nptech

If a conference can inspire new ideas, clarify one’s mission, and connect the people who can put those new ideas into action, then it rocks! That was my experience yesterday at the Nonprofit Technology Conference in New Orleans.

After a lackluster performance by David Pogue (I realize that 75% of the conference attendees disagree with me on this point), my day got rolling with an awesome presentation by Brian Reich of EchoDitto (author of Media Rules). Few people can sum up the unique qualities of 30+ niche social networks and then contextualize these distinctions for the nonprofit sector. Reich’s presentation did just that and got the wheels turning in my head.

In the afternoon, I headed over to “APIs for Beginners”, presented by Kurt Voelker (Forum One Communications), Tompkins Spann (Convio), and Jeremy Carbaugh (Sunlight Foundation). This is where my mind really started churning.

I was in the second row, a real keener, thinking about the big elephant in the room: collaboration.

API’s allow for the integration and mashing of data, services and hardware. Data in the broadest sense can include the actions that constituents take in support of nonprofits, independent projects, and specific outcomes.

It’s no leap to imagine APIs that allow for seamless, on the fly, coalition building among nonprofits and social action platforms. Merge (temporarily) the constituent databases of three leading nonprofits, present an opportunity to take action in support of the common mission these nonprofits share, and carry out those actions by drawing on the toolset of two or more social action platforms.

That would be making the most of APIs for social change work.

The problem, as Jeremy Carbaugh pointed out in response to a question I posed, is the culture that nonprofits work within. We tend to think about technology in terms of advancing specific programs at specific nonprofits instead of delivering on the promises we have made to fulfill our mission.

Let’s take some time to examine the culture in which we do our work. Let’s bring programmers to the table before we spec out our programmatic work (hat tip to Tompkins Spann) and rule out the possibility of working toward our mission in full partnership with the nonprofits that also work in our area.

My "Mashup of 29+ Social Action Platforms" could be a first step toward this vision. I’m trying to create a meta-level “cloud” of all social action opportunities that individuals can take in support of nonprofits, independent projects, and specific outcomes. This “cloud” draws from 16 social action platforms, and offers real opportunities for individuals to engage with social issues. Often these opportunities are created by individuals themselves.

The "cloud," once turned into “a search engine for social change,” ‘’a map of social change,” or “a recommendation engine for social change” will result in an integration of the nonprofit sector in ways we can’t fully imagine.

Through “A Mashup of 29+ Social Action Platforms,” social action platforms like Change.org, SixDegrees, DonorsChoose, ZaZengo, and others are showing that opening data to 3rd party developers can result in more opportunities for engagement and (I hate to borrow from Milton Friedman) “lift all boats.”

On the fly technology-enabled coalition building is the future of nonprofit tech. Getting there won’t be easy. Thank you to the presenters I met yesterday for sparking these reflections.

PS – The enthusiasm for my work that Idealist.org founder Ami Dar offered toward the end of last night, during the Calder Strategies launch party, served as extra affirmation that I’m on the right track. Thanks Ami! I’ll make sure Idealist.org knows about the open-API of social action opportunities as soon as it’s ready. In the meantime, people can test drive the mashup here.

PPS – If you like what I'm up to, please cast a vote for "A Mashup of 29+ Social Action Platforms" in the NetSquared Mashup Challenge. (Voting ends on Monday, March 24 at 5PM PST)

Help me out by posting this request on Facebook

Dear readers,

I am asking for your support in an online contest called the NetSquared Mashup Challenge.

Below, you will find simple instructions on how you can vote for my contest submission. Your support will help me attend a conference in San Jose at the end of May and take my work in micro-philanthropy to the next level.

It will take 20 minutes at the most to complete this request.

I have spent the last 18 months working independently on my blog, About Micro-Philanthropy and building Social Actions.

Without financial support, I have devoted my time and computer skills to advancing the notion that technology, used in the right way, can help people create, identify, and support grassroots solutions to urgent social problems.

I want to continue this work. But to do so, I need to find funders, foundations, and collaborators in the nonprofit technology sector who are interested in my mission. Enter an online contest called the NetSquared Mashup Challenge.

About the NetSquared Mashup Challenge

In early January, NetSquared put out a call for the most innovative mashups for social change. A mashup is an online tool that combines multiple data sources with some kind of visualization or search function. To determine which contest submissions are the most innovative, the staff at NetSquared decided to “crowd-source” the winners. Anyone and everyone can vote for their favorite mashup proposals.

The polls opened on Monday at 8am. And they will be closing on Friday at 5pm PST.

The 20 mashup proposals with the most votes will attend the annual NetSquared Conference in San Jose, May 27 & 28, 2008. During the conference, the creators of the 20 most popular mashups will have a chance to pitch their projects to funders, foundations, and fellow nonprofit tech professionals. I hope to be among the people promoting their mashups at the conference.

About My Contest Submission

I have submitted a project called “A Mashup of 29+ Social Action Platforms.” My mashup combines the latest peer-to-peer social change campaigns from a range of social action platforms (Change.org, FirstGiving, GiveMeaning, Kiva, and others). The dataset as a whole is made available through a search engine and the Google Maps API.

A colleague and I built the initial version last week. You can test drive it here.

To read the full description of my project, visit “A Mashup of 29+ Social Action Platforms.”

In brief:

I feel strongly that these innovations will move the field of peer-to-peer social change in the right direction. The goal is to simplify the process in finding relevant campaigns for end users of social action platforms.

At this point, I need votes in order to secure a spot among the top 20 mashups for social change. Please take just 20 minutes to vote for “A Mashup of 29+ Social Action Platforms.” Thank you in advance for your support.

Simple Instructions for Casting Your Ballot

1) Create a free user account at NetSquared

2) Add "A Mashup of 29+ Social Action Platforms" to your ballot (You must be logged-in to do this; at the top of my proposal page, click "Add Project to Ballot")

3) Add four other mashups to your ballot

4) Review your ballot (Make sure "A Mashup of 29+ Social Action Platforms" is listed)

5) At the bottom of your ballot, click the "Cast Ballot" button

Note: The ballot submission process is a little bit confusing. If you get lost in the process, email me.

Thank you so much for your support!

After you have cast your ballot, please email me. This is the only way for me to know when to send a thank you note.

Thank you so much! I’ll let you know how it turns out.

All the best,

Peter

PS -- If you have a blog, I’d appreciate any link love you can share. Email me a link to your blog post, and I'll be sure to post a comment.

Tom Watson, author of the upcoming book CauseWired: Plugging in, Getting Involved, Changing the World, has recently published a reflection (not quite a case study) of the Sharing Foundation's success during last month's America's Giving Challenge.

Here's an excerpt:

For background on America's Giving Challenge, see this December 2007 article from Forbes Magazine, Giving Like an Entrepreneur.

This morning, I received a press release from Firstgiving about new features on their platform for person-to-perosn fundraising.

Earlier this year, fundraising blogger Paolo Ferrara asked eighteen nonprofit tech professionals to write up predictions for online fundraising in 2008. Below is the slideshare version of his findings.

For even more techy insights, see ReadWriteWeb's presentation on web technology trends.

Note: The slides are in English but Ferrara's blog is mostly in Italian.

| View | Upload your own

Below is a remixed version of the presentation I made last Tuesday at the NY Tech Meetup. I have selected the excerpts that relate to my proposal on the NetSquared Mashup Challenge, and created the following video.

Please post your comments on NetSquared.

Social Actions at the NY Tech MeetupLast night, the NY Tech Meetup hosted a conversation with 6 social action practitioners (myself included) about the future of organizing.

Presenters included: Jordan Goldberg (Stickk.com), Jesse Richards (MeetUp), Paul Miller (School of Everything), Andrew Mason (ThePoint), Clay Shirky (Here Comes Everybody), and myself.

For notes from each presentation, see Sanford Dickert's live blogging of the event. A big thank you to Scott Heiferman and Dawn Barber for organizing the event and inviting me to speak.

I used my time to provide an overview of the peer-to-peer social change field, quickly demo Social Actions, and then make a pitch for my proposal on the NetSquared Mashup Challenge.

I have audio from the event, and will spend tomorrow preparing the archived presentations and subsequent Q&A.

Update 3/12/08: I have uploaded the presentations to my profile on Blip.TV.

In the meantime, here are the slides from my presentation.

| View | Upload your own

Note: The third slide of this presentation didn't convert well to the SlideShare format. It should read: 29+ social action platforms, each with its own: User base, Facbeook app, Tag cloud, Reputation system, Widget system, Payment method, and Fee structure

Last month, a friend from Montreal wrote to me for suggestions on how to raise money for an organization she had come across several years ago in Peru. She was about to return to the country and wanted to bring good news in the form of a micro-philanthropy campaign that would support the organization's community projects.

The only problem: she didn’t know anything about micro-philanthropy.

Below are my suggestions to her. I’m posting them here as a resources to anyone thinking of raising money and support for an inspiring organization they meet while traveling...

FIRST, you will need materials:

• Digital pictures of the group at work, preferably from this trip
• Video footage of your trip
• An interview with the founder and a few interviews with the people involved. You can translate and put subtitles on these materials later in the campaign.
• Footage of the group’s workspace and the community where they are based.
• Ask the people you're visiting to state their needs in their own words. If you can get the group to write a “fundraising letter/solicitation” explaining their situation, then you’ll be in good shape. If you can get them to read it to you (and record it), then you're micro-philanthropy campaign will be smoking.
• Facts and figures about the region/issue you’re focusing on

All of these materials will help give your micro-philanthropy campaign its proper voice -- in the end, the campaign will appear created by and for the organization in question. You will be the messenger and nothing more.

SECOND, you need to think about what the fundraiser will accomplish:

• How much are you trying to raise?
• Who are you trying to get involved?
• How will you deliver the funds?
• Where will the money go once it’s collected?
• What will the donations make possible?

These are questions that potential donors will want answers to. If you can anticipate as many questions as possible, and provide comprehensive answers, then you're more likely to gain the trust needed to get more people to donate. Posting an FAQ will help in soliciting donations from the extended network of your friends and family, and from the people who come across your campaign by chance.

THIRD, you need to pick the right combination of social action platforms and tools.

For now, all you need to know is that you're going to use a combination of 'social action platforms and tools' to spread word about the fundraiser and receive donations. You can explain to the staff at the nonprofit that you're going to use new online tools to make the micro-philanthropy campaign spread to people who have never heard of the organization.

Also, you can assure them that you'll provide the exact names of the tools and platforms that you plan to use before the campaign is launched. Some of these platforms will be commercial. Some will be strictly nonprofit. It's important that the staff members at the organization know how their message is getting out. This will keep them in the loop and also give them the possibility of using these tools on their own to reach donors at some point in the future.

Raising money for an international organization is not easy. Most social action platforms are geared to U.S.-based nonprofits. As a result, you have two main options:

1. GiveMeaning is a social action platform based in Canada that can help you find an official organization through which to pass the funds. This will help produce the tax-receipts for 'donors' who want them.
2. ChipIn is a tool that will permit you to raise money with a specific fundraising goal in mind and receive donations through a PayPal account. In other words, you wouldn't have to worry about finding an organization to distribute the funds. If you use ChipIn, you can simply transfer the money from PayPal to a bank account or make periodic distributions from PayPal to the organization via PayPal. A third payment method would be to transfer the money from PayPal to yourself and then write a check and mail it.

GiveMeaning and ChipIn on their own won't produce the desired result. You'll want to enlist a range of social media tools and social networking sites to fully disseminate the message. Basically, there are a few things you'll want to do:

• Create a Flickr account with photos of the group and your trip
• Invite your friends to donate by email
• Invite your friends to invite their friends
• Thank people who contribute as soon as they donate
• List the campaign on Change.org as a “change”
• Perhaps start a blog for your fundraiser
• Perhaps create a Facebook group for the organization.
• Definitely compile the video footage into an actual online video that people can send around through YouTube
• Update the website of the organization (if they have one).
• And the list goes on.

CNN also has suggestions on launching a successful micro-philanthropy campaign.

I hope these suggestions provide you with enough information to get started.

All the best, Peter

Last week, The Case Foundation published official statistics and a message about America’s Giving Challenge and The Causes Giving Challenge.

Here's an excerpt from the message:

While the overall numbers are impressive, the detailed statistics are perhaps the most useful to nonprofits. (Note: The numbers below represent The Case Foundation's findings as of 26 February 2008. Changes may be published in the coming weeks).

In June 2007, I compiled benchmark figures for group fundraising based on the statistics from five social action platforms: SixDegrees, GiveMeaning, JustGive.org, ChipIn, and Firstgiving. The chart below presents the figures from America's Giving Challenge and The Causes Giving Challenge in comparison to those benchmark figures.

Can nonprofits learn something from Barack Obama’s online fundraising success? This is the subject of a recent discussion over at NTEN.

For me, the short answer is, “Yes, they can.”

For the long answer, I’d recommend the final section of Anthony Barnnett’s Taking Obama Seriously. Barnnett argues that the digital natives running Obama’s campaign have achieved online successes unlike any other candidate because their message, style, and form have matched the new medium.

What does this mean for nonprofits? It’s not enough to put interns in charge of your social media strategy. The entire organization -- from its executive director and board members down to rank and file supporters -- need to adjust to the changing communications environment in order to stay relevant.

To develop a consistent personality online, new positions should be created that require the expertise and intuition of digital natives. Communications and development directors should update their skill sets. Executive drectors should start blogging. And most importantly, nonprofits should not be fearful of empowering extra-organizational activists to promote their work online and recruit new donors.

Here are a few excerpts from Taking Obama Seriously:

The coming weeks are bound to see many more blog posts on how nonprofits can base their communications and development strategies on the "Obama model". If you know of other articles on this subject, please post a link in the comments section below.

For a contrary view to the notion that nonprofits need to embrace social media, see The NonProfit Times article, Social Networking Becoming Old Technology In A Hurry.