‘What is the one thing we can take back from Haiti with us to tell people?”

That was the question I asked people while in Haiti over the weekend. For there is a lot going on. A lot of sadness. A lot of frustration. A lot of violence. Struggles to reconstruct, rebuild, take a country that was already the poorest in the Western Hemisphere and have it come back better than before.

“Tell the good. There is positive happening here. The (traditional) media only tells the stories of hardship but there are a lot of positive stories coming out of Haiti too.”

And indeed there is. Smiles and laughter. People helping each other. Community leaders stepping up. International aid organizations committed to helping in the reconstructions. Houses are being built. Schools are in session. A presidential election is right around the corner.

So that’s what I want to do. I want to honor the wishes of the people I met in Haiti during my trip last weekend. I want to tell stories that haven’t been told 100 times. It’s important for us – us in the privileged developed country – to remember that in the aftermath of a natural disaster most other countries don’t have the option to clean up like we do.

Sanitation is often said to be the No. 1 indicator of how developed a country is. Second is road infrastructure and the ability to get from point A to point B. Haiti is obviously behind the U.S., so is there trash in the streets and piles of rubble? Yes. But I expected that.

What was amazing was the bright colors! The creativity of the Haitians. The way they are embracing art as a means of expression. They are struggling, of course, but there is hope in Haiti. There is hope for the future. That is humankind, that is what makes us resilient. Hope.

I hope you’ll remember that when you think of Haiti, if nothing else.

I’ll be sharing more of that perspective of Haiti in the coming days. In the meantime, I’ve just started using Cinch to record audio messages to share. Click the link for a message I just recorded about Haiti and storytelling.

If you have specific questions about Haiti, please let me know. If I don’t know, I’m happy to help find someone who would. And for more information on the Heart of Haiti campaign visit Fairwinds Trading or follow the hashtag #heartofhaiti on Twitter.



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Watchitoo, DoGood, ClassWish, Zynga, business ethics & more

We’ve been deluged recently with updates and rollouts of interesting new sites, tools and services. There’s no way to fully do them justice, but they deserve attention, so here’s a roundup of eight worthy projects and websites that have crossed our desk:

Watchitoo: Collaborate with rich media

1At Socialbrite we have a pretty good directory of cutting-edge Web 2.0 productivity tools, so we were intrigued when a longtime friend, Brian August (who provided legal advice to Ourmedia.org), told us of a new Web conferencing service called Watchitoo. It’s a live, two-way, HD multi-streaming video platform that lets participants collaborate and share any form of rich media (video, photos, documents) in real time. Fully web-based and embeddable, Watchitoo offers any organization the ability to communicate and collaborate remotely. It also has full integration with Twitter and Facebook

Says Brian: “Watchitoo represents a portable, modular, simple way to instantly collaborate while sharing media. A candidate could use this technology to have a web-based town hall watched by hundreds (or thousands) while taking questions from constituents who will appear live on screen with the candidate. A reporter could use this to review footage/photographs with others in the field. The implications of this type of remote intimacy are profound.” I’m looking forward to seeing Watchitoo in action on June 3 at the Personal Democracy Forum in New York.

DoGood: See good. Do better.

2With DoGood, a free browser plug-in for Firefox, IE or Safari, you can turn your everyday web browsing into donations that support green initiatives and movements for positive social change, at no cost to you with no privacy or security issues. Today, for instance, DoGood “served” 172,673 good ideas. The DoGooder hides generic advertising on the Internet, and shows thoughtful green initiatives, philanthropic calls for action and health and wellness ideas instead. The site then donates 50 percent of its profits from ad sales back to good causes, effectively turning web surfing into a funding mechanism.

Zynga: $3 million to charity

3You’ve probably heard of Zynga because of Farmville, Cafe World, Mafia Wars, Fishville, PetVille, and other games in its stable of online diversions. (Disclosure: I’ve spoken on panels with Zynga CEO-founder Mark Pincus.) What I didn’t realize until recently is that Zynga has raised more than $3 million for charitable causes through its online game sites. For example, Zynga’s relief efforts for Haiti were impressive, given the size of its audience and the pledge to donate a good chunk of proceeds to the cause, although it should be noted that Zynga spends $5 million to $8 million every month just for advertising on Facebook.

wowcrowd: Allocate program funding by crowdsourcing

4The start-up Brighter Planet is working on software-as-a-service platform to help socialize grant giving and cause marketing efforts. They’re nearing launch and are using wowcrowd.com to manage the entire supply-chain process: create funds, make deposits, solicit proposals, track votes, facilitate discussion and prevent fraud through the use of a hosted, secure web app. Project authors will act as independent agents, promoting their projects — and your fund — throughout their networks as they compete to secure funding. Says a Brighter Planet representative: “Get your dollars where they belong, build your lists dramatically, and encourage fund-raising through transparency.” Definitely worth checking out.

ClassWish: Tweet for better classrooms

5I’m an advisor to ClassWish.org, an ambitious new initiative to enhance the quality of education across the nation, so I was glad to hear about its tweet-to-win promotion to improve classrooms. Every time you use Twitter to spread the word about ClassWish, you’ll help students and teaches and earn a chance to win prizes. Facebook share-to-win is coming soon.

mileAsmile: Helping kids in Haiti

6mileAsmile, recently launched by my friend Mark Dowds and Adrian Eagleson, proclaims: “We are two lifelong friends facing the midlife crisis of turning 40 in May. [Yeah, turning 40 is absolutely cataclysmic.] Instead of wallowing in self-pity we have chosen to run as far as our legs will take us for six months, with the final challenge of a 100 mile foot race across the Tahoe Rim Trail in July 2010. The reason to run is to help kids in Haiti get a better education and become the leaders who can shape the future of their country. The average Haitian lives on less than $2 per day and nearly 50% of children don’t go to school. Each time we lace up our running shoes with your help we will know that another child will smile and have a better life.” I just pledged, hope you will, too.

OpenPublish: Open-source online news publishing

7Two weeks ago, the Nation Magazine relaunched, using OpenPublish, the open source platform built on Drupal designed to connect news publications with their online communities. It’s designed for mid-size operations that need to publish a lot of a content but don’t have large staffs or infrastructures. It’s worth a look by magazines, newspapers, journals, trade publications, broadcast outlets, wire services and other publications. For more info, read here.

Dreams for Kids: Helping isolated youths

8Dreams for Kids empowers youths living in poverty and those with disabilities by uniting them with their peers, recognizing their abilities and allowing their voices to be heard. The site says: “Isolated young people from communities are reminded they have something to give. While fearlessly pursuing their dreams, they are leading others to their own and compassionately changing the world.” What can you do? Donate, volunteer or join the dream team.

Business Ethics: The magazine of corporate responsibility

9Business Ethics: The magazine of corporate responsibility is an online magazine with a heritage in the fields of ethics, governance, corporate responsibility and socially responsible investing. Now available only on the web, Business Ethics was launched in 1987 and published for 20 years as a quarterly print magazine. The mission of Business Ethics – now, as then – is “to promote ethical business practices, to serve that growing community of professionals and individuals striving to work and invest in responsible ways.”

Sausage and iPads: 3 giveaways coming up

10This just in from our friends at 12seconds.tv: For the next two weeks, the site is hosting a contest where the producers of the best user-created videos will win three 32GB wifi iPads. Just make a video talking about tailgating, grilling, eating Johnsonville sausage (the sponsors) with friends, family or in special locations. The first winner will be announced this Thursday, so make as many videos as you’d like and enter this week and next. Here are the details.

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For my first go as a podcast host, this came out extremely well, so much so that the UniversalGiving team transcribed our conversation. (Idea: BlogTalkRadio should offer transcriptions as a premium service.)

Click the above player to listen to parts of the 40-minute podcast on the power of giving, which BlogTalkRadio featured on its own blog.

A few highlights from our talk. Pamela on donations to Haiti:

You want to make sure that the organization you’re donating to has been vetted, and that’s one of the things we do at UniversalGiving. One way to really help ensure that is going with a small or medium organization. There’s less administration; there’s less layers of personnel because they have to be scrappy. They have to be nimble, and they have to be focused and quick with their resources. One that we promote that is very strong is Action Against Hunger, which helps with the long-term and short-term sustainable solutions to hunger. And they operate in 40 countries across the world, including Haiti. They may not have the Red Cross brand but they’re extremely accomplished because they’re so focused in one area, which is combating hunger and doing that in 40 countries across the world.

Pamela on corporate social responsibility:

You do need to have a plan of action (with CSR). And ideally with your plan of action, it’s tied into the business objectives of product adoption and your profit center. You want it to be tied in there. And so ideally it’s not just something that’s coming from the foundation or the community relations department, but is also something that’s tied into the marketing department and also to the CEO’s office and what their bottom line objectives are as far as product adoption and profit objectives. …

CSR absolutely can be used first of all as a retention tool that makes people really feel good about their company, and they want to stay. Second, it makes the employees more motivated, wanting to build whatever business or business unit they’re involved with, because they believe in the company and the company’s values. And third, it is a great recruitment tool. You will certainly find that with people in their 20s, 30s and 40s, they’re really seeking that company that’s doing good in the world.

I hope to continue the conversations with Pamela and turn this into a series on CSR and social media. Maybe I’ll even get to meet her in person one day!

First timer on BlogTalkRadio

A note about BlogTalkRadio: This was easier to set up and do than I expected. (I wasn’t aware, until a few days before the podcast, that there’s a training session for new hosts held every Wednesday.) The host’s dashboard is nicely laid out, with a great countdown until your next episode.

For those who don’t know, the service is free — just hop on and start your own podcast!

Some of the interface could be a bit more intuitive. When I first registered, I wasn’t sure what was being displayed to the public and what was for account purposes only. Thus, “Chief Cat Herder” instead of my name is being displayed on my page.

Because I may do a BTR podcast only sporadically, I’m not sure I’ll need the Premium Host Services, which include switchboard moderation, switchboard outdial, increased show promotion, the ability to edit and replace episodes and more. But if you host a regular BTR show, those seem like essential tools.

Disclosure: I’ve met BlogTalkRadio CEO Alan Levy and had dinner with him a couple of years ago.

Resources

• Universal Giving

• Living and Giving: The Pamela Hawley Blog

• Center for Corporate Citizenship

• CSRWire

• The Committee to Encourage Corporate Philanthopy

• Socialbrite.org

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Use the power of the social Web to make an impact

The earthquake that shook Haiti last week demolished and devastated the entire nation. Looking at pictures online, reading testimonials of survivors and following the developments in the rescue and emergency response teams, I felt, like many of you, overwhelming sadness. Mere weeks after completing my Kiva Fellowship last summer, the Philippines were hit with Typhoon Ondoy, another natural disaster resulting in true devastation.

I was looking back on pictures from the Philippines and wanted to share the slideshow above from when I went to visit Bernardita Dayo, a Kiva borrower that I had actually funded before I became a Fellow. Looking at those pictures, their homes located so close to the water, I’m reminded that for every picture we see of Haiti NOW, just last week there were other pictures showing THEN.

The pictures above, that village, doesn’t exist in the same way after the Typhoon, now it is just a memory as the Filipino people work to rebuild their villages and homes so too now does Haiti have a long and turbulent road ahead of them. The “then” in their pictures were vibrant lives and villages with personality, history and culture whose path has now forever been changed.

When you give to help Haiti, and you should, $5-$10 is little to most of us but means the world to them, I’d like to ask you to remember that you’re giving not just to help the Haitian people out of their dire current situation, but investing in their future and the rebuilding of the parts of their society and community that helped define them.

Here are a few quick and easy ways from WhatGives!:

• Text HAITI to 90999. $10 will be charged to your cell phone bill and given to the American Red Cross.

• Text YELE to 501501. $5 will be charged to your cell phone bill and given to Yele Haiti. (see note at end of post about Yele Haiti)

• Text CERF to 90999. $5 will be charged to your cell phone bill and given to the United Nations Central Emergency Response Fund.

• Text HAITI to 45678. $5 will be charged to your cell phone bill and given to The Salvation Army.

• Text QUAKE to 20222. $10 will be charged to your cell phone bill and given to the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund.

• Text SAVE to 20222 (US Only). $10 will be charged to your cell phone bill and given to Save the Children.

Other ways to make a difference

In addition to the above, I’ve also made a donation to Architecture for Humanity and I’d like to ask you to join me. Cameron Sinclair wrote a powerful article in the HuffPost about the rebuilding of Haiti:

When we are rebuilding, do not let the media set the time line and expectations for reconstruction. I remember vividly well known news personalities standing on the rubble of homes in the lower ninth proclaiming that ‘this time next year we will see families back home.’ Some well meaning NGOs, who usually have little building experience, are even worse — ‘we’ll have 25,000 Haitians back home if you donate today.’ In reality, here is what it really looks like;

• Pre-Planning Assessments and Damage Analysis (underway, will run for a year)
• Establish Community Resource Center and Reconstruction Studio (Week 6 to Month 3)
• Sorting Out Land Tenure and Building Ownership (Month 6 to Year 5)
• Transitional Shelters, Health Clinics and Community Structures (Month 6 to Year 2)
• Schools, Hospitals and Civic Structures (Month 9 to Year 3)
• Permanent Housing (Year 1 to Year 5)

Thank you to WhatGives! for creating the widget below that makes it easy for you to make a donation in just a few clicks.

The social web has incredible power to impact change on the world and when disaster strikes, we must dig into our pockets, past where we already give and help those in need. Because we’d want the world to act the same if something horrific were to happen in our backyard. A lesson I’ve learned all too well from the amazing people here in New Orleans.

Please text or make a donation to help the rebuilding of Haiti today.

If you liked this post, you might like:

• Simple Ways To Make A Difference Today
• $5 or 5 minutes, 1 Way to Make A Difference Today
• Be A Part of Tweetsgiving

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