The purpose of my blog was to record my actions on what I did that was positive and made things better in the world. Many of my posts are about my donations to Kiva.org, because I think they are really going to change the world. I blog about it a lot, because kiva loans are easy to do. Its not a charity where your money gets donated and you're not really sure where it goes.
With Kiva, you get updates on where your money is. You even get it returned to you. The concept that you can significantly change people's lives by just lending them money is so powerful that it will resonate with a lot of people.
And that's what is happening. I have been with Kiva since December 2006, and there is still more lenders than loans. The people who run Kiva were surprised that the business model they envisioned didn't happen because they got so many lenders. I believe that people are fundamentally good. People are skeptical about giving away money, but not so much about lending it. And $25 isn't a large sum to many people in the developing world. For $25 they can feel good. good returns.
I set the spark for Kivafriends.org, because I knew there must be other people like me wanting to share the Kiva experience and talk amongst ourselves. I suggested it on the yahoo group, Joe ran away with the idea and set up the board, and its got thousands of members and has done incredibly productive things, including other charities, helping kiva and kiva fellows, putting out yearly calendars, and much more. I meet with kiva friends on the boards and in chat and in second life and on facebook, and have done lots of good work with them.
I really like the fact that there is all this transfer of monies from the developed world to the undeveloped world without big banks getting a cut. It still feels so grassroots.
I'm a narcissistic philanthropist. I like to lend to Julia's.
This blog post is part of Zemanta's "Blogging For a Cause" campaign to raise awareness and funds for worthy causes that bloggers care about.
6 comments:
I loaned to kiva because of you and I'm going to loan again. One of the cool things about kiva is, theoretically (and I'm sure in reality), you could take, say $100, give 4 loans over a staggered period of time and, really, just keep loaning that same $100 out as the loans get repaid. Your $100 could work for years and you would have only the initial investment of $100. I would think that would appeal to a lot of people who might be concerned about losing their $$.
May I ask--how do you find people named Julia--I don't see anywhere in the search function how one could do that but I might be missing something. I only see how you can search by region and by type of business. Do you just browse until you find Julias?
Oh, and p.s.--I just checked out Zemanta's Blogging for a Cause--how cool, I will be participating in that, too. Thanks!!!!!!!
What a wonderful compliment to hear, that someone loans to kiva 'cause of me. I totally agree with you that the 'lending' part is great. I think of it as allowing other people to use my money till I need it.
I find Julia's using the search, I just type in Julia in the search box and it pulls out the loans that mention the name. You can search on anything - weaving, fruit, etc.
I realize its a bit narcissistic, but its so hard to choose amongst so many worthy recipients.
I don't think it's narcissistic at all--I think it's a unique way to find recipients. I agree that it's hard to choose because they all seem so worthy. You're lucky you have a name that seems to translate to so many different parts of the world :)
I tried searching on different words and didn't seem to come up with much--maybe I was being too obscure :)
I always read your blog, but rarely post. I assume this is true for a lot of people: only the stat counters know for sure :)
I think it is a clever way to loan. Because of your tendency to loan to Julias, I found it interesting that there ARE so many Julias.
As a Kiva Friend, it has completely enriched my Kiva experience. I found the Kiva website too static, too disconnected, and wanted more of a community interaction, so KF is perfect.
Carry on and happy lending...
Unilove aka Lisa
I am also finding the number and range of Julia's interesting.
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