Hat tip to TechCrunch, “Microsoft’s i’m Initiative, which launched in March 2007, has expanded to include Hotmail. The program donates a portion of the ad revenue generated through Hotmail and Messenger to any of ten worthwhile causes.”

Background on Microsoft i’m:

i’m is an initiative from Microsoft. Every time you use Windows Live™ Messenger or Windows Live Hotmail®, our free webmail service, Microsoft shares a portion of the program’s advertising revenue with an organization of your choice from a selection of some of the world’s most effective organizations dedicated to social causes. We’ve set no cap on the amount we’ll donate to each organization. The sky’s the limit. And it’s free.

Here’s another affinity search engine, Ecocho, which basically take Google and Yahoo search feeds, gets a share of the advertising, and buys carbon offsets with some of that money.

See our previous post on affinity search engines to get some background about this space. Here’s the review from TechCrunch.

Link to article: When Tech Innovation Has a Social Mission

Organizations mentioned:
Mozilla
TechSoup
Benetech

From PSD Blog:

The Microfinance Gateway has just released a good and quick comparison between two major players in microfinance: Kiva and MicroPlace.

Better World Books collects books from university bookstores and libraries and resells them, donating an average of 10 percent of the price of the book to nonprofit literacy groups–Books for Africa, Room to Read, World Fund, and National Center for Family Literacy.

Here’s a link to their website. The company raised a total of $4.5 million in its first round of financing, which was led by Good Capital. Here’s a link to the news story on CNET.

Facing budget shortfalls that are squeezing education basics, more Massachusetts public schools are turning to online auctions this spring to raise money for supplies, field trips, library books, playground equipment, and computers. And they’re raking in from $6,000 to $20,000 in the process - more money than live or silent auctions generate at traditional fund-raisers.

The online auction site is powered by BiddingForGood.com, which is a product of cMarket.

Here’s the link to the article.

The portal doesn’t seem to be live yet.

As cause marketing gains popularity, MSN aims to help it along. The company announced last week that it would partner with WhatOnEarthIsGoingOn to create an online community by which brands can connect with consumers through issues they find important.

The whatonearthisgoingon.msn.com portal will tap MSN’s existing user base to create an online community where they can learn about and act upon social issues. The site will then target them with relevant marketing programs from “like-minded brands.”

Link

DotOrg officials said they had decided to spend the money on five initiatives: disease and disaster prevention; improving the flow of information to hold governments accountable in community services; helping small and medium-size enterprises; developing renewable energy sources that are cheaper than coal; and investing in the commercialization of plug-in vehicles.

Link to NYTimes article

Officially launching today is www.maatiam.com, the website known as FreePledge during its beta. The release is just in time for the upcoming holiday shopping season. You can read more about the launch here.

The revamped website offers a fresh new look, an even simpler user experience, and a couple of new capabilities to enhance users’ giving and shopping experiences.

These include:
* The Ability to customize your home page with your favorite retailers.
* An inclusive directory enabling to select any of the 800,000 (501(c)3) nonprofits, powered by GuideStar.
* 200+ retail partners.
* An Effortless Tell-A-Friend with webmail contact import (AOL, Hotmail/Live, Gmail, Yahoo, LinkedIn, and more), and contact files upload.

In 2007, the explosive growth of online social networks seems poised to drive a similar upheaval in the world of philanthropy.

A flood of new ventures — like Bill Clinton’s MyCommitment.org and Dollars for Darfur, an initiative by two high-school students — aim to use Web-based communities to raise money for charitable causes.

Check out this NYTimes articles that examines the impact that some online ventures have had on charitable causes. In particular, three organizations are described in some detail: MyCommitment.org, Dollars for Darfur, and SaveDarfur.org. If you are up for it, here’s a related article in the same issue of NYTimes: In the Fund-Raising Game, Blogs Cut Both Ways