Buoy Up

Do good while you read the news

5.0•1 review•

1 follower

Do good while you read the news

5.0•1 review•

1 follower

Visit website

We're four founders who were frustrated by the huge volume of bad news and tired of feeling like we couldn't do anything to change the news cycle. We want to make it easier to give to charities and support organizations in the moment, while you read the news. We hope it helps you as much as it's helped us!

Launch tags:

Charity & Giving•Tech

Launch Team

Brian Lee

TheyMadeThat

Upvoted for being a project that isn't just bread and circus My only issue with it is that I would never donate to most of the non-profits you guys listed. Why? I could be wrong but this how I percieve those orgs: - Some are lacking in transparency. - Some do financial gymnastics. Attributing spending to the actual cause, when in reality it's just being used for either administration (I don't want to donate to a jobs program that doesn't advertise itself as one) or awareness campaigns. - Some are just not effective, where millions of dollars do little actual good and the best output from that money are really nice ads which ask for more money. imo in the valley's perspective old school non-profits are too slow, too inefficient & wasteful, and maybe even too corrupt. I would rather my money go to non-profits like https://watsi.org and https://www.kiva.org/ where the transparency is super high and so is the effectiveness. Maybe as a future feature, your plugin can redirect to those orgs's specific projects when it pertains to a country or location in the news?

Report

8yr ago

Leslie Poston

Buoy Up

Maker

@kay0stheory Good feedback! Thank you. We're always adding charities to our database. We stay away from charities that fail our litmus test, which is that they are actually giving money to the people who need it (so, you won't see Susan G Komen or Red Cross, for example). If you have a charity you'd like to see, let us know. Interesting idea re: Kiva and Watsi as well.

Report

8yr ago

Brian Lee

TheyMadeThat

@leslieposton actually i do see Red Cross. It's one of the main example nonprofits on your landing page. I forgot to mention it but that was my red flag. Doctors Without Borders is great but not too keen on UNICEF either even though they're not as bad as Red Cross

Report

8yr ago

Leslie Poston

Buoy Up

Maker

@kay0stheory We'll have to take that off, then! Good eye.

Report

8yr ago

Brian Lee

TheyMadeThat

@leslieposton awesome - I know it's cliche but you guys are actually making this world a better place and helping others do the same

Report

8yr ago

Leslie Poston

Buoy Up

Maker

@kay0stheory :D We hope so! Thank you!

Report

8yr ago

Vaibhav Jain

Very interesting concept! Nice job guys! However I do not trust the organizations that the money goes to(mostly because of transparency issues), so wouldn't want to donate! If only there was a alternate option for donation. Maybe Tie up with social crowdfunding platforms, content aware crowdfunding?

Report

8yr ago

Leslie Poston

Buoy Up

Maker

@mav337 Thanks! We're very intrigued by the trust issue that is being mentioned with some of the charities. We take that seriously and don't include charities that *we* don't trust (like Komen, Red Cross, etc). If you have time, I'd love to hear more about why you don't trust these orgs, and what kind of charities you do trust. Re: crowdfunding platforms - we love this idea but it would take a while to implement. It depends on: API of platform; IRS ramifications of donations and how to connect people to them in a safe, legal way; time to vet (we personally approve charities - so sites like Charity Navigator rank ALL orgs claiming to be charities, and we personally review them for inclusion in our list to make sure they actually give money); scoping out scammers vs real recipients of money; and a few more factors. We'll look into it!

Report

8yr ago