Social Actions Tuner
In the spring of 2009 we helped create a unique tool for connecting people with volunteer and donation opportunities, as part of the Change the Web challenge. It’s a great contest, and a cool technology, but it needs some explanation….
“Social Actions” ( http://www.socialactions.org ) is a database of volunteer and donation opportunities. It combines 50+ of the largest other databases of this kind on the web: Kiva, Volunteer Match, Idealist, Change.org, the list goes on. This is a good thing because it allows nonprofits to post their requests for time, skills, or money ONCE rather than keep 50+ profiles up to date. It is also a good thing because more eyeballs will have access to the Social Actions database, and don’t need to create logins or anything. Overall this is a HUGE, fantastic shift in how the online marketplace of donations and volunteering works.
“Change the Web” ( http://www.netsquared.org/changetheweb/vote ) is a contest, put on by Social Actions and Net Squared, for people to create applications to use the Social Actions data. People have created Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, iPhone apps, widgets, map visualizations, the works. In this respect, the contest has already been very successful – it would have taken a long time, and a lot of money, for Social Actions to fund all this development and extend the reach of their data into all corners of the internet.
“Social Actions Tuner” ( http://satuner.preludeinteractive.com & http://www.netsquared.org/projects/social-actions-tuner ) is our entry. It is a “smart filter” for the data that learns from your choices. It’s a little intimidating at first but give it a try. Feedback welcome! More on the about page: http://satuner.preludeinteractive.com/pages/about
So in summary, you now know about Social Actions and Change the Web. Both are great things, so keep an eye out for them in the future.
I’d like to extend a big thanks to Jake Hofman and David Petersen, who are both super, duper smart and made the app about a million times better than I could have on my own. That’s it! Thanks for your time, feel free to pass this around, and have a fantastic day.
