Net Squared recently held 2 meet-ups in Auckland and Wellington, bringing together groups of people to share their passion for social causes.

Eddy Helm and Jade Tang of Curative, an Auckland design and communications agency that work to enable community communication, spoke to the Net2Akl group on Communication for Social Change.

Around 40 people attended the meet-up at The Kitchen, a coworking space for changemakers in Ponsonby.

"We were only going to have 12 guests, but it was so popular we ended up holding it in the open space, and letting more people come," said event organiser Lindsey Telerico-Hedren.

The Curative Team covered "What is Social Change? " and "How can communication create social change?", referencing examples from some of their previous work on Lifewise Big Sleep out, Neighbours Day Aotearoa, WTF campaign, Oxfam Unwrapped and Live Below the Line.

Their key messages around communication for social change were:

• Be brave
• You don't need a big budget. You just need a big idea
• Start a movement
• Create something that people can belong to
• Prove people wrong. Don't tell me, show me
• Have fun doing it
• It won't happen overnight, but it will happen

Net2Wlg met in Wellington in January for an informal sharing session on the New Year and topics they would like covered. Around 10 people met to brainstorm topics, inspiring the upcoming March meet-up topic of Crowd sourcing.

For more information, about Net2Akl sign up via Meetup or follow the organiser, Lindsey on Twitter and look out for the hashtag #Net2Akl.

For more information about Net2Wlg, you can sign up via Meetup or follow the organiser Stephen on Twitter.