Tactic: Steve Case Experiments with Online Donations

Written by Mary on December 24, 2007 – 2:20 am -

The Case Foundation, created by America Online founder Steve Case, is experimenting with citizen-led online philanthropy. On Thursday the 13th, readers of Parade magazine and members of the Causes section of Facebook were invited to enter a contest to win a total of $500,000 and $250,000, for their favorite charities The money was donated by Mr. Case.

What makes this contest interesting is that the winner is not determined by which organization earned the most money, but by which organization received the most unique donations. “Philanthropy shouldn’t be defined as a bunch of rich people writing big checks,” said Jean Case, Steve Case’s wife in a New York Times interview. “Small amounts of money given by large numbers of individuals can be combined to do great things.”

What Mrs. Case said about the power of the masses is true. The problem is that the Case experiment is wasn’t really about people power. In the end, the money still came from “rich people writing big checks,” that is, from the Cases themselves.

Online micro-donations do pose a great opportunities for online organizers. For example, the Paypal donation plug-in offers a great opportunity for even small campaigns to fundraise online.

The Case experiment was a good idea in that it hopefully raised awareness of online donations, but rich people writing checks is still the old way of fundraising, even if it is online.

(Story originally reported by the New York Times on December 13)


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