Recap: Day 2 of the NTC, Messiness is cool

 

flickr: corey pud

 

In my last post, I forgot to mention another org at the science fair.  I first became aquainted with Care2 at the IMA conference. Care2 is a unique social network website that connects socially responsible people with the causes they care about.  Check them out and sign up, they have nearly 7 million members!  I mention them also because Hatef Yamini from Care2 assured me that Thursday’s keynote speaker would be excellent and he was right! 

 

That was David Weinberger, an entertaining, visionary thinker and observer of technology and how it is changing our culture and vise versa. He’s also a fellow at the Berkman Center at Harvard, but you may be more familiar with him as an NPR commentator on All Things Considered. 

 

David’s (poor guy had the flu) talk was enlightening for me.  He discussed what he calls the “P2P” (person to person) nature of the web; how each of us can individually influence the thinking and actions of others using the web in a way that businesses cannot.  He posted a great example of this on his blog on April 8th.

 

One theme in his presentation that really resonated with me was “Messiness as a Virtue” in relation to how dramatically the Internet and web 2.0 are changing the way information is organized, or actually rather disorganized.  Think old-school encyclopedias; physical hard-bound books, limited to one or 2 contributors on a subject that is just a couple paragraphs long.  Time, space and physicality limited what information was included.  Now think wikipedia–limitless, up-to-the-minute content from many sources and the ability to refute or add to the subject.

David reminded us that we (people) are completely revolutionizing the way that we organize our world. 

 

This idea really opened up my thinking for the remainder of the conference.  As some of you know who have been on the receiving end of my attempts to define what I’m grappling with in my role at DEI.  Which is how generational and cultural shifts in donor expectations are going to change how we raise money for public radio.  All the while anticipating what immerging technologies will deliver the public radio content we are asking listeners to support.

 

This new paradigm challenges us to reconsider the structure of a membership as we know it.  As I will share in coming posts, there are many ways people want to contribute to our cause that don’t fit into the neat components of being a member as we traditionally thought of–with a renewal cycle and a willingness to give through mail and pledge. Donors are now supporting causes through new conduits including micro payments, personal support badges on blogs and web pages. The American Cancer Society recently held it’s second Relay for Life event in Second Life, raising approx $41,000!

 

 

Check out the links in this post and share your thoughts with me.  Are you starting to think beyond what we know as best practice in pub world?  When do you think public radio will start pursuing these new models?  Which stations will be the first to dive into the “fundraising 2.0″ world?

 

-Melanie Coulson, Coordinator for Online Individual Giving, DEI

Notes from Nonprofit Technology Confrence - Day 1 Science Fair

 

I had a really fun and educational time at the NTEN - Nonprofit Technology Conference in Washington DC last week.

 

Don’t let the name fool you, this conference was rich with content for fundraisers as well as techies.  And there are even a large number of sessions where we all come together to learn from each other.

 

Wednesday afternoon was the Science Fair,  where attendees had one shot to check out the vendors at the conference, after that, the vendor area closed!  There were about 100 vendors, here were a few highlights that I thought might be of particular interest to you as well.

 

I had the opportunity to meet Laura Quinn, Founder and Director of Idealware. www.idealware.org is one the best resources for nonprofits trying to find the right software solution, and has tons of useful articles for all “accidental techies”.  If you don’t already receive their monthly enews, sign up.

 

Techsoup - www.techsoup.org is also an invaluable resource to nonprofits.  Not only can they provide advice, they connect can connect you with product donations from companies like Microsoft, Adobe, and Cisco.

 

ePhilanthropy foundation was present, www.ephilanthropy.org. DEI’s own Betsy Harman is a ePhilnathropy master trainer.  This org provides online and in-person training during their “etours”.  One standout bit of information I was reminded about was their work in the area of online fundraising ethics. Check their ethics center and resources–it’s time well spent! 

 

http://www.ephilanthropy.org/site/PageServer?pagename=ethics

 

There were many other vendors and resources that I didn’t get to mention here, but if you are curious you can see an entire list of Science Fair Vendors (look in the column on the right side of the page) at the Nten website.

http://nten.org/ntc-science-fair

 

-Melanie Coulson, Coordinator for Online Individual Giving, DEI 

 

-flickr credit:yuduke