Where Should I Eat? Fast Food Flowchart. Via Debbie.
posted this | this entry's link | speak your mind
| Fast Food | Flow Charts | Food | McDonald's
| Math | Scary | Topology
I like to give people gear. Being a gearhead, I don't want all hoard all my research on which doohickey is the absolute best doohickey to solve your doodad problem. Gear is useful, and it's the kind of thing that non-gearheads don't usually buy for themselves.
Today's gear guide: Keychain Stuff!
That's all for today's gift guide. Go Give Gear!
| Gear | Gift Guide | Gifts | Tools
So there's been quite the debate going on in the NPIN (Nonprofit / Philanthropy / Internet Nexus, a term I just invented) about Kiva. Kiva is a microlending site where you can pick an entrepreneur and make them a loan. (Sort of a P2P Grameen Foundation.) Poor people get to start their own businesses, you actually get your money back (to re-loan or cash out), what's not to like?
Well, the problem is in that "pick an entrepreneur" part. Apparently all the entrepreneurs on the site have already received their loans. Their stories are real, and the funds you gave will actually help them, but the idea that you are choosing where your funds are going is an illusion.
Lots of debate is going on, from an opening salvo (Kiva Is Not Quite What It Seems) to the CEO's response. You can read more over on the Tactical Philanthropy blog, whose author was kind enough to put my comment into its own post. I'll reproduce here for those of you who won't read any other site than Ishbadiddle:
The central issue, to me, isn't that the pool of money is fungible (i.e., my donation goes into a large pool, out of which the partners are funded, out of which individual loans are made). Nor is the question of microphilanthropy vs. the need to fund overhead. The issue is that Kiva implies that the lender's choice helps determine who gets a loan.Kiva gives the impression that if lenders do not fund a project, that project will not happen. Right now there's a project with $250 left to go, and it "expires" in 8 hours, 15 minutes. That gives me a sense of urgency. I might even give the whole amount. But if the loan has already been made, then the "expiration" isn't true. There is no real choice.
I worked for a number of years at DonorsChoose.org, and I can tell you that giving donors an actual choice is hard. Good projects will go unfunded. You have to return credits to donors who have partially funded a project that never happened, and convince them to reapply those funds to a new project, which itself might not be fully funded, etc. Tracking it all is no piece of cake, either. But if you don't do all of this, you're not being transparent, and you're not giving your donors real choice.
I don't believe that microphilanthropy (or microfinance, peer-to-peer giving, etc.) is a good solution for most problems. DonorsChoose.org has an advantage, in that they are funding discrete classroom projects within public schools, but do not have to fund the infrastructure of the schools themselves. Most problems just couldn't be solved in this way. ("I'd like to fund only the violas in the orchestra, please.") But if you're going to advertise yourself as giving choice to the donor, you'd better do it.
I must say that I'm disappointed in Kiva. Time to switch to GlobalGiving?
posted this | this entry's link | speak your mind | Kiva | Microcredit | Microlending | Non-Profit Sector
Containing a capital letter or two. From the person who showed us How Your Blog Can Get You Fired.
posted this | this entry's link | speak your mind | How To | Twitter
Cross-posted from my Social Actions blog.
We here at Social Actions have been hard at work this summer trying to improve our serve. Not the tennis kind, the volunteering kind! And if you haven't heard already, it's time to sign up for a great opportunity to improve your serve -- Mozilla Service Week!
During Mozilla Service Week, tech-savvy volunteers all over the globe are going to help meet the technology needs of individuals, schools, community groups, and non-profits. If you're reading this on the web, you're qualified to help out. Teach your grandma how to use the Internet. Refit that old laptop in the closet with Linux and open source software and donate it to your local community center. Get together with your friends, find out what help non-profits need, and pledge your support!
Another way you can help is to spread the word to people and groups who might need technology help, so they can post a volunteer opportunity.
We've helped Mozilla bring together an amazing group of Friends to ensure the success of Mozilla Service Week:
Join in and improve your serve!
posted this | this entry's link | speak your mind | MozService09 | Social Actions | Volunteering
"We completely understand the public's concern about futuristic robots feeding on the human population, but that is not our mission," stated Harry Schoell, Cyclone's CEO. [HT: Colin]
posted this | this entry's link | speak your mind | Robots | Weird Science | Zombies
Cross-posted from my Social Actions blog.
Lots of links relating to social media, social enterprise, and the non-profit sector. I hope that some are new and useful to you!
| Social Actions | Social Enterprise | Social Media | Social Software
Most expensive javascript ever? Via Gadgetopia.
posted this | this entry's link | speak your mind | Opera (Browser) | Programming
| Fast Food | Food | Sustainability
Cross-posted from my Social Actions blog.
I've worked in a lot of non-profit organizations, and one thing that most of them have had in common is the lack of an IT department. As a geek-in-residence, I've done double duty as LAN administrator, PC repairman, software trainer, and help desk. (Then there's the time when I was removing bugs -- real bugs. Roaches like the nice warm motherboard to snuggle up to.) In addition to, you know, my regular job. So I've picked up a few things here and there.
One thing that is often overlooked is the importance of off-site backup. Let's face it, most of us know that it's important to backup, but how often are you actually doing it? And even if you've got your files automatically backed up to the network, what happens if the building burns down? You need to back up your important data off site. Think of it as Data Insurance.
Personally, I've been very happy with Amazon's service. You download an app called JungleDisk, tell it which directories you want to back up, and it sits silently in the background making sure your data is backed up (and encrypted) to Amazon's servers. You're charged based on how much you back up. And they support Kiva!
Another outfit I haven't tried is DigitalBucket. They're offering 5G of free storage to 501(c)(3) non-profits in the US and registered charities abroad. See their offer here.
Now go forth, and back up!
posted this | this entry's link | 1 comment | Backup | DigitalBucket | Digital Tools | Free | Social Actions | Social Enterprise | Storage | Unasked-for Advice
As you know, I've been doing the independent-consultant thing for the last six months or so, mostly with ImprovEdge and now with Social Actions which is working to philanthropize the web. More on that later.
Working from home has its benefits (unlimited coffee, relaxed wardrobe standards) but it's certainly not as productive as going to an office. Perhaps it's just my mindset, or the number of distractions here ("Did I water the plants?"), or, you know, kids who want to play with you.
But I hate working in a café. The music's loud, finding a seat is annoying, WiFi slow if present. Plus there's the "how much should I spend here in order to justify my ass taking up a seat?" factor. And forget about trying to make phone calls.
You know what Brooklyn needs, I thought. It's a place where you can rent a quiet cubicle for a few hours, plug in, and do your stuff. Fortunately, the folks at the Brooklyn Creative League had the same idea, and went and built it. So I now have a part-time office space! Check it out:
| Office Space | Park Slope
An interesting article on strategy for Google, Apple, and Microsoft.
posted this | this entry's link | speak your mind | Google | Microsoft
Lehman Sits on Bomb of Uranium Cake as Prices Slump. Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. is sitting on enough uranium cake to make a nuclear bomb as it waits for prices of the commodity to rebound, according to traders and nuclear experts.
Now if GM starts buying centrifuges, we know we're all in trouble.
posted this | this entry's link | 2 comments | Lehman Brothers | Nuclear Weapons | Wall Street | Yellowcake
happy 5th birthday, subservient chicken (via MeFi:
We needed to make less than 400 video clips seem like millions through sleight of hand and clever ambiguousness. I came up with some Actionscript, inspired by a program I had written when i was like 10 on my Commodore 64, which was in turn Inspired by the movie War Games. Replaced "How about a nice game of Chess?" with "Have it your way," and we were off to the races.There were two things about this that made it really exciting for me. First was that I had not just done simple keyword matching, where you would get all the results that matched a given word. I devised a system for matching phrases, words and fragments. Then the script would give a score for each possible video clip based on those phrases, and serve the highest scoring video. Second was that we decided to have everyone in the company participate in adding words and phrases to the data set. The catch was, that only a few people in the company knew what any video clip was supposed to be. So, we had people describing clips not based on what was shot, but what they perceived to be the shot. (The former psychology student in me LOVED this methodology). It made all the difference. Stuff we never thought about when making the shot-list magically seemed more descriptive of the video clips than the original.
Hard to believe that was five years ago. Blogdex. Remember Blogdex?
| Chickens | Fast Food | Memes | Viral Advertising
-- via BoingBoing
Why we think it's OK to cheat and steal
| AIG | Crime | Economics | Great Recession | Psychology
"34% use Advertising, 12% a Variable Subscription model, and 8% each for Virtual Products (typically digital downloads), Related Products (typically a large software company offering a free product to attract you to their platform) and Pay-Per-Use." Ah, I remember when Sell / Exit ("Create a popular application/website, then make it someone else's problem to monetize e.g. YouTube") was the only way to go. 1999, where did you go?
posted this | this entry's link | speak your mind
" a few recent glimpses into some of the places and lives affected by what some are calling the Great Recession.". Via BoingBoing.
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The Untold Story of the World's Biggest Diamond Heist
posted this | this entry's link | 1 comment
Chuck E. Cheese Character Training Video
posted this | this entry's link | speak your mind | Fast Food | Pizza
