In the Harsham Internally-Displaced Persons & Refugee Camp, a converted pumping station serves as a portal to the rest of the world. Harsham Camp is on the outskirts of the city of Erbil in northern Iraq. The camp hosts 1,500 internally displaced Iraqi families who fled ISIS from Mosul and surrounding villages in mid-2014. Erbil is the capital of Iraq's Kurdistan Region, which hosts around 1.5 million internally displaced Iraqis and almost 230,000 Syrian refugees. Through the portal, a young entrepreneur spoke with President Barack Obama and another with Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi. The portal is made possible by UNICEF Iraq and Terre de Hommes.

In partnership with UNFA and the Gates Foundation, Shared\_Studios activated a Portal Screen at County Hall in London to connect global health leaders – including Melinda Gates and Priti Patel – to UNFPA field healthcare workers in Herat and Nairobi. Melinda Gates visited the Portal. High profile world health leaders connected with health care workers in Herat and Nairobi about access to contraceptives and maternal healths. Melinda spoke to women's healthcare leaders in Herat, Afghanistan. The Health Minister of Uganda and Priti Patel also participants.

L’Oréal wanted to understand how to build better products for people living in water scarce conditions. Through a day-long series of global connections, L’Oréal’s research department connected with target customers in Rwanda, Mexico City, and San Joaquin Valley, uncovering insights on how habits and product usage changes when living in drought conditions. The connections served as a launchpad to waterless product design hackathons hosted at L’Oréal later that week.

Our Portal in the Primary co-working space in Manhattan connects colleagues to counterparts in San Francisco.

Portals connected students from Harvard Divinity School to aid workers and residents of refugee and displaced communities around the world. Participants spoke about the role and impact of distance education and how new startups led by former refugees are being used to tackle problems created by new humanitarian crises.

Portals enable live DJ battles at major music festivals including Lollapalooza and Reeperbahn. With live audiences outside the Portal, hundreds or thousands can participate.

Shared\_Studios participated in “The Senses: Design Beyond Vision,” an exhibition at the Cooper Hewitt. We were among dozens of talented designers and artists examining how multisensory design amplifies everyone’s ability to receive information, explore the world, satisfy essential needs and experience joy and wonder.

Starbucks brought its employees in Seattle into the portal to meet with coffee-growers around the world. Participants shared stories, traded tips, discussed market trends, and of course, drank coffee together.

The Biden Cancer Initiative used Portals to globalize their event, hosting dialogues between participants at the Biden Cancer Summit and people affected by cancer on five different continents. The event brought the world together in conversation about cancer research, care, and survivorship, and ensured accessibility to groups separated by geography. Thanks to the Portal, an international array of patients, caregivers, and researchers could participate in the event, share stories, and connect with a global community.

The Portal at Aspen Ideas Festival connected the themes of the conference to participants across the globe.

We gained new perspectives on space and exploration with a Portal during Kids Week at The Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum. The Intrepid\_Portal connected young explorers of all ages with NASA researchers, environmental adventurers and spacecraft designers. Intrepid Portalers connected with Nic Scott, a researcher at NASA Ames Research Center, for an out-of-this-world discussion on exoplanets and the Solar System. We then connected with Tim Jarvis, acclaimed explorer and environmental activist, who spoke about recreating Shackleton’s journey and his record-setting trek – on foot – to the South Pole. Then, we connected with scientists from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab in Los Angeles, where two researchers spoke about space and the atmosphere. We rounded out our planetary week by beaming into the Orion mock-up at Johnson Space Center, where rocket engineers described the process of building a crew module which will eventually carry astronauts to the moon and to Mars. They even shared their favorite types of space food (pro-tip: stock up on the mac and cheese)!

A Portal outside the European Parliament connected elected officials to refugee and migrant communities to highlight Europe’s refugee crisis. Portals provided a direct feedback mechanism for MPs who were able to speak with those on-the-ground to better understand the impact of the policy decisions and legislation currently under review.

After the earthquake in Oaxaca, Mexico, in February 2018, students at Marymount School worked with engineers and students in Mexico City to design earthquake resistant structures out of popsicle sticks. Students were able to collaborate across distance and culture and see the real-world impact of their STEM classes.

AIM Academy helps bright children with language-based learning differences such as dyslexia thrive through an innovative, evidence-based curriculum. The Portal at AIM Academy connected to 20+ Portals around the world.

Cornell University’s Olin Library hosted a Portal for a series of events, seminars, classes, and performances for undergraduate and graduate students. Connection topics ranged from discussions on migration with San Pedro Sula, Honduras to black speculative thought with Kigali, Rwanda. The Portal also hosted jam sessions between American folk musicians in Ithaca and traditional Afghan musicians at the Afghan National Institute of Music in Kabul. Participation was widespread and actively drove diverse community engagement; we are now working on building a permanent Portal at Cornell. Cornell Library staff also promoted the Portal as a primary source, and worked with faculty and students across projects and divisions to develop research projects around Portals and community engagement, and position the Portal as a source for existing academic research and collaboration.

Google used Portals at the Global Entrepreneurship Summit to connect participants to innovators at their Google for Entrepreneurs hubs in London, Seoul and Mexico City. Start-up founders who could not attend were able to pitch to Silicon Valley VCs and connect with mentors without ever having to leave their cities.