Thursday, March 17, 2011

Finally, some useful internet activism

Great article in this Monday's Technology Review on different websites/apps set up to help people in Japan, such as Ushahidi, SparkRelief, and Hurricane Party.

I was happy to read about these efforts, and encourage you to participate with them and/or donate on your own.

For monetary donations, InterAction has a list of verified charitable organisations who are accepting donations, which also describes how they will use the funds. Definitely check InterAction or with the Better Business Bureau before donating - there are a lot of scams out there.

For non-monetary donations, you can donate frequent flyer milessocks, or send hopeful letters. (The sock guy mentioned letter writing as a thoughtful gift the Japanese will appreciate, which I think sounds like a great idea).

2 comments:

  1. Thanks for your support of Sparkrelief and noting us in your blog. We are working extremely hard to revolutionize disaster relief through empowering the community. Would love to connect if you have any suggestions on how we can all help more.

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  2. Thanks for your comment, Eli. I actually just realized I didn't actually remember to link to your site and the others, just fixed that.

    I'm not sure I have any concrete suggestions at the moment, but if I think of anything I'll definitely drop you a line.

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