Nonprofits Balk at iPhone Donation Ban

Apple has stoked the ire of charities by refusing to allow donations through nonprofit groups’ iPhone applications, writes The New York Times.

Potential donors using the charity apps are directed to the organization’s Web site, a process Beth Kanter, co-author of the book The Networked Nonprofit, called “cumbersome.” In August, Apple demanded that PayPal drop an iPhone app that allowed direct donations.

Ms. Kanter started an online petition to protest the ban, which has attracted 1,600 signatures, and she announced on her Twitter feed that she planned to dump her iPhone in favor of a device using Google’s rival Android operating system.

An Apple spokeswoman, Trudy Muller, declined to tell the newspaper why it had banned charitable solicitations via apps, saying only, “We are proud to have many applications on our App Store which accept charitable donations via their Web sites.”

Read a Chronicle of Philanthropy article about the iPhone app flap and an opinion article Ms. Kanter wrote for The Chronicle with her co-author of The Networked Nonprofit, Allison Fine.