Direct Relationships: Individual donor engagement
The Power of Many: From Smart Mobs to Cause Mobs
Vetting Innovation
Ashoka’s Citizen-Base Initiative
Charitable Idol
Case Foundation Giving Challenge [and Slate takes a look]
Long Haul Communities of Innovation
Knowledge Management
Record attendance at digital media gatherings at NCG in 2007 and significant demand for streaming archive.
As a support organization for grantmakers we realize we need to provide one-click access to learning
The tools have different meaning for different parts of the philanthropic enterprise
Program Officers: new ways to build knowledge of the field and engage with grantees
Communications Staff: new methods for the message
Technologists: the thrill / specter of open source
Research Staff: increased integration of data
Trustees: the right feed for a regulatory environment
The motivation for understanding oscillates between philanthropy’s need to understand what practices to support in grantees and what practices to adopt for itself
Alison Fine’s Foundation Report on Web 2.0 for the Overbrook Foundation
The “shared space” of grantmakers and grantees in partnership for change is not widely evident
The Buck Foundation’s Buck Scholars Private Intranet is on Facebook
California Council for the Humanities is launching a collector
The adoption of web 2.0 is of course about technology and more of course about culture change. How do we reconcile philanthropy’s culture of individualism with the wisdom of crowds? [ Grantmaking in a Web 2.0 World ] Is the web -- many small pieces loosely joined -- making old grantmaking practices in advocacy and democratic engagement obsolete? What does grantmaking in an interactive world look like? Remember that Web 2.0 moves extremely fast. Is that compatible with reflective practice?
Mars Needs Wisdom. As these new tools for giving emerge, a new cohort of givers is participating, with different perspectives on what makes change, and what philanthropy can accomplish. A review of the top Facebook Causes reveals that priorities are very top-level, and don't appear to scratch the surface of understanding of how giving catalyzes long-term change. And while "WidgetGiving" increases participation and spurs innovation, it is preserving a traditional weakness in philanthropy: creating a landscape of unconnected efforts about what’s going in and what’s coming out.
Regional associations, as premiere providers of grantmaker education, can play a vital role in bringing grantmaker experience into the Web 2.0 landscape.
How to Get There