Nonprofits embracing social change to promote their missions isn’t exactly new, but some groups are using the social Web to recruit, educate, and help people in novel ways. The payoff? Donors get to see the direct results of what they contribute, rather than just collecting another tax writeoff.
DonorsChoose.org, a nonprofit pioneered by Bronx, N.Y., high school teachers, is using the Internet in an innovative way to address a chronic shortage of learning materials. If you're a teacher, you can use their site to describe your class projects and the funding you need for them.
If you're a contributor, you can fund projects in full or in part.Once a project is completed, you'll get a full report from the classroom, with photos, showing what's happened.You can also set up a competition, where people select a group of projects to represent them. Contributors "vote" for the competitors by funding their projects.
In some respects, DonorsChoose illustrates the democratizing effects of the Internet.Most people want to make a difference, to help out others. However, conventional philanthropy is indirect, and you rarely see the effects of your contribution.With DonorsChoose, the middleman is minimal, and the help you provide is direct, with real feedback.
The Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA) effectively uses Web 2.0 tools to educate the public and raise money to help improve the lives of veterans and their families. For example, IAVA is promoting the new GI Bill, which provides reasonable educational benefits to returning veterans.Part of their efforts involves reaching out to bloggers (including myself). IAVA also uses the Net to promote other related efforts, including adequate medical treatment for veterans, and immigration of translators from Iraq into the U.S.
VotoLatino.org, which promotes the voting rights of Hispanic voters, is combining Latino pop culture with Web 2.0 technologies to motivate people to register to vote. For example, they're using online video (in "telenovela" melodrama soap opera style) to entertain people and remove the intimidation implicit in any City Hall experience.Recently the nonprofit transmitted a PSA telenovela with the message: "No love for you until you register to vote."(I actually had a starring role in it, if by "cameo" they meant starring.)
Sunlight Foundation addresses the problem of transparency and accountability in Washington. For the most part, Sunlight funds other groups who are building online databases that make it easy for people to see how the money flows in Washington.The idea is that if you bring the actions of insiders into the sunlight, you get to see what happens. Ultimately, it might be relatively easy to track lobbyists' contributions, and what they get in return -- say, no-bid contracts or special privilege legislation.
For example, Sunlight's newest project is "Fortune 535: Running the Numbers on Congressional Wealth."Check out what's the deal with Senator Ted Stevens or Senator Mitch McConnell. Sunlight's work might have major implications for American governance, particularly since Barack Obama's platform includes major work on accountability and transparency via the Net.
Finally, Kiva.org, a person-to-person micro-lending Website, has created an online process for people to get together and make very small loans to entrepreneurs in developing countries.The site lets you browse entrepreneurs' files on the site, choose someone to lend to, and then make a loan. In many cases, a loan of a thousand dollars, or even a hundred, can get a business going for small business owners throughout the world.
Kiva works with those local aid groups in developing countries who know what's going on and can nominate businesses for loans, with a good chance of repayment.On Kiva's site, you can look at projects throughout the world that might need a few dollars from you, and help someone out directly.It's not quite as direct as DonorsChoose, but it works.
These innovative online efforts allow nonprofits to help others in ways that actually mean something, simply by using the Net in far more effective ways than previous media allowed. When you contribute via DonorsChoose or Kiva, you can see the effects fairly directly. That ain't bad.
— Craig Newmark, Customer Service Rep and founder of craigslist.org
The social web has certainly helped non-profits all over the world. There are all kinds of programs out there that have become more popular and helpful with the aid of the internet. Now a program that is based in another country can get world-wide support for it's cause whereas before it could only rely on local resources to complete its mission.
Myspace is big on the non-profits. They are all the time flashing ads to support a worthy cause. The fact that you can create a profile for your cause and put information on it about your cause is incredible. You are able to put so much more information on the profile than you ever could with a normal mailer.
There are other social web sites that allow you to do similar things as well as a host of websites. Non-profits can definitely benefit in so many ways from the social web. Im almost positive that the more popular social webs become the better chance you have of getting your message and or cause recognized. Think of how many millions of "subscribers" or "members" there are on these social sites, its amazing.
Craig is too modest to mention it, but his craigslistfoundation.org is aiming at/well on the way to becoming the central resource for best practices and much more for nonprofits -- since 2000. The slogan is "helping people help." Check it out!
Hello Craig!Thanks for great post.I have a question. A lot of non-govermental organizations want to help developing countries and poor people.But poor people don't have computer and Internet.And If in the US you may find the ways of finding computer with the Internet, it may become a real problem in developing country.So how the help will be addressed to the people who really need it?
Every single use of the internet to "lend a hand" to developing countries is praiseworthy. A few dollars can save many lives in those countries where people live with less than 1 dollar a day. Monitoring how one's donation has been disposed of will indeed help many to give freely, knowing that the money will not end in other pocket than the one it is intend to.
Apart from giving or lending money, some social web Tools for Developing Countries are being implemented to "help non profits located in developing countries to adopt and benefit from social web tools in their fields of work, without technical skills, financial resources for infrastructure or english language knowledge. Starting with organizations based in Ecuador, South America, Yankana seeks cooperation with other international organizations to expand its reach into other countries and languages."
A plethora of sites have been created to aid activists
pursue their goals in a variety of endeavors with many of them having
tremendous success.
This is definitely a sign of how the Internet could be used
to potentially make sweeping changes in our society.
Unfortunately, the ailments that plague our society still dwarf
the achievements of these sites but, for the future, the continued
growth and popularity in such sites look promising.
Thanks for the informative article. It is good to see the non profits using the cost effective web to achieve tremendous results. I believe that the added transparancy and direct realization of beneficial contributions increase the incentive for people who want to help but have been reluctant to.
I also have to tout the website http://www.freerice.com - for every vocabulary word you get right, 20 grains of rice are donated through the UN Word Food Program. Yesterday, 182,747,860 grains of rice were donated! People get fed and you get smarter! It also offers some transparancy regarding which countries are holding up their end in the fight against world hunger, has video of the free rice being distributed and offers links for people who want to do more. I personally have donated over 50,000 grains of rice, and learned a few new words, and sent the website to everyone I know. People love it.
Thanks for your excellent post. This just point to the versality of the internet which on one hand can make some guys in silicon valley or some other places billionaires with their web 2.0 startups but can also provide a formidable platform for nonprofits to thrive successfully. However, your post fall short for not putting out a concise strategy to help nonprofits to effectively utilized the social web.
It's true that many of these nonprofits are actually using the social web but most of them are struggling to even keep their simple websites or devising strategies on how to use the Online Service Network(OSN) platforms. In this light, what are ome of the best pratices you have in mind that will help existing nonprofits or those trying to start one?
Also, What are some of the trends you seeing with nonprofits and technology? How does the social web fit into that, and should foundations be funding nonprofits' use of the social web?
Donorschoice is pretty cool and I think it illustrates a further dynamic--small applications like this are examples of innovation and creativity that larger organizaitons can emulate. Foundations and other charitable causes--even annual school fundraisers such as candy sales--could learn from these sites, in turn feeding more creativity. Thanks for highlighting these sites and concepts.
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The Internet is a powerful medium for thousands of commercial groups and private-sector organizations whose members share common positions on public policy. But I see a disturbing growth in the number of Websites set up by front groups that pretend to independently promote the efforts of special interest groups.
A look back in time helps clarify what's happening with the ongoing evolution of the Net. The societal ramifications are far more important than the technology.
New York's Metropolitan Transit Authority is conducting a pilot test of digital kiosks to guide subway users to where they want to go more efficiently and at lower cost.
The whole Amazon.reader debate is a double-stupid. It's stupid to think that there's any e-book buyer who doesn't know Amazon's URL, and it was stupider to let ICANN launch the whole free-form TLD initiative to start with.
While NFC's original goal was to enhance mobile commerce applications, it is finding its way into a number of other uses, which is creating both opportunity as well as challenges for IT departments.
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Edmunds separates customers into segments based on the info it collects on its site and from partners, and uses that to push out custom content, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
The automotive website uses propensity modeling to target ads and customer registration forms, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
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