Manifesto for Microphilanthropy
Microphilanthropy is the Next Big Thing. It’ll be a child of the Age of Choice - the same way humans no longer tune into a channel an Watch What Is On, but instead flick through the hundreds of channels the AoC has made available to them (or, pushing it to an AoC extreme, go to Youtube and search for their entertainment - i.e. micro-personalises his/her experience). No longer will mass campaigns, focused at the head of the curve, be the dominant force in philanthropy - the Long Tail phenomenon that has revolutionised industries like bookselling, electronics retailing, publishing, music, the arts, TV, etc, will also hit charity.
We will see a move from charities and foundations as monolithic armies of street teams and envelope lickers on the donor side, and reasonably large and static deployments of Western expat “missionary” forces on the ground, receiver side - to an entirely new model for charitable institutions, much more like a telephone exchange of old - operators, there to connect you to the ground level, to the cause you care passionately about - even though nobody else in your social circle, neighbourhood or even city cares about it. The Internet will bring enough ‘freaks’ like you together to make the world move in that specific, totally unique way that resonates so strongly with you). The ground level will need to be mobile and flexible and able to react to spontaneous coming-together of interest groups - taken to an extreme, that is a concept I call ’smartmob philanthropy’ and to be totally flexible and responsive on the ground level, it’s going to need Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” of the markets. But that’s not my focus today. I’m looking donor-side.
Future charities will need to make themselves as transparent and connective as they possibly can - a no bullshit, no interruptions, constant connection with your cause. Keep the pipeline up, and they can get more dollars flowing from your bank account than a mass media, totally untargeted mailout, TV spot or street ‘attack’ could ever have. You, as a donor, have so much more than just money to offer, if you can be connected with causes you care about. You can become its greatest advocate in your social circle, far more persuasive and actionable than some well-meaning spotty teenager in a fluorescent bib with a clipboard and a nametag could ever be. You can also be a source of inspiration, networking and innovation to those on the ground level receiving your passionate support.
The Internet is the key technology. My generation, unlike that of my parents, has grown up totally native and accustomed to the Age of Choice - we go to iTunes and we download the music that resonates intimately with us - mainstream radio bores us. The AoC is an unstoppable force - every message, every experience - marketing, entertainment, retail, google ads - trend towards becoming ever more tailored, customised. Charity can’t stick to standard, mass broadcast modes. With the internet, it has infinite gallery space and a rich framework for recommendation tools - old charity is stuck in the mentality of mailing out 3 page pamphlets in which it can only hold one story, aimed at tugging the heartstrings of an entire population - and FORCING the message through with the spotty clipboard brigade or other rude and aggressive moves like including a pen with the mailed-out pamphlet.
Time for a change.
[I suppose the only reason philanthropy is so far behind every other Internet-revolutionised industry is the lack of market forces - it's damn hard enough getting a dollar out of you, let alone competing for it against other charities. That'll change.]
Related:
- Microphilanthropy is to traditional charity what dual core processors are to single-core processors
- An interesting comment popped up after my "manifesto for microphilanthropy" post. In it, it was suggested that micropayment was important for microphilanthropy. I disagree, and here's why (this is a reblog of my reply:) Pure commoditisation - which ultimately, is what needs micropayment - is almost the exact opposite of microphilanthropy! It leads to donation requests getting so micro as to make the donation they ask for so small that potential donors can't be bothered to do it - it's too much effort to get your wallet out, type in the card details, etc (hence the need for micropayment systems to get over this transaction barrier). Microphilanthropy is not (in my eyes) the act of commoditising charity into tiny, massmarketed, micropayment experiences (i.e. micro-donations by millions of people) - it's about fostering a Long Tail in our new hyperconnected world. The micro relates more to the size of the niche - specific families, specific stories - than to the size of the donation. Micro-donation is an alternative model for charity more suited to the existing, highly institutionalised model of philanthropy (but could be very important/useful to it, so also requires discussion) There's no reason why average donations can't stay relatively...
- Future trends in philanthropy: targeted donation, wikicharity
- I was browsing around WikiLeaks (a site's that's been in the news a lot recently - it collects whistleblower evidence and exposes it to the world; like WikiPedia, it's collectively and openly administered and edited) for JPMorgan/Bear Sterns content. Not much there so far, except this clever investment vehicle JP Morgan has invented to allow insider trading. Sucks to be you, external stakeholder. Anyhow. What interested me was their 'business model' (it's not-for-profit, to be clear). When whistleblowers submit evidence of evil, that goes up for all to see. Wikileaks takes charge of taking that, doing additional background research on the story, and writing it up as a press release (the JPMorgan insider trading write-up can be seen here). It's an important step in a day when newsrooms are increasingly under pressure to survive (and thus to get to stories as quickly and efficiently as possible). But it costs money. The business model is this: 'targeted donation' requests on the leaked documents page. Rather than generally be a supporter of wikileaks, I enable/provide direction to its work by restricting my donation to particular issues I care about (the 'Sudan Appeal' type of charity function, writ large, writ standard). I see...
- NYTimes: The Prize Economy and Philanthropy
- There's an interesting introductory article (albeit a little light on substance) in the NYTimes today on these multimillion dollar prizes that seem to be proliferating these days, incentivising philanthropic (usually tech-focused) progress. Recent examples include the Ansari X Prize (space travel, $10m) , Google.org RechargeIT (energy efficient cars, $10m) - which is similar in its theme to the Automotive X Prize, the Archon X Prize (genomic sequencing, $10m) and the Google Lunar X Prize ($30 million). Several more prizes are in the pipeline, too - mainly the X Prize Foundation's pipeline! There's no question that these work. Space travel had, indeed, slowed after the frenzied Space Races of yore. The $10 million offered a strong incentive for teams to deliver commercially viable spaceflight - the money is there, they just had to deliver - and deliver better than rival teams! The Lunar X prize should hopefully keep the momentum going. But looking at the list above, does anyone think current philanthropic prizes are somewhat limited in size and scope? And for all their benefit to humanity, the public is merely a spectator in all of this, as well-funded teams of experts battle it out for cash offered up by extremely...
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July 18, 2008 at 7:03 pm
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