The Uncultured Project

It’s the first of April, and I’m standing in a dimly lit room with a bright projector light blinding me. In front of me, some high ranking officials who came to hear me speak. This is no April’s Fools joke: this was my presentation to Save the Children USA’s Global HQ.

Save the Children's USA HQ (pic by Madge Canning)

After an hour of Keynote slides, graphs, and videos I was pleased to see that my presentation was well received. Lots of nodding heads. But I needed one more thing. I need to drive the message home. It was time to unleash what I called the secret weapon.

I went to my laptop, loaded up YouTube, and played one last video. This time the video wasn’t filmed in some rural village, it didn’t have fancy editing, and it didn’t have nice background music. It was filmed in the parking lot – just before I stepped into the room.

Yes, I too am mind boggled how my videos could be seen more than any video of her. Do charities need celebrities?

Within the brief time I was giving this presentation, not only did people leave comments – but many people made video responses which I was able to play for staff right then and there. The message of each video was the same: let’s team up and do more projects.

Finally, to hit the last nail, I compared the views of this video to Save the Children’s slickly edited video staring America Ferrera on location in Mali. In less than a couple of hours, this video had more views than America Ferrera had got in over a couple of weeks.

“If this is what I can do for you in your parking lot, imagine what I can do for you in the field”. This, in essence, was my pitch to Save the Children. In fact, it’s my pitch to any charity. It’s not complicated, it’s not bureaucratic, it’s simple. Here are the facts:

• Fact 1: Any charity that uses donations for PR, outreach, or social media needs to justify that it’s spending it wisely for maximum impact.

• Fact 2: To date, all the various branches of Save the Children, are spending millions of dollars (from your donations) and hiring hundreds of staff to raise awareness on YouTube, Twitter, and elsewhere in “social media”.

• Fact 3: Part of these millions of dollars goes to sending videographers, bloggers, and other PR personnel around the world. Including personnel video blogging from the World Cup in South Africa.

• Fact 4: Despite this, the online reach of all those efforts combined is still less than the online reach of this project. This project is the #1 “social media” source about Save the Children.

• Fact 5: For less than the cost of hiring me, Save the Children can team up with me as a “free agent” again and continue to have access to the reach of this project backed by one very awesome community.

Click for full size: A chart I showed at my presentation showing total YouTube views generated. Blue is Save the Children USA efforts (under 200k views) and Red is globally funded efforts (under 1 million views). Orange is me (over 2.1 million views). Identical trends exist on Twitter.

Despite this, in over a year of discussions, there still isn’t a concrete plan to team up with them in the developing world again.

This has been described as “Not Invented Here” syndrome. Beth Kanter might call it a “fortress” mentality. But the end result is that charities like Save the Children overspend on social media and reach far less people than they could by collaborating with free agents.

A big hit on the ground & online for Save the Children. But I had to beg and borrow to get there and film the conclusion.

If you’re familiar with this project, you probably are familiar with the water project I completed with Save the Children. The video of that got over 100,000 views - that’s far more views than any official Save the Children video has ever got online.

Despite that, during the conclusion of that project, I had to find my own funds to go to the village to film it. Save the Children would not even support the creation of that video by letting me hitch a ride with them from the city to the village.

Bonus Fact 1: As more charities become more like “Networked Non-Profits”, charities that are “fortresses” or have “Not Invented Here” syndrome are either going to have to evolve or make way for better charities.

Bonus Fact 2: I wouldn’t be trying so hard if I didn’t think Save the Children was a charity worth supporting. And part of this comes from the fact that I’ve seen how they conduct themselves on the ground.

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When I was a student, I would often find scholars who were thinking the same thing I was – but were able to express themselves far more eloquently than I ever could. I’ve recently found someone just like that when it comes to my thoughts on charities. That person is Beth Kanter.

Beth Kanter

I don’t believe the reason extreme poverty exists is because of a lack of charities. In my lifetime, the number of charities fighting global poverty has grown astronomically. Yet, we haven’t seen a proportional decrease in global poverty.

The reason I haven’t formalized, disadvantages aside, is because global poverty won’t be solved with yet another charity. Instead, I believe we need to change the conversation and change how we work to solve this problem.

Before starting this project, I never realized how competitive and insular many charities can become. Some charities won’t even talk to their sister branches in other countries! And many charities expect outsiders like me just to stick to signing petitions and checks.

Whether or not it’s through my project, I want charities to be more about communities – not corporate structure. I want them to collaborate – not compete. I want individuals like me to be able to “plug in” and help.

That’s exactly what Beth Kanter is talking about. Except she does it from a position of a well-respected expert and scholar. Here’s what she has to say about how charities should be conducting themselves in the 21st century:

What I like about Beth is that she completely understands the frustrations I have to deal with. I’m what she calls a “free agent”: someone who does what a charity does, but as an individual. Both Beth & I think free agents should team up with charities – but many charities resist this:

Thanks to Beth and the Red Cross’s Wendy Harman, I’ve been making a lot of progress in teaming up with the Red Cross. In fact, I’ve made more progress in a few weeks with the Red Cross than I have with my year-long talks with Save the Children.

Prior to meeting Beth, I would have raised my arms in frustration at this resistance many charities throw up when it comes to teaming up with free agents. But, Beth has made me realize that I need to imagine organizations complexly. People inside may want change, but the organization itself might be a “fortress”.

And really, in many respects, people like Beth aren’t just talking about what charities should be doing. What Beth is really talking about is what charities must do if they want to exist in the 21st century. It will be interesting to see which ones evolve… and which ones become obsolete.

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Earlier today, here in Toronto, someone took their own life by jumping in front of a subway. This created a disruption which took out half of Toronto’s subway system for several hours. Tens of thousands of people were affected.

Torontonians Disrupted by Subway Suicide (Taken This Afternoon)

I’m writing this because this incident reminds me that no one lives in a bubble. We all live in this world and create ripples that affect – and “disrupt” – other people. Whether this “disruption” is positive or negative on others depends on how we live – and on what terms we die.

The value of a single life has been on my mind a lot today because I’ve been attending this conference here on Toronto for charities called “Net Change 2010″. As an outsider to the charity “ecosystem”, I’m often surprised how much charities act like (or at least talk like) dispassionate businesses.

Despite being surrounded by people & charities doing amazing things – saving lives in Haiti, helping the handicapped, providing assistance to the homeless – I felt like I was at an MBA seminar. “Marketing”, “Retention”, and “Branding Strategy” were all the buzzwords in most seminars.

Not only that, most people whom I’d talk about my project to would praise me but then ask “how do you plan on scaling this?”. How can I do more than “just one water project”? Since I can’t be everywhere at once, how can I help more than “just one village” during a natural disaster?

My question is this: why does it always have to be about the numbers?

I like that I do charity work as an individual. I’ve given reasons before, but one of the luxuries is that I don’t have to worry about the numbers. Well, except when I’m trying to network with charities that is.

If I want to change the world, all I have to do is meaningfully change one life. Just one. And then all I have to do to make it “scale” is sit back and watch the spark of that one life create positive disruptions throughout humanity.

And, you know what? If charities focused more on the value of one, I’m pretty sure all their concerns about “marketing”, “retention”, and “branding strategy” would fall into place by themselves.

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When it comes to filming & photographing, I always try and learn from the professionals. I recently discovered superstar photographer “Joey L”. Joey’s worked with some big names (The Jonas Brothers, Usher, NBC, FX Network, Warner Music, and the Salvation Army).

Joey also travels to developing countries and photographs and films those living in poverty. Recently, he uploaded a video on his trip to visit the The Mentawai in rural Indonesia (WARNING: NOT SAFE FOR WORK):

The reason this video is not safe for work is because it shows full frontal nudity of children. I’m not trying to hate on Joey. In his defense, this is probably nothing more than you’d find in National Geographic Magazine. I’m sure the intention was documenting – not pornography.

But, this raises a question, what are the ethics of filming and photographing the poor in the nude? Is filming for charitable purposes different than filming for documentary purposes? Are the standards different for those living in the West vs. those living in developing countries?

From what I can tell of Joey’s work, that seems to be the case. In this video, he blurs and blocks out nudity of himself and his assistant as they bathe in a river – but does not do the same for any of the naked locals in the same scene (WARNING: ALSO NOT SAFE FOR WORK):

For me, I come from a very different perspective. Even if families are itching and eager to be on camera – if they are nude, I say no. Or, at the very least, frame it to protect privacy. This helps because when I team up with Save the Children, I’m in line with their policies and practices.

But the fact is, no matter how much care & consideration one takes in filming and photography, there is always going to be someone out there who thinks you’re grossly violating the rights and disrespecting your subjects.

On-the-ground I know that my paranoia of not filming nudity seems to foster respect among those I film & photograph. It also stems from the fact that I share a cultural ancestry with most of the people I try and help.

It’s for that reason, I’m not going to change how I do things. But, I’d love to hear your thoughts on this – especially if there are any professional photographers and filmmakers out there reading this.

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Beth Kanter

This blog post is for those who have found my work through Beth Kanter’s presentation at the Personal Democracy Forum in New York City.

First, don’t let the self-referential blog posts, tweets, and videos fool you – this isn’t about me as much as it is about the community supporting it. We are a group of idealistic people who want to be part of the generation that ends extreme poverty (in our lifetime no less).

But, we don’t like being guilted into donating with depressing images of poverty. We don’t like to donate money in a way we can’t track where our donation has gone. And we don’t like the fact that most charities can be fortresses which tend to keep us at arms length.

My role in this community is simple: I’m part journalist (telling stories from the field), I’m part philanthropist (raising funds as a private citizen), and I’m part implementer (executing the democratic will of the communities I meet on the ground and the community that participates online).

I call this community-powered “philanthropic journalism”. Beth calls it being a “free agent”. If this is something you’d like to engage – here’s what you should keep in mind:

On the Ground Access

5) I need on-the-ground access: I need to be able to bring my camera, cellphone, and laptop into the field with your charity or organization so I can write blogs, make videos, and tweet. This means I need both the permission from your organization to do so and technical capacity (i.e. internet connection & bandwidth) to upload content from the field.

4) I have a preference for Bangladesh: My parents were born & raised in Bangladesh – it has a special place in my heart. More importantly, if we team up in Bangladesh you don’t have to worry about needing a Bengali translator or worry about setting me up with mobile internet. I can figure it out.

3) I do more than report: I need to be able to provide your organization with restricted donations to do specific projects. Why restricted? Because it’s the only way I can guarantee to the community where exactly their money has gone. Ideally, I’d like to negotiate minimal (or no) administrative costs.

Connecting Communities

2) I do more than donate: I have learned the devil is in the details. Having control over naming rights, signboard design, and allowing for changes in project plans based on on-the-ground feedback and online input is how this becomes less about hand-outs and more about one community helping another.

1) I don’t do it for name or fame: If this was about self-aggrandizement, I wouldn’t be writing this blog post from Toronto, Canada. I’d already be back in the field with a fly by night “charity” which would let me do whatever I wanted. This is about doing good with good organizations.

I realize that these five things don’t make it the easiest for me to work or team up with. It would be so much easier for me to take photos while I hand you a big check at your home office. But, the community behind this project wants something more substantive. In exchange, you will find we’re fiercely loyal and passionate. And made of awesome.

If you’re a for-profit, you’re more than welcome to join what we could call a “threesome for good”: with me as a free-agent, a trusted organization as charity implementer, and a for-profit helping to fund the logistics (and the charity’s admin costs) behind all this. And hey, if there is a for-profit that will pay a man to dance around the world, surely there is a for-profit that will pay for this guy to go and help people.

You can reach me on Twitter @uncultured and by email at project@uncultured.com

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My blog post on “Does Steve Jobs Care about Global Poverty?” has been republished on the Cult of Mac blog. It seems to have started a small firesstorm of discussion, tweets, and retweets.

Just thought I’d follow up that post with a video. Here’s something a Microsoft employee sent me about the work they do with CARE to save lives in Kenya:

I’m typing this on a MacBook Pro and I just recently came back from a pilgrimage to two Apple Stores in search of a Camera Connection Kit for my iPad. I’m a fanboy.

But I dare you to find Apple doing anything like this.

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Many charities think the best way to raise awareness of their work is to get a celebrity endorsement. Don’t get me wrong: Hollywood celebrities can do a lot for a charity – but not as much as you think.

As I’ve blogged about before, especially on the internet, charities may actually get more mileage by giving regular folks (with online supporters) the same opportunities that charities give celebrities.

I’ve been doing more than just ranting on this blog – here’s six (among many) charities that I’ve talked to about this.

Continue reading ‘Weaning Charities off Celebrities’

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