Lucy Bernholz

betterworldbooks

BetterWorldBooks - record breaking gift

I love this story. Regular readers of this blog will understand why. BetterWorldBooks, a very cool social enterprise, buys and resells books to raise funds for literacy programs around the world. Sometimes, they hit the jackpot. This happened today, when BWB finalized the sale of a rare 1848 facsimile of

acorn

Items in the mirror may be closer than they appear

I'm supposed to be doing something else, so my mind wandered over here. And here's my question. If anyone had bet you, on January 20th, 2009, the first day of the Obama Administration, that one of the more sordid scandals of the social sector in 2009

Decoding the Future Part Two: Clouds and Networks

The plot so far: Center for Strategic Philanthropy and Civil Society changing philanthropy The project started with interviews, research, a paper and a wiki, rolls up to include discussions with invited experts and thoughtful challengers, continues to identify practical points for more experimentation and observation, and rolls out with your

benkler

Thanks for helping "decode"

(Note to my cherished email subscribers: I'm not sure why the email posts are suddenly truncated, I'm working on it. In meantime, the Title links in your email should be live and take you through to the blog itself. Thanks!) Thank you all who have been

Decoding the future of philanthropy Part One (redux)

Apparently the email version of this post got truncated (ahh, technology) so I'm posting it again. This is part one - much more to come....I'm going to try to weave together several themes in this post. Since I am famous for "burying the lead&

Decoding the future of philanthropy

I'm going to try to weave together several themes in this post. Since I am famous for "burying the lead" I'm going to get to the point and then begin weaving. * The point: data are the new platform for change. They will continue to

Nonprofit Mapping

Nonprofitmapping.org is a GREAT new example of data as a platform for change. Here's what the folks behind NonprofitMapping are trying to do: "NonProfitMapping.org will transform previously inaccessible data sets into useful knowledge than can be made broadly available using the Web, geospatial mapping tools,

Acumen Fund

Metastasizing Metrics: Panel summary from SoCap09

I had the honor of facilitating a session on metrics at last week's Social Capital Markets conference. I also had the duty of apologizing for the name of the session, which was Metastasizing Metrics. I didn't name it, I just moderated it. I've done

Social Capital

Social Capital Markets Roundup

I've just left the Social Capital Markets conference (#SoCap09) after 2.5 days of nonstop meetings, sessions, ideas, and energy. I'm literally running away to the woods for a few days camping and then I'm going underground for three days to continue writing the

Brad Smith

How did we get here....

In some ways, "how did we get here" and "where are we going" are the key questions of this blog. In this post on technology and philanthropy, Brad Smith of the Foundation Center joins me - and we hope you'll jump in - to

Map the (social capital) Market - links should work

NOTE: This is a re-post from yesterday, but with key links fixed (fingers crossed). Thanks to ALL of you who let me know that the mapping links weren't working - I hope this version will load. You get to the GSIX map at http://www.gsix.com/ Today

Acumen Fund

Map the (social capital) Market

Today the Global Social Investment Exchange - an emerging federation of social investment exchanges - launched an interactive, online map of the various players in this space. This is timed perfectly for the Second Annual Social Capital Markets Conference (#SoCap09) which runs from September 1-3 in San Francisco. The purpose

Information sharing

(How) will technology change philanthropy?

(how) will technology change philanthropy? This is a frequent topic of this blog, and also the subject of a piece of research and eventual article I've been working on for some time. The research has given me the excuse to talk to some of the most forward-looking people

NPR interview on embedded giving

Here's the story that ran Wednesday morning on NPR's Morning Edition. Thanks to friends on twitter for alerting me to it - I turned off the radio one story too soon this morning! Tags: philanthropy, embeddedgiving, npr

Social Networking philanthropy policy

Philanthropy Policy Project Mind Map

Lots of positive response to this post about building a crowd-informed Philanthropy Policy Project. You can join the conversation on twitter at #philpo. Here's a rough cut mind map of the policy domains that matter: Here's a link Policies that influence Philanthropic Giving where you can

Bernard Madoff

Philanthropy Policy Project

The most recent complete review of regulations, policies and practices for the nonprofit sector (of which I am aware) was the 2005-2006 Panel on the Nonprofit Sector, hosted by Independent Sector, which produced a first report with 120 recommendations and a supplemental report a year later. Since then we'

Conferences that Matter Fall Edition 2009.2.1

Back in the Spring I wrote about some conferences that matter to philanthropy. That list can be found here. As we head into autumn we approach the second great conference season of the year - here is my Fall list of conferences that matter. Let me make something clear at

kalman

Where change comes from-part 1.5

I've been working long hours, traveling and volunteering 5+ hours a day for the last many many weeks on an event that will take over San Francisco next week. I've been too fried to blog. I'm now stuck in JFK, which is usually very

Wither giving in 2009?

Everyone wants to know - will 2009 be better or worse than 2008 when it comes to philanthropy? I had the opportunity to hear Brad Smith (The Foundation Center) and Bob Ottenhoff (Guidestar) talk about this yesterday. You can catch some of it here from twitter. The Guidestar report referenced

california

California budget - foundation dependent?

(photo by Jeff Keen, Flickr, Creative Commons) I live in California. In the 19 years I've lived here the state has been late in approving a budget more times than not. Developing a state budget is a game - literally - you can play it here on the

buzzword2009

Buzzword 2009.7 Taxonomy

(photo by dubai.digital. Flickr, creative commons) I am honored to announce the wonkiest buzzword ever. Taxonomy. For those of you who don't traffic in test-prep vocabulary, a taxonomy is "the practice and science of classification," or, as I like to think of it, a taxonomy

buzzword2009

Buzzword (buzz tool?) 2009.6 Maps

(Photo by Annie Mole, Flickr Creative Commons license) (I posted this on July 14 and edited it slightly on July 15, 2009) In the last few months maps of grant data have started popping up everywhere. Here are a few - launched and in process. I'd appreciate your

Sense Making in the New Data-Scape

An edited version of this post is available on the SSIR Opinion Blog. The version below is unedited. Some things are so obvious they are hard to see. For example, why do we make change organizations go looking for funders instead of having funders go look for change organizations? Now,

philanthropiccapitalmarkets

Where does change come from?

Where does positive social change come from? My answer to this question is that it can come from potentially anywhere and everywhere. That potential - for positive social change to come from individuals, non-governmental organizations, communities, businesses, worship groups  - is why the changes in the philanthropic capital markets, development

What are we not doing?

This question - what are we not doing? - may be the most important question any strategist, funder, program officer, or board member can ask. It contextualizes the choices that are being made. It sheds light on how well you (or your staff) have scanned the landscape. It will help