I raise funds online (as an individual – alas, not tax deductible) and I give 100% of what I raise away to charitable causes. And I mean 100% – I even have a friend who covers the PayPal fees of your donation (for now at least). I then show you were the money goes via YouTube and/or Twitter. Sometimes both as you can see in this video.

Most of my work focuses primarily on Bangladesh because I have an ancestry there and still have a few aunts & uncles who live there (although they’ve kinda shunned me for pursuing a project like this – but that’s another story). But, poverty exists everywhere – even around your street corner. That’s why I decided to focus on the LA Regional Food Bank – you don’t need to go overseas to help people.

If you have a few minutes to spare, you can watch my food bank video by clicking here (it’s 3 minutes long). If you want to know more about “The Uncultured Project” you can watch this (it’s also 3 minutes). And if you have a bit more time, please do check out this video of a water project I did in Bangladesh that took over a year to complete (it’s a 4 minute video).

If you are wondering how to support my work – well, donating isn’t the biggest way. The biggest way is by helping me build a bigger voice on YouTube. Please consider signing up for a YouTube account (it’s free) and subscribing to my channel on YouTube. The bigger the voice this project can get, the better the chances that sustainability and more opportunities can come around the corner.

I also want to give a shout-out to my friends Hank & John Green (who were also quoted in that article). Without Hank & John, I wouldn’t have started to accept online donations from the public (they also get automatically notified every time you make a project donation). Also a huge thanks to my friends working at YouTube (many of whom I got to meet IRL) who made this interview with CNN possible.

Stick around. There are lots of hurdles – but I’m positive the best is yet to come.

Malaria No More is one of the world’s leading charities fighting malaria in Africa. For exactly $10, they can protect an entire sleeping site from malaria for up to five years. As of the writing of this post, donations on behalf of Henry Green are now enough to protect over 250 sleeping sites (or an estimated 1,000 people).

That’s the good news. The bad news is that, of the 250 sleeping sites that Malaria No More could be helping with this donation, only 231 sleeping sites will be served. That’s an estimated 75 people (most likely much more) that won’t be (but should be) sleeping under a mosquito net.

Find out more after the jump…

How could this be?

The reason actually has nothing to do with Malaria No More – and everything to do with the way in which the donations were collected. John Green, like many Americans trying to raise funds for charity, decided to use the website FirstGiving.com.

FirstGiving.com allows anyone to create a custom donation page for their favorite charity. Anyone making a page can set a fundraising goal, provide a deadline, and allow donors to leave comments and rally others to donate. It’s interactive and a very “Web 2.0″ way to fundraise.

What makes FirstGiving.com great is that it avoids the mess of having to handle the money yourself. FirstGiving processes all donations for you and sends the funds to the charity of your choice. No need to worry about accounting or wiring funds. FirstGiving is essentially your trusted middle man.

FirstGiving allows anyone to fundraise for their favorite charity. Progress bars, custom images, donor comments, and more make this a very interactive and community-based way to fundraise.

But what’s the catch?

The thing that gives me pause about FirstGiving.com is that, for the mere privilege of acting as a middle man, they take $7.50 from every $100 donated. For anyone who has raised funds for charity via PayPal, you’ll know that FirstGiving is charging more than double what it would cost to raise the funds yourself.

But it’s just 7.5%, right? Well, think of it this way. For every $133.33 donated to Malaria No More via FirstGiving.com, one family that could have received a mosquito net will have to go without. That’s one family that’s at risk of dying when they shouldn’t be. Hate to say it but it’s true: 7.5% is the difference between life and death.

But what is fair compensation for a middle man?

Don’t get me wrong. I believe everyone in this world has a right to earn a living. The staff at FirstGiving.com are no doubt highly passionate and hardworking people that deserve to be compensated for their work – even if that work is helping to raise funds to help charitable causes.

But how much should it cost to be a middle man? Let me put this in context: Save the Children is one of the biggest charities in the world. They take a cut from every dollar they receive. With that cut they can hire engineers to do water projects, rent warehouses to store emergency relief, and have offices right in the communities they serve.

How much does Save the Children take from every dollar to fund this vast international operation? Eight percent. Why does FirstGiving.com, a small 20-person company based in Massachusetts, need to have nearly as big a percentage cut as Save the Children?

In fact, why isn’t FirstGiving.com (the US site) at least as competitive as their counterparts in the United Kingdom? I am a huge fan of the UK version of FirstGiving – called JustGiving.com. Why? Because 100% of every dollar donated (by UK citizens) goes straight to the charity.

If you are not a UK citizen, JustGiving will still handle your donation – but they will just charge a mere 5% fee. This needs to be emphasized: if you are American, more of your money reaches the charity of your choice if you use the UK site instead of the American site.

The Need for the Web 2.0 Middle Man

Efficiency aside, the reason why sites like JustGiving, FirstGiving, and Facebook Causes (which charges 4.75%) need to exist is because most charities simply don’t get it. John Green could have easily pointed people to Malaria No More’s own official donation page. While that does guarantee 100% of the funds go directly to the charity – it is fundraising without community interaction.

Using only the official donation form, John could not set a fundraising goal, time limit, or give an explanation as to who the donations are in honor of. In turn, donors could not track how many donations were made nor would they be able to interact (via donation page comments) with other supporters.

With so many of us engaged in “Web 2.0″, why is giving money to important causes stuck in “Web 1.0″? It’s because most charities don’t have any impetus to change. Their biggest donors are still baby boomers and most charities fail to see the value in investing to become more accessible to a tech savvy generation.

In many respects, FirstGiving, JustGiving, Facebook Causes, and even what I’m doing are ways to try and push old fashioned charities into the 21st century. The problem is that many charities are dragging their feet, kicking, and screaming every step of the way. Although the tragedy in Haiti is pushing many charities forward, there is still a long way to go. The charities that adapt the fastest will be the ones to survive.

Survival of the Fittest

Even though Save the Children has been around since the great depression and is able to build clean water wells at a price few charities can beat ($2,500 per well), most of my friends tend to donate to Charity: Water instead. Why? Charity: Water makes it easy for you to donate and bring your community with you.

If I wanted to, I could setup a donation page at mycharitywater.org in under five minutes. I can have a custom logo, fundraising goal (at the cost of $5,000 per well), and give an explanation for my fundraising. Donors, in turn, can leave messages and track the progress in real-time. And, unlike FirstGiving, JustGiving, or Facebook Causes, there is no transaction fee.

Similarly, in the face of the crisis in Haiti, on the ground charities like Partners in Health have made it easy for people to setup a custom donation page right on their own official website. Sure, you could use middle men instead – but then part of your donation will never reach the shores of Haiti.

Wake-Up Call to Charities

I once told staff at Save the Children that their organization’s capacity to adapt to the needs of my generation in the next five years will determine whether or not they will survive fifty years down the road. That isn’t an exaggeration – and that statement is by no means limited to any one particular charity.

The socially conscious in my generation are making it clear that they value convenience and community-interaction over cost-efficiency. The more charities embrace this kind of fundraising, the quicker this doesn’t have to be a choice between efficiency vs. interaction. And, the charities that embrace this first are the ones that will earn the loyalties that will last years to come.

Now that I’m back from the disaster area, I will be closing the Cyclone Aila Relief Fund in the next 24 hours. I’m leaving it open for one more day just in case there is anyone who wanted to donate earlier but couldn’t.

I also don’t want my efforts to be mistaken for official fundraising for Save the Children (or any charity for that matter) – so the sooner I close the donation page, the less confusion there will be.

Thanks again for all the support this project has been getting. And, as always, don’t feel obliged to donate. Just stick around – there’s a whole lot more I’d like to do if I can keep this project going.

You can buy yours for about $2.25 at a convenience store for about a 1.5 L bottle.

Here’s what you guys spent your money on instead:

Pond Sand Filter Water Samples (click for larger size)

This is water samples from the near-finished Pond Sand Filter. Paid for by donations from you and voted democratically upon in Challenge Poverty. This will serve over 50 families in rural Bangladesh and has the potential (if maintained inexpensively by the local community) for approximately ten years.

Just some of the 50+ Families to Benefit from This

Thanks to Save the Children for tirelessly working on this to make sure this small rural community gets to drink water as clear as if it came from the French Alps.

For this year’s Project for Awesome, I decided to pull out all the stops and show you guys a lot of the stuff I’ve been doing but haven’t had the time to put into individual episodes or videos. I keep saying that this project is less about me and more about the community behind it – hopefully this latest video helps convey that.

And, yeah, this video does use copyrighted music by Coldplay (part of EMI Records). I did enough research into YouTube’s agreement with EMI Records and am fairly certain this video won’t be taken down. But, of course, I also had to forfeit any chance of earning any ad revenue and (as I later found out) any reasonable chance of having this video being featured or promoted. EMI can also reserve the right to take down this video, region lock it, or place ads on it where they can earn all the ad revenue from it (just like the Counting Crows & Universal Music have region locked my Cyclone Sidr video and take all the ad revenue from it).

But that’s cool. This was a kind of video I wanted to make for ages. I just never could find the right match of visuals and music until I heard “Life in Technicolor ii” by Coldplay.

Hello from Plano, Texas! I’ve got some great news. First, I got to meet Hank & John Green. They are even more amazing in real life than they are online. If you want to see them, they are going on a Cross-America trip called the Tour de Nerdfighting. Check this map to see when and where they will be next – you can even RSVP by clicking on the city location.

Second, if you’ve ever wanted to make a donation but 1) Can’t or don’t want to use PayPal and 2) Don’t like how PayPal takes a cut of every donation – than there is a great opportunity for you to get involved in this project in a way that guarantees 100% of your donation is used. And best of all? I don’t ever have to touch a dime.

Hank and John will be accepting donations at every stop of their tour up until November 12th. On November 12th, they’ll be in Westport, Conneticut – the home town of Save the Children USA. If all goes according to plan – they’ll be handing over the donations directly to Save the Children. That money will be spent based on how you guys vote in my Challenge Poverty video. Voting is still open – so please do get involved!

I don’t have to touch your money, 100% of the funds raised go straight to helping the poor, you get to decide how it’s spent, and it all helps one of the world’s greatest international charities. How more awesome can it get?

Click the jump for some photos from the Plano event…

Here’s Hank and John signing books – the bag for accepting donations on Hank’s left.

Here’s a Nerdfighter I met by the name of Becca. I was explaining to the crowd how far a dollar could go. I started by saying “If the first ten people in the front row donated just one dollar…” but before I could finish – the first ten people in the front row were already pulling out a buck or more. Nerdfighters are truly made of awesome.

Here’s the crowd itself. It was jam-packed.

Hank and John were also signing books outside before the event began…

And Hank sang a few songs from his CD that was released that very day.

P.S. All these photos are uploaded to my Facebook account. If you notice yourself in any of these photos – do add me as a friend and tag yourself in the photo!

In fact, I had written:

In my opinion, peace on Earth will come when we stop hating what is different among us and start loving what it is we have in common. When we finally do that, I think we will find that we share the same wisdom – though we may find it in different places and from different books.

This little project may not have changed the world – but it seems to have created a little bubble of the kind of world that a lot of us would like to see. I started to realize this when I started going over those who had made donations to this project. Take a look at some of the countries people have been donating from:

What makes this even more interesting is that it seems that virtually every race, religion, and ethnicity has contributed to this project. Corresponding with a few of the donors I know for a fact that atheists/agnostics, Jews, Christians (and not just Catholics from Notre Dame), Muslims, and Hindus have all contributed to this project.

I used to think Mahatma Gandhi’s phrase “be the change you want to see” was just cliché beaten to death by countless charities, fundraisers, and organizations. But, I gotta say… I’m starting to become a believer in that saying.

(Photo Credit: Flag Icons Made by IconDrawer.com)

Jamison Young, originally uploaded by dominick.chen.

When I started accepting donations, John Green said it best – “this isn’t charity, this is an experiment in community”. Even though I’m not an official charity, accepting donations from the public has been a great way of making a connection between those who this project has been able to help and those who have provided the funds to make that help possible.

In my previous blog post of “Meet a Donor” I introduced you guys to Hank Green (although I’m sure almost everyone reading this blog is already familiar with Hank Green and the vlogbrothers). Hank decided to match my “Xbox 360 challenge” by donating the funds equal to that of buying a new Xbox 360. I used those funds (after a rather remote and shaky journey) to help sponsor a child name Rithanu in the Chittagong-Hill-Tracts.

In this blog post of “Meet a Donor”, I’d like to introduce you guys to someone who has blown me away with his level of generosity and compassion: Jamison Young.

Jamison Young is an Australian born singer who lives in Prague. Even before he donated any money, his contributions to this project have been invaluable. Jamison licenses all his music under the Creative Commons. Not just that, but the specific license Jamison choose lets people use his music (in both for-profit and not-for-profit capacities) without having to pay Jamison a cent for the rights. It’s Jamison Young’s song “How Far” that has been the theme song for this project ever since the second video went online.

And it’s also actually been Jamison Young’s generosity with his work that inspired me to release all my videos, blog posts, and photos under the Creative Commons. I already thought Jamison was a generous guy – but his latest contribution blew me away. One of Jamison’s song actually got featured in the soundtrack of the new X-Files movie. For a guy that normally gives his work away for free, this was one of those opportunities where he actually earned some well-deserved money on his work. And you know what he did? He gave it all away.

Jamison Young at the new X-Files Movie, originally uploaded by jamtea.

So, when voting ends for my latest video, I’ll be going back to Bangladesh to execute whatever you guys have voted for. Depending on which options I end up doing, Jamison’s donation will be enough to cover either a large chunk – or the entirety – of one of the options. How far can this dreamin’ go?

Choosing has always been the hardest part of this project. I’ve tried my best to share all the emotions I’ve had during this project like the joy of helping children in the Hill-Tracts, or the anguish and sense of powerlessness during Cyclone Sidr disaster relief, or the craziness involved in reaching some remote rural village. With this latest video, I’m sharing the toughest reality of this project: being forced to choose.

With this video, there is no wrong answer – only tough choices.

More after the jump.

There are a total of five options but there is only enough money to do maybe two or three of them. The options are:

• Build a Deep-Tube Well *
• Build a Pond-Sand Filter (aka PSF or Biosand Filter) *
• Buy 80 Salter Scales **
• Build a School Latrine *
• Repair a School Damaged by Cyclone Sidr ***

I haven’t listed prices but I have put a * star to indicate 1/3rd of the budget. So, the school repair would take up 100% of the budget (***), 80 Salter Scales would take up 2/3rds of the budget (**), and a School Latrine, Pond Sand Filter, and a Deep Tube Well each cost approximately 1/3rd of the budget (*).

The reason I am not mentioning the prices is because, with the downturn in the global economy, the price of raw materials is rising everyday. I’ve accounted for that and have budgeted for price changes. The other big reason I’m not mentioning prices is that I’m not trying to use this as an appeal for more money.

In fact, even if I could do all five, there are tons of things I saw out there that are equally as important. We will always be forced to choose…

Option #1 The Deep Tube Well

If you are going to get water from underground water sources, you need a deep tube well. It’s called “deep” because you literally need to drill quite a bit underground. This particular deep tube well reaches to an underground water source 1,000 feet underground. You need to drill that deep because the water just underground is full of salt.

The Big Upside: Deep tube well have been around for ages. They are the most reliable way to get clean and safe drinkable water. It’s also rather cheap – potentially using only 1/3rd of the budget I’ve got for this region.

The Big Downside: Underground water in this region has heavy iron deposits. The water comes out reddish. It’s safe to drink but you can’t use it for cooking (as it spoils a lot of food).

This option touches upon (in one way or another) on the following Millennium Development Goals:

Option #2 The Pond Sand Filter

A lot of people bathe and drink from pond water instead. Pond water doesn’t have the iron problem found in the deep tube well, but pond water can often be full of bacteria, worms, and dangerous parasites. Save the Children helps to make pond water safe with something called the Pond Sand Filter.

The Big Upside: It’s a proven way of providing water that is not only safe to drink but also safe to cook with. The pumping system is also the easiest I’ve ever seen.

The Big Downside: Pond sand filters are a filter-based system. And like any filter, sooner or later, you’ll need to repair and/or replace it. Save the Children USA tells me their pond sand filters last a minimum of two years – that’s a long time, but it’s not permanent.

This option touches upon (in one way or another) on the following Millennium Development Goals:

Option #3: Buy 80 Salter Scales

I’m sure you already know the depressing facts about how many children die in the developing world each day. It’s true that between pregnancy and the age of five is the most vulnerable time due to disease and malnutrition. Save the Children is trying to fight infant and child mortality with a program called “Survive To 5″. This program needs weighing scales (called Salter Scales) in order to monitor the weight and development of babies.

The Big Upside: Monitoring weight is a simple but critical part of preventing child and infant mortality.

The Big Downside: Even though any one Salter Scale isn’t that expensive, Save the Children has specifically requested 80 because they want to ensure fair treatment and distribution. They don’t want mothers going to one medical center and not the other because one center has a Salter Scale and another doesn’t. So either we help everyone or none at all.

This option touches upon (in one way or another) on the following Millennium Development Goals:

Option #4: Build a School Latrine

When I was in high school, I knew a lot of people that didn’t care to use the bathrooms at school. That’s fine when you have running water and a bathroom back home. But, in rural areas like Barguna, the bathroom facilities at school are usually the only proper facilities many children have access to.

The Big Upside: A school latrine is an easy way to make sure a school is a healthy place.

The Big Downside: The only real downside is public perception. People can brag about sponsoring a child. Building a bathroom? Ehh… not so much.

This option touches upon (in one way or another) on the following Millennium Development Goals:

Option #5: Help Rebuild a School Damaged by Cyclone Sidr

There are a lot of emotions tied to this option. It’s shocking to see a school remain in disrepair so long after Cyclone Sidr hit. It’s depressing to think that children still go to this place to study – even though not a single classroom is usable. It’s also frustrating knowing that – in order to make significant repairs to this school – all the other options would have to be forfeited.

Repairing a school – like this co-ed secular junior high school is one of the options available as part of this operation. But, the downside is that it would take up the entirety of the budget I’ve made.

This option touches upon (in one way or another) on the following Millennium Development Goals:

How To Vote:

Leave a comment on YouTube or make video response to this video. Video responses preferred

After the second meeting, I had a list of all the grandmothers and what animals they chose to receive.  It is probably the most interesting shopping list I’ve ever had:

My co-worker Joseph and I got to the village of Buwaiswa on Wednesday afternoon, and were immediately greeted by Mama Lillian, who helps out at the orphanage.  Mama Lillian conveniently had eight piglets ready to be sold, we could have first pick if we so chose.  Done.

This gave us time to go around on foot (anything else was impossible) and visit some of the grandmothers who wanted goats.  Three of them had even done shopping on their own and found goats for us to buy.

That night we went into the trading center of Busota to see if we could find an animal salesman named Dadi.  He supposedly had a bunch of goats waiting to be sold.  After we arrived in Busota and were mobbed by kids who hadn’t seen a white person before, we eventually found his assistant.  He confirmed that Dadi had some goats ready to sell; the only problem was that he wasn’t in town.  We would need to come back tomorrow.  We exchanged phone numbers and then hitched a ride back to Buwaiswa.

The next morning, we took an early tea and then ventured up to Busota again.  Dadi was still missing.  His phone wasn’t getting any reception (no surprise), so we just had to wait.  And wait.  After repeated attempts, we finally got Dadi on the phone long enough to find out that he was technically sold out of goats at the moment, which was why he was frantically driving around trying to find more.

Back to square one.  This was going to be a long day.  Our boda-boda driver told us that he had an idea, which was as good as anything, so we pulled a u-turn and headed back past Buwaiswa.  Along the way, we found a chicken farmer and made his day.  He finished the transaction sixteen chickens lighter and 105,000 shillings richer.

The goat dealer we found didn’t have any either, but he at least knew where to get some.  We found a tree for some shade and sat down as he took our boda driver off into the bush.  Over the next hour, he came back four times with a goat on his lap, tied it to a stump, and headed off in another direction.  On the fifth trip, he hopped off, tied up the last goat, and walked over to us.

“That’s all I could find.”

I was impressed.  Five goats in an hour.  That’s twelve minutes per goat!

After this stroke of luck, things were looking good.  In war, what we did next is called “mopping up.”  For the rest of thursday and friday, we just meandered around on foot and found the last four goats.

Our shopping was over.  We called the grannies.  They needed to help bring in groceries.