Why don’t more companies operate this way? The world would certainly be a better place if they did.

[via A VC]

The story of HIV/AIDS in Tanzania, and the struggle of a group of orphans all infected with the virus.

I’m going to Kenya and Ghana knowing full well these are the types of stories I’m going to hear — and I’m looking forward to hearing them.

You can view more awesome technologies here on the Kopernik website.

[via MicrofinanceHub]

I bought Fortune on my Kindle (magazines on the Kindle are awesome by the way) this morning and the first article was about the “fundraising” initiative — the Giving Pledge – Warren Buffett and Bill & Melinda Gates are undertaking to convince the world’s billionaires to pledge 50% of their net worth to philanthropic causes by the end of their life. This is probably the biggest fundraiser ever embarked on in history — and it’s being embarked on by two of the richest men in the world. Fortune estimated the campaign could bring $600 billion to charities. That’s a massive massive number and regardless of how many billionaires and millionaires sign on to the pledge, it’s going to make a gigantic impact on the world’s poor in a number of areas across the globe.

Here is Warren Buffet’s personal pledge:

More than 99% of my wealth will go to philanthropy during my lifetime or at death. Measured by dollars, this commitment is large. In a comparative sense, though, many individuals give more to others every day.

I really really recommend you read the entire document. If Buffett can give 99%, then surely other billionaires can give 50%. I expect Gates and Buffett to be hugely successful in their campaign simply due to the unbelievable example they are setting.

One excerpt from Buffet’s pledge that doesn’t really relate to the pledge, but particularly resonated with me:

The asset I most value, aside from health, is interesting, diverse, and long-standing friends.

It’s great to hear someone with so much experience say what he values most in life is the same as what I value.

I’m thrilled to have been asked by Sloane Berrent to participate in her newly announced “Cause It’s Summer” series on the C The Causemopolitan. What is it? From her blog post:

A fun new series on The Causemopolitan where guest bloggers tell THEIR stories and share their reasons of what giving back means to them, where to start, and how to get involved TODAY.

I’ll post a link to my guest post here once it goes live in early July!

I thought this “Thank you to our volunteers” video put together by the team at Vittana was an extremely smart move on their part. Creating videos such as this that portray the personality behind an organization is exactly the way to go about building stronger relationships with existing volunteers and humanize the organization further for potential volunteers. There are no shortage of organizations out there who are seeking help from volunteers, so each and every one must attempt to stand out from the rest — and often that comes down to personal relationships, which can only be built via getting to know the team.

I got an email from my friend Lindsey Maxfield, the Communities and Operations Manager for Vittana, a week or so ago thanking me for volunteering my time with a link to the video above, but didn’t watch it until yesterday (I know, I’m behind). I’ve met the entire core Vittana team and they are all amazing individuals passionate about providing access to higher education via student loans in the developing world. I’ve known their CEO Kushal for several years as a result of both of us residing in Seattle – at least until I decided to pack up shop and relocate – and being involved in the local microfinance community; he’s as sharp as they come. Everyone only has so many hours in the day to give their time. I’m happy to be part of the new Vittana Ambassadors program, and I can firmly say that it’s the time that I’ve spent with their team over the past few years that got me interested in the program. At the end of the day, people want to spend time with and work for people they can relate to — and it’s easy for me to relate to the entire Vittana team.

If you want to get more involved with Vittana, there is more information here. In addition, I believe they are also looking for a Marketing Manager. Or of course you can lend to a student such as Beatriz Urado Medina from Peru.

Are you a real estate professional just jumping into the social media and online world, and looking for some help navigating the waters? If that’s you, THIS is the opportunity for you. Seriously. It’s a “Real Estate Web Marketing” package on ebay including over $9,000 in VALUE that includes products and services from a range of companies and individuals that can help you understand and utilize the web to grow your business. Starting bid is only $500. And the best part — though it will cost you money, all the proceeds benefit Mothers Fighting for Others (the charity I just blogged about the other day) and help build an orphanage in Kenya; none of the individuals or service providers make a dime. The auction was coordinated by the Dakno team and is being hosted by Jeff and Rocky, so kudos to everyone for pulling this whole thing together. Of course, a huge thanks has to go to Mike Mueller, Diverse Solutions, Altos Research, Dakno Marketing, Active Rain, Real Estate Shows, and Nicole Nicolay for donating their time/services to the cause. Since I’m such a big fan of helping others, I of course volunteered some of my personal time to the overall cause in the way of an hour of consulting time.

Here are more details:

Starting Bid is $500

The Following Have Graciously Donated Their Products or Services For This Charity Auction
All proceeds benefit Mothers Fighting For Others and their mission to provide orphaned girls in Kenya with opportunities their parents would have provided, if they only could; a loving and nurturing environment and a quality education, so they can learn, thrive and achieve their highest potential. #MFFO #50kfor50k

ActiveRain – $715 Total Value
One Full Year Membership with the following:

* $348 – RainMaker
* $159 – RainCamp Ticket (closest Location to winner)
* $108 – Localism Sponsorship – 1 local community
* $100 – Outside Blog (includes support)
* Feature one post of choice – (complimentary)

Mike Mueller – $500 Total Value

* One Custom Facebook Business Page (Includes 2 custom built tabs)

Dakno Marketing – $2682 Total Value

* SwiftSite with 5 hours additional design customization ($925)
* SwiftBlog ($550)
* 1 Year of Hosting both the website and blog ($708)
* Posterous Blog Customization (to match the design of the site/blog) ($199)
* 6 month membership to Dakno’s AllAccess Live Training

RealEstateShows – $1562 Total Values

* A whole office account for up to 50 agents.

Nicole Nicolay – $2000 Total Value

* Donate 2 hours of one-on-one social media coaching via phone/Webinar. Coaching can be used for a specific goal or project, OR a review of current social media strategies and Web presence. Nicole will also provide you with a custom social media plan, including revised/or new goals with recommended implementation tasks. (Total value: $3500)

Altos Research – $960 Total Value

* One Altos report subscription one year (provided they are within their service area)

Diverse Solutions – Value Varies (estimate of $500)

* an IDX for a year (provided they are within their service area)

Drew Meyers – $150 Total Value

* 1 hour of consulting time – SEO, Social Media Marketing, wordpress, or whatever the person wants to talk about.

All proceeds benefit Mothers Fighting For Others. MFFO is a non-profit 501c3 organization (EIN/tax ID number: 26-0320699)

What are you waiting for? BID AWAY!!!

I think this nonprofit – Greenscroll — takes a pretty interesting approach to offsetting the carbon footprint of the internet. Here’s a little bit more about them:

The Internet — we love it, and you do too — but just by reading this sentence, you are already involved in an issue that affects everyone. The Internet uses massive amounts of power 24/7, most of it is polluting the environment and significantly escalating global warming.

Greenscroll is a non-profit organization created to fight climate change in the real world, on the battlefield of the virtual one. Recognizing the growing environmental footprint of the Internet and the infrastructure involved in running it, Greenscroll’s mission is to power the Internet by green renewable energy and help save the Earth. We do so by helping you make your website environmentally friendly. On your behalf, we pump green energy into the grid to power your website and hence the Internet.

If I made more than $5 a month on this blog (I don’t) or ran it as a business, then I’d certainly “green” my site. Maybe in 2011.

[via Mashable]

Social media is an extremely powerful thing if utilized correctly. Some people just have a knack for using it the way it should be used – to make the world a better place. Jeff and Rocky Turner are two of those people that I have a vast amount of respect for. It comes as no surprise to me that they are leading the charge for Mothers Fighting for Others (where Rocky is a board member) and using social media to help fund building an orphanage in Kenya.

Here’s the breakdown of what’s needed to construct an orphanage for 34 girls (here are photos of the girls):

Startup Costs:

• 6 months rent in advance: estimated $12,000 USD.
• Furnishing the home – furniture, beds, sheets, towels, supplies: estimated 10,000 USD

Operation Costs for one year:

• Food – roughly $1 per girl, per day: $12,000 USD per year
• Utilities: estimated $4000
• salaries for six: estimated $12,000 a year
• medical and counciling: $4,000
• personal items such as toilet paper, soap etc: estimated $2,000 a year
• security system for the home: estimated $1,200 a year

As a result of us both being in the RE.net space, I’ve known Jeff for several years now and spent a fair amount of time with him at conferences. I don’t know Rocky quite as well, but as a result of interactions with her online and having met her at a conference or two, she’s certainly no stranger. I even visited the Turner household in February and got a taste of what the “real” Turner household was like (hint: there are six kids involved). Anyone that has met them knows they understand social media and are just all around good human beings working day in, day out to make an impact on the world with the opportunities presented to them. I could not think of better people to oversee the use of my philanthropic dollars — I have 100% confidence that the money will not be wasted in any way and is going toward a worthy cause.

That, my friends, is how social media should be used — to help improve the lives of others.

If you’re reading this, you are better off than at least 90% of the world (if you don’t believe me, read THIS) and I’m sure you can afford to pitch in $10 or $20. And if you can afford $1,000 or more, by all means, go for it!

And if you’re made it this far, one last request — help spread the word by blogging or Tweeting about this!

I recently donated to Redeem Haiti and got a nice, HAND WRITTEN, thank you note in the mail. Thank you for taking the time to send a thank you via postal mail!!

Bill Gates announced that the Gates Foundation will donate $10 billion dollars to the fight against a number of illnesses including AIDS.

One word – AWESOME

For those in Seattle and interested in helping the Haiti effort, there is an event tonight at the Pike Brewery you may be interested in. From the SeaMO blog:

When/Where: January 28th, 6pm-9pm at the Pike Brewery, 1415 First Ave Seattle WA

What: A Benefit to support the work of one of Haiti’s most well-established economic development organizations as they play a key role in emergency relief and long term reconstruction efforts.

Who: Hear from Melanie Howard, the Secretary of Fonkoze’s board of directors and from Charlene Balick of the Grameen Foundation as they describe the current situation and their organizations’ efforts to hasten relief and recovery.

Plus: Live music from Sunday Evening Whiskey Club

Cost: We are suggesting a $20 donation at the door, with all proceeds going directly to Fonkoze.

RSVP at our Facebook Event Page

I want to congratulate Sloane Berrent for being selected as the new MySpace Wall Street Journal Citizen Journalist for Davos! For those interested, you can read more over on her blog.

Sloane Berrent MySpace Journal Davos Submission

Sloane | MySpace Video

I’ve had the pleasure of getting to know Sloane over the past year as a result of helping with her Causeitsmybirthday fundraiser for malaria and have been thoroughly impressed with everything about her. So, congrats, and have fun in Switzerland next week!! I’ll certainly be following the trip virtually!

Please pass it on!

[via ONE Blog]

My old colleague is at it again (see here and here) with another video. This one is an I Want a Goat spoof for charity, which is why I’m so quick to promote it.

Warning: EXPLICIT language

If you enjoyed the video, please consider donating a goat for $20 at http://iwantagoat.com.

…because he does things like this.

For those of you who don’t know (why haven’t you read my last blog post?), there’s a fundraiser tonight at Copper Cart in Belltown — Causeitsmybirthday – Seattle. There is going to be a raffle taking place at this event — everyone who donates at least $15 gets one raffle ticket,  and people can purchase additional tickets for $1. Below are the items that will be raffled off:

Commemorative Plaque of Seattle Supersonics Retired Jerseys

Other items:

1. Portable Music System for iPod
2. DVD player
3. Sue Bird 8×10 autographed photo with a Storm t-shirt & hat – courtesy of Seattle Storm
4. Lauren Jackson 8×10 autographed photo with a Storm t-shirt & hat – courtesy of Seattle Storm
5. Two Tickets to Star Wars in Concert at Key Arena on October 13th
6. Two Tickets to Your Choice of a Seattle Mariners Game
7. Robe from LaCoste
8. Wenger tri-fold hanging kit – 6
9. Wenger hand crafted leather billfold – 16
10. Wenger tri fold wallets – 5

I also want to thank Jordan Woodworth from New Mode Productions — he’ll be photographing the event tonight and will post photos afterward!

Hope to see everyone there!

Over a million people are killed by malaria EVERY SINGLE YEAR. Think about that for a minute, and watch the video below.

Netting Nations PSA – Nets Save Lives! from Netting Nations on Vimeo.

The sad thing is combating malaria can be so simple. Bed nets, which cost about $5 per net.

For those in the Seattle area, there is an event October 7th at Copper Cart Cafe in Belltown that you should attend to help us raise money to buy malaria nets. It’s part of a 7 day, 7 city tour across the US organized by Sloane Berrent and Doug Campbell. The 7 cities are:

• NEW YORK Saturday, October 3rd
• MIAMI Sunday, October 4th
• NEW ORLEANS Monday, October 5th
• CHICAGO Tuesday, October 6th
• SEATTLE Wednesday, October 7th
• SAN FRANCISCO Thursday, October 8th
• LOS ANGELES Friday, October 9th

You can get all the details at Causeitsmybirthday.com. Please help us save lives by donating as much as you can, even if you cannot attend any of the events. If you can’t donate, please consider helping by spreading the word to your personal networks via Twitter, Facebook, Blogging, or — yes — even e-mail! Thanks in advance for any help you can provide.

Note: Sorry for the somewhat short post — I would write more and explain my interest in this event further, but I’m in Prague and not in the mood to spend a few hours behind the keyboard. The important thing to note is that malaria is a cause worth caring about and you can help combat it with as little as $5.

I’m happy to say that I’m spearheading the Housing for Homeless Initiative that will accompany the Seattle RE BarCamp on September 8th. Proceeds will benefit Solid Ground, which is a local Seattle charity.

I am SO glad that Ginger Wilcox got this train started with the fundraiser in San Francisco. Not utilizing the RE BarCamp community to create real change just didn’t sit well with her and she decided to act; nor would it have sat well with me if the Seattle event went over without a fundraiser behind it. For those organizing a RE BarCamp event in your area, please be a “doer” — there aren’t near enough of them in this world. If you need help getting it up and running, ASK. But be prepared to act on it.

Head over to the RE BarCamp blog for more details about the Seattle fundraiser and how you can help!

My friend sent me an article about a local Seattle non profit — the Jolkona Foundation — worth checking out for those passionate about giving back to others. From their about page, their mission is To build awareness and mobilize our youth to support successful community development projects around the world. The site seems somewhat similar to Kiva since it focuses on fund raising for specific people or causes, but much broader in scope as a result of not being limited to microfinance — I’m not saying that being broader in scope is better (there are pros and cons both ways), just different. The organization was founded by Adnan Mahmud and Nadia Khawaja.

I gave it a whirl tonight and feel good that I just spent $25 to plant trees in Maili – and didn’t even have to create a new password on the site to do it (they’ve hooked into Facebook Connect for log-in and Google Checkout for payment)!

Anyway, head over to the Seattle Times to read the whole article.