The online (micro)charity organization ‘Crowdrise‘ has grown in presence and influence since its founding a bit over a year ago. Its goal was/is to raise money by encouraging people to sign onto ‘teams’ that use their social-media presences to reach out to their friends. The team thus pools its time and the money collected, and […]
Harsh Op-Ed On ‘Charitable Scrooges’
Debates about social media as catalyst, about political responses to economic crises, about open internets, about the care of our health… can help us sharpen our own positions and/or encourage us to take on ideas that we had avoided. This particular blog outlet tends to focus on the nexus of nonprofits, politics, and communications technologies, […]
If Charities Can Not Market Apps, Then Text Them Your Support
So Apple is uninterested in working with the nonprofit and charitable community to give them access to the iTunes Store for money raising. There are other ways that bypass the Byzantine process of Apple acceptance and still offer means to support (some of) your favorite charities with your mobile device. Even your iPhone: Texting donations […]
#Philanthropy: Apple – The Bad Apple In The Corporate Philanthropic Bushel?
We have often discussed the roles corporate philanthropy plays both in supporting environmental, social, educational (etc.) causes and in the arguments that corporations should not be preemptively philanthropic as corporations (though even those who criticize ‘Corporate Social Responsibility’/CSR tend to encourage share-holders to be philanthropic). A recent argument has flared up over Apple’s unwillingness to […]
How Is It That Higher Educational And Cultural Institutions Still Manage To Raise The Big Bucks?
As we have often discussed on this blog, charity giving has taken a notable downturn with the economy over the last couple of years. Nevertheless, that downturn has not been as steep as the economy itself, suggesting people’s ongoing commitments to help others and try to have a greater influence with their money than boosting […]
Resolved: Social Media Produces Social Good (Part 2: Arguments For The Negative)
In the debate over the influence social media has in steering social and/or political movements, the assumption seems generally to be that, yes, the ‘socially-engaged’ businesses, philanthropies, NGOs, etc., have found meaningful ways to leverage SM to further their causes. Two oft-cited examples are the impact that groups like MoveOn.org had in the election of […]
Resolved: Social Media Produces Social Good (Part 1: Arguments For The Affirmative)
As a buildup to our upcoming Perspectives interview with Kristen Cambell, Director of Programs and New Media the National Conference on Citizenship, that will be published this Thanksgiving week, we wanted to point our loyal readers to a brewing debate about social media as a change-agent for good – that social media have the capabilities […]
It’s Cool – And Lucrative – To Be Mobile. Is It Smart?
Today we again turn to the polling giant Nielsen, who have published a survey of over 5000 consumers who have a mobile device and how life situations influence their choices of mobile device and the ways they use it. In this particular survey, the questions focused on who used their mobile device to follow (or […]