Saturday 24 January 2009

Push a button for change

I'm a member of Kiva, a microlending site that gives loans to people in third world countries. Yes, there is an article out there that says that microfinancing won't help anyone (need to help change the communities, not the individuals), but it still feels a good thing to do.

But this year, you can help out to, by getting Intel to donate 5c every time someone pushes a button. It's the Small Things Challenge, and you don't need to sign up or anything, just push the button (and enter capcha text) and done!

The microlending business is very popular at the moment, so much so that Kiva is running out of people to give loans too. People are listed for a month, but at the current rate of giving, they're not likely to be listed for an hour! That says an incredible amount about the people willing to help out.

(Interestingly, I notice that the three largest teams are Atheists, Agnostics, Skeptics, Freethinkers, Secular Humanists and the Non-Religious, Team Obama and Kiva Christians.)

Fine, yes, I'm not donating a lot, but I am giving, and already had some of my loans paid back (which I turned around and loaned out again). If you can, give what you can, and help others get off the ground and get themselves productive.

[END]

1 comment:

Morgan Davie said...

Interesting to see someone doing this. Kiva's model makes a lot of sense to me, leveraging direct communication via internet and relative wealth disparity so a loan that is little from one end can have big effects at the other end.

Nice one. Keep at it. Will talk to you about this sometime.