73 Blockchain Social Good Organizations That Are Actually Doing Something —―
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3/12/2019 73 Blockchain Social Good Organizations That Are Actually Doing Something —― 73 Blockchain Social Good Organizations That Are Actually Doing Something By Jessica Klein 02.01.2019 https://breakermag.com/73-blockchain-social-good-organizations-that-are-actually-doing-something/ 1/25 3/12/2019 73 Blockchain Social Good Organizations That Are Actually Doing Something his story is part of BREAKER’s Social Good Week, a series looking at ways T blockchain technology can engineer progress and help humanity. As with any lofty idea that touts “blockchain” or accepts crypto, people likely will (and should) take promises of “blockchain for social good” with a grain of salt. “Blockchain” connotes hype-riding publicity plays. Crypto-acceptance screams “scammer.” Yet many seemingly genuine organizations claim blockchain technology as an integral part of their missions to save the world—from environmental perils, from poverty, and from its biggest threat of all, humanity. At BREAKERMAG, we waded through numerous nonprofits, for profits, startups, and established institutions to look for organizations that are using blockchain technology with deeply positive intentions. Among the many futuristic promo videos and do-gooder buzzwords, we found startups with smart, practical plans of action that happen to include distributed ledgers and state-independent currencies—not because those terms make bitcoin billionaire investors wiggle their ears, but because the technologies bolster the organizations’ goals. (Besides, crypto winter weeded out many of the purely ear-perking projects, anyway.) The organizations we looked at are in varying stages of development. According to an April 2018 Stanford Graduate School of Business report that looked at 193 organizations using blockchain for social impact, 74 percent are still in “pilot” mode. The fact that so many of these projects are at such early stages of development made it very difficult to come up with uniform criteria to judge which ones would make our list, so we kept it simple. Each organization had to have exhibited credibility in at least one of three categories—concrete action (have they done anything?), money (have they gotten or given any?), and/or big names (do we know and trust the people involved?). https://breakermag.com/73-blockchain-social-good-organizations-that-are-actually-doing-something/ 2/25 3/12/2019 73 Blockchain Social Good Organizations That Are Actually Doing Something It’s a low bar, sure, but remember that the organizations on our list are very young, as is blockchain technology in general. The bitcoin whitepaper was only released in 2008, and the technology described in it only really caught on with the 2017 crypto boom. That said, 55 percent of the organizations included in the Stanford study were expected to reach beneficiaries “early this year.” Several of them have. We split the following organizations into eight categories: funding and donations, environment, food and agriculture, gender and sexuality, government, healthcare and medicine, identity and banking, and information and education. It’s possible that we missed some organizations doing great work in any of the above. Really, not all of blockchain is Lambos, $100,000 watches, and creepy cruises—there are a lot of people out there harnessing the power of distributed ledgers for good, and more are learning about the technology every day. Funding and donations The problem: Many people question whether donations are making it to their intended beneficiaries. The blockchain solution: Transparency The organizations: They range from homemade tip bots to one of the U.S.’s biggest banking establishments; some allow donors to send payments directly to the nonprofits https://breakermag.com/73-blockchain-social-good-organizations-that-are-actually-doing-something/ 3/25 3/12/2019 73 Blockchain Social Good Organizations That Are Actually Doing Something of their choice, others focus on providing transparent funding mechanisms for larger organizations. Atix Labs Founded: 2011 Mission: Helping small social good enterprises gain access to (transparent) funding Cred: UNICEF’s Innovation Fund invested time and money in this Singapore/Argentina- based company. (Read our story about the Atix Labs and five startups participating in the UNICEF Innovation Fund’s blockchain workshop in New York last week.) Binance Charity Foundation Launched: 2018 Mission: Bringing accountability to charitable donations Cred: Its platform features only a small handful of charity projects, but one funded 20 beneficiaries affected by a landslide in Uganda’s Bududa District. BitGive Foundation Founded: 2013 Mission: Letting donors follow their bitcoin donations step-by-step Cred: Its early partners included nonprofits like Save the Children and the Water Project, and the organization has worked with others across the globe since. (Read our interview with BitGive’s founder here.) Blockchain4Humanity Founded: 2017 Mission: Acting as an accelerator for blockchain projects that aim to affect social change Cred: The organization has given out two rounds of awards in which they’ve helped facilitate funding for 41 blockchain social good platforms, including BitGive. Disberse Founded: 2016 Mission: Making it more efficient to send and receive funds between donors and aid organizations around the world Cred: Disberse has enacted pilot programs in Albania, Rwanda, and Ukraine and counts partners such as Oxfam, The Netherlands Red Cross, and Start Network. Dogecoin Tip Bot Created: Very signature, much design Mission: Such tips Cred: This may sound like a joke, but using this tipbot, the Dogecoin community was able to hand out 156 pairs of socks to homeless people in Los Angeles this past November. Fidelity Charitable Started accepting cryptocurrency: 2015 Mission: Letting people make charitable donations using bitcoin https://breakermag.com/73-blockchain-social-good-organizations-that-are-actually-doing-something/ 4/25 3/12/2019 73 Blockchain Social Good Organizations That Are Actually Doing Something Cred: Fidelity is one of the world’s largest asset managers, managing more than $2,459 billion worth of assets as of March 2018. GiftCoin ICO started: March 2018 Mission: Letting charitable donors track how and when their money is spent Cred: GiftCoin is running two pilot programs, one with established charity payment processor Network For Good, another with an forthcoming platform called Charity Checkout. It’s been tested out by small charities like Ourmala, which offers yoga classes to refugees. Giveth Founded: 2016 Mission: Removing intermediaries from charitable giving Cred: The Giveth decentralized app is currently live in beta and is running six campaigns, which have cumulatively received more than 644 ETH (more than $67,100 at time of writing). Pineapple Fund Founded: 2017 (though it’s now defunct) Mission: Using bitcoin to fund multiple charitable organizations Cred: When live, the Pineapple Fund raised $55,750,000 across 60 charities listed on the project’s website. Charities spanned all sectors, including environmental conservation, The Internet Archive, the ACLU, and drug information website Erowid. Ripple for Good Founded: 2018 Mission: Supporting organizations that increase global financial inclusion Cred: It’s backed by Ripple, which has ample financial resources and a robust team, and is partnered with DonorsChoose.org, an initiative that helps public schools. (Read our story about how Ripple’s charitable giving is also a savvy marketing play here.) RootProject Founded: 2017 Mission: Creating a decentralized community around crowdfunding Cred: RootProject has raised modest funds for a few campaigns. One aims to aid Iraqi orphans, and another seeks to help homeless teens in the U.S. Sustainability International/Sela Pilot launched: 2017 Mission: Fostering communication among stakeholders to keep track of project finances Cred: Sela launched a pilot program in Nigeria in November 2017 in which a group monitored an oil cleanup. Members used Sela to fact check information from contractors working on the cleanup in exchange for financial compensation. https://breakermag.com/73-blockchain-social-good-organizations-that-are-actually-doing-something/ 5/25 3/12/2019 73 Blockchain Social Good Organizations That Are Actually Doing Something The Giving Block Founded: 2018 Mission: Helping nonprofits receive cryptocurrency donations/working with blockchain- related nonprofits Cred: The Giving Block has worked directly with a number of nonprofits to help them set up cryptocurrency donations, including the Lupus Foundation. (We asked The Giving Block how to make sure you’re donating your crypto to a trustworthy cause here.) XRP Tip Bot Launched: 2017 Mission: Rewarding content creators and commenters on social platforms Twitter, Reddit, and Discord Cred: Using the XRP Tip Bot, people have donated more than $11,800 to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital—a happily unintended consequence of a bot created so people could, in essence, financially upvote comments they liked. (Read our story about the tip bot’s surprising success here.) Environment The problem: Maintaining sustainability in the face of the hulking pre-apocalyptic human- fueled very current danger we almost euphemistically call “climate change” feels genuinely impossible. The blockchain solution: Incentivizing and tracking The organizations: They’re actively rewarding people using solar power in Brooklyn and helping corporations reduce their carbon footprints…but tracking fish seems to be the first universal test