Metrix, also shone brightly in Maine. She says she can now envision Mobile Metrix bringing access to vital services and basic right to 4 billion people. Check out her work by clicking here.

More coverage of the conference can be found in Jessie Scanlon’s BusinessWeek article.