Rather than buy sophisticated software systems, some charities find it pays to lease them via the InternetFor years, Ted Allison, the one-man membership department at KBEM-FM in Minneapolis, kept track of the public-radio station’s membership list using simple word-processing software. ALSO…
By NICOLE WALLACE
Features Editor
Making Weddings Into Charitable Events
By NICOLE WALLACEAt a time when engaged couples can post online gift registries with Tiffany & Company, Crate and Barrel, and even the camping store REI, a new Web site is encouraging couples to think about how they can incorporate giving into their wedding plans. MarriedForGood.com profiles…
By NICOLE WALLACE
Features Editor
Multimillion-Dollar Gift Pledged Online
By NICOLE WALLACEA Baltimore lawyer has pledged $2.5-million to United Cerebral Palsy over four years -- and he plans to donate the entire amount through the organization’s Web site. On May 15 at the National Press Club, in Washington, Stephen L. Snyder used his credit card to make the first…
By NICOLE WALLACE
Features Editor
Online Gifts Boost Comics’ Charity Act
By NICOLE WALLACEA charity in the United Kingdom founded by comedians combined star power, whimsy, and a good cause to raise £50-million, or more than $70-million -- with £3.6-million, or more than $5-million, coming in online. Every two years, as part of its Red Nose Day campaign, Comic Relief…
By NICOLE WALLACE
Features Editor
Online Newsletters Offer Technology Advice
By NICOLE WALLACESeveral new electronic newsletters offer charities free advice about how to use information technology in their work and in their fund raising. Published monthly by two nonprofit technology consultants, Marc Osten and Michael Stein, Dot Org offers charities advice on how to use…
By NICOLE WALLACE
Features Editor
Bay Area Collaboration to Help Charities
By NICOLE WALLACECompuMentor and the Management Center, two San Francisco organizations that provide technology assistance to other nonprofit groups, have announced a partnership in which they will work together to help charities develop and carry out strategic technology plans. Each organization…
By NICOLE WALLACE
Features Editor
Charity’s Antismoking Site Turns For-Profit
By NICOLE WALLACEA Boston public-health charity is spinning off its online smoking-prevention program as a for-profit company. Since its creation in 1995, QuitNet has provided information and support to people who are trying to break their dependence on nicotine. The site was started as a project…
By NICOLE WALLACE
Features Editor
Bits: Awards Program Suspended; Dot-Com Philanthropy Ventures Parodied
By NICOLE WALLACE On April 2, Ericsson, a Stockholm telecommunications company, announced the third annual Ericsson Internet Community Awards, or ERICA, which were to have awarded $500,000 in Web development services and equipment to charities with innovative technology ideas. But the program has…
By NICOLE WALLACE
Features Editor
Foundations Urge Creation of ‘Digital Trust’
By NICOLE WALLACEA new report calls for the creation of a national trust to promote the innovative use of information technology in education. “A Digital Gift to the Nation,” published by the Century Foundation, recommends that the federal government use the proceeds from the auction of the…
By NICOLE WALLACE
Features Editor
Civic-Action Groups Benefit From Dot-Com Decline
By NICOLE WALLACEElection season may be over, but the deal making hasn’t slowed for organizations that use the Internet to educate voters and encourage citizens to participate in the political process. Two charities have been the beneficiaries of failed dot-com political portals, and two others…
By NICOLE WALLACE
Features Editor