March 8, 2011 | Read Time: 3 minutes
Craigslist founder Craig Newmark has a new Web site he hopes will connect nonprofits to one another and rally new supporters.
The site, craigconnects, will feature handpicked nonprofits on its home page and include a directory of other organizations, with the goal of having nonprofits and their supporters “stand up for each other,” Mr. Newmark said in an interview with The Chronicle.
“I have kind of a bully pulpit—which I don’t need for myself, which I don’t need for Craigslist,” Mr. Newmark said. “If I shared it with nonprofits who needed to get stuff done, I think that would be a good way to live.”
The new site more closely resembles a blog than a listings site like Craigslist, and nonprofits can’t post their own calls to action.
The site’s mission is to feature only “good, effective” organizations, especially those that are “socially responsible, self-perpetuating, and replicable.” The site vets groups using online tools such as Charity Navigator, GuideStar, and GreatNonprofits.
DonorsChoose.org, a charitable Web site that raises money for education projects, was featured on the Craigconnects home page Tuesday, and for the first year the site will include only organizations working on community building, journalistic integrity, the Middle East, open government, volunteering, technology for social good, and veterans’ issues.
Mr. Newmark says he has supported many of these groups in the past.
“I’ve been doing nonprofit work a lot more over a period of about 10 years,” he said. “Some months ago, I asked a friend to compile a list of the nonprofits I was involved with, because I figured I should know.”
He said he expected that list to total 20 or 30 organizations, but the number was closer to 100.
“When I talk [at events], I talk relatively little about Craigslist, and mostly I’m talking about my idea of public service and philanthropy,” Mr. Newmark said.
The site arrives at a time when a number of high-profile personalities are starting online efforts aimed at helping nonprofits. In November, Chris Hughes, the Facebook co-founder, started Jumo, a social-networking site designed to give donors the ability to discover and connect with charities or causes. The actor Edward Norton has been working on a similar online network, Crowdrise, to help charities raise more money online.
And while other charitable offshoots of big-name Web sites, like Google.org, have come under scrutiny lately for falling short of their initial ambitions, Mr. Newmark said that he will keep the energy up in support of this project.
“The only two things I’m doing in my life now are Craigslist customer service and this,” Mr. Newmark said. “I made a commitment 16 years ago to stick with Craigslist customer service, and I’m making a commitment to work with Craigconnects now.”
Mr. Newmark described the site as a personal project. It will not give grants or raise money.
The Craigslist Foundation is the fiscal sponsor of the project, which is funded by Mr. Newmark, himself.
Updated on March 9, 2011. A previous version of this story stated the Craigslist Foundation was funding the project.
