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Thoughts on Click and Give Sites
By Jayne Cravens, April 2000
The March 23 issue of the Chronicle of Philanthropy profiled web sites that allow users to generate donations for an organization just by clicking and viewing the site. The most well known is probably the Hunger Site [http://www.thehungersite.com], which generates donations from advertisers to the United Nations World Food Programme each time a visitor visits the site (limited to one visit each day).
Several sites follow this model, as reported by the Chronicle of
Philanthropy, including:
Quoted in the article is Howard Lake, a fund-raising consultant in the U.K. who is well known among online nonprofit circles. He
questioned whether the new sites are sending the right message: "Do they really want to give donors the impression that giving is both painless and can cost them nothing?"
This last sentence really struck me -- it says what I've been thinking for some time both about these "click and give" sites and about how some people portray the "ease" of virtual volunteering, as though it is so simple that it takes no real time or commitment.
The want of a way to support something that is both "painless" and costs nothing is what drives the continued forwarding of e-mail "petitions" in support of the National Endowment for the Arts, National Public Radio, oppressed women in Afghanistan, some child somewhere collecting postcards to get into the Guiness Book of World Records, and so forth. Of course, these petitions do NO good, as those being petitioned would never take such seriously (e-mail petitions are easily forged and there's no one willing to verify the "signatures"). But still, these petitions continue, with senders thinking they've done some good just by forwarding an e-mail.
Successful, meaningful online advocacy and virtual volunteering take real time, real effort, and real standards. Maybe instead of trying to make it all easier to do, we should concentrate on educating potential donors of time or money about what long-term, effective, meaningful support of our causes looks like.
Just a thought....
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Jayne Cravens <vv@serviceleader.org>
Manager, Virtual Volunteering Project
http://www.serviceleader.org/vv/
and TxServe
http://www.txserve.org
at the University of Texas at Austin
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