October 21, 1999 | Read Time: 1 minute
The AOL Foundation — the giving arm of America Online — has started a new Web site that brings together information for donors, volunteers, and charities.
The site, called Helping.org, allows visitors to learn about the activities of any of the more than 650,000 charities listed in the GuideStar data base, and to make on-line contributions to them. GuideStar is a Web site operated by Philanthropic Research, a charity in Williamsburg, Va.
The Dulles, Va., foundation will cover the cost of processing the contributions; only a standard credit-card fee will be deducted from the gift. All of the charities listed in the data base will receive a letter to notify them about the service and give them the opportunity to choose not to participate.
Visitors will also be able to search for volunteer opportunities in their region — and sign up for them on line — through a data base run by VolunteerMatch, a service created by Impact Online in Palo Alto, Cal.
“We want to make it as easy to serve and to give on the Internet as it is to do e-commerce,” says David Eisner, vice-president of the foundation.
America Online asked the Benton Foundation, in Washington, to gather non-profit technology experts to develop a section of annotated links to Web sites, as well as case studies, that discuss how non-profit organizations are incorporating technology into their work. In addition, visitors can create their own list of favorite non-profit sites, which will appear every time they come back to Helping.org.
To get there: Go to http://www.helping.org.
