Category Archives: Philanthropic Technology

The “Power & Influence” of Social Media in Philanthropy

(Update: The Nonprofit Times emailed me to point out that I should have disclosed that I write for the Chronicle of Philanthropy when I wrote this post. They’re right, I should have. I write a monthly column for the Chronicle of Philanthropy.) The Nonprofit Times has released their annual Power & Influence Top 50 list […]

Funders Lagging Nonprofits in Technology Adoption

This is a guest post by Tessie Guillermo, CEO of ZeroDivide, an organization that helps underserved communities realize the transformative power of technology to achieve social progress and economic opportunity. By Tessie Guillermo The demand for technology by nonprofits as a tool for social change has been rising. However, the supply of technology funding has […]

GuideStar Launches Expert Nonprofit Reviews

Last year, GuideStar, Charity Navigator, GiveWell, Philanthropedia, GreatNonprofits and Philanthropy Action put out a joint press release announcing their rejection of overhead expense ratios as the primary approach to evaluating nonprofits. GuideStar was a little bit of an odd group to sign the press release, because while they provide information about nonprofits, they do not […]

Social Entrepreneur API

The Social Entrepreneur API from Social Actions launched at the SoCap Conference. The Social Entrepreneur API (Application Programming Interface) is the first open database of information about social entrepreneurs who have won fellowships and awards from social enterprise funders. The current API includes awards made by Civic Ventures, The Draper Richards Foundation, ideablob, PopTech, The […]

Learning From Foundation Tweets

Beth Kanter (currently a visiting scholar at the Packard Foundation), recently analyzed the list of “foundations that tweet” on the Philanthropy411 blog. Beth gives a really interesting breakdown of the various ways the foundations are using Twitter as well as takes a look at the “profiles” the use. She breaks the profiles into four types: […]

International Grantmaking Repository

Philanthropy In/Sight shows how raw data, when intelligently sorted and engagingly displayed, can enhance understanding, lead to insights and result in better philanthropy. With that sort of project in mind I’d like to point your attention to the Repository Project. The Repository is a project of Council on Foundations, InterAction, Foundation Center and Independent Sector […]

Knowledge Sharing & Ambient Intimacy

Philanthropy has for some time been enamored with the idea that the internet will allow us to create a huge database of philanthropic knowledge that will be universally available to everyone. My own posts on the subject of the Googlization of Philanthropy could certainly be read this way. But I’d like to propose that the […]

Philanthropy In/Sight Special Free Trial

Unsurprisingly, the Foundation Center rather liked my review of their new Philanthropy In/Sight mapping tool. I just got this comment from them: Sean, Thanks so much for your comments on our new mapping tool, Philanthropy In/Sight. We are thrilled that you like it! And we’re hoping that the rest of the field agrees. We encourage […]

Your Free Ticket to NetSquared

Two months ago I wrote about how excited I was to attend the fourth annual NetSquared Conference in San Jose, CA on May 26 & 27. I wrote: Longtime readers of Tactical Philanthropy know that I’ve always been a fan of the NetSquared conference. From N2Y1, where I heard about some site called Facebook for […]

Smart Money & the Social Entrepreneur API

In financial markets there is “smart money” and “dumb money”. These rather crude phrases refer to the fact that certain types of investors tend to make good decisions and others tend to make bad decisions. The “smart money” usually goes against the crowd and makes investments in things that the “crowd” currently dislikes. “Dumb money” […]