Developers are used to the idea that the covers of O'Reilly programming books feature animals. Indeed some classics, such as the camel book, are referred to by their animal. Now O'Reilly wants us to help endangered species.

The O'Reilly Animals campaign was launched at OSCON to raise awareness of the animals' plight, with a special emphasis on the ways in which people and organizations are using technology to help save and restore endangered animal populations around the globe.

In this video O'Reilly's "Animal ladies", Creative Director Edie Freedman and Senior Production Designer Karen Montgomery, talk about both the cover designs, the way in which the featured animals are often at risk of extinction and the technological projects they hope developers will get involved in to help preserve or restore endangered species.

The campaign website currently lists four projects where developer expertise can make a positive impact - including Instant Wild, a free iPhone an app developed by the Zoological Society of London that links to a website, with the aim of using crowd sourcing to identify rare species the photographs taken by remote camera  for analysis and identification. This is just one app that is looking for volunteers and the site plans to introduce you to more good causes as the campaign proceeds.