World Vision Vloggers

World Vision is the first charity to really reach out to the YouTube community. We need to support this - but we also need to make it clear we want more than vlogs about poverty.

More about this on my blog:
http://uncultured.com/2010/08/22/world-vision-vloggers/

Update: Since I made this video, World Vision has revamped the World Vision Vloggers website a bit. Now the donations you can make on this site are more restricted and for specific things (like child sponsorship). They listen to feedback and improve things - that's exactly what a charity should be :)

Special Thanks to Elgato Systems for donating the gear needed to edit & compress this video: http://www.elgato.com

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[Oct23rd4004BC]

...

The presence of objective people (the vloggers) in whom their subscribers have confidence removes the excuse offered for not giving that TV adds select the worst cases in order to manipulate.

I like that they have started in areas where world vision have been working and are showing the difference that has been made, rather than showing the worst in order to encourage giving.

[thestudent]

@Oct23rd4004BC Agreed. I think there is a lot to commend about the World Vision Vloggers initiative.

[Oct23rd4004BC]

This raises many interesting issues. A certain amount of administration is necessary in order to effectively use donations and help in the most effective way, and unrestricted donations allow for this. While the concept of seeing exactly where donations go is nice theoretically, in practice most means of doing this increase administration, therefore reducing the amount which goes directly to the more practical work. ...

[thestudent]

@Oct23rd4004BC Have you heard of charity: water? They are a perfect example of how overhead expenses can be covered while (at the same time) tracking donations and even having some donations have no cut taken for overhead.

[ToLokyo]

Hmmm...I think it's interesting.

What's your concept of the scalability of what you do? It seems like you're pushing the value of you being "just a guy", but is it something that relies only on your presence to be effective? How can what you're doing multiply to go beyond just the places you personally can reach?

Do you see what you're doing as a testing ground for possibly other people following in your footsteps? Or is it more just to teach big charities to change their ways?

[thestudent]

@ToLokyo The second part of my response has to do with the nature of social media. YouTube, Twitter, etc is all part of social media. And no one really knows how it will evolve. So the idea of coming up with this perfect, infinitely scalable, plan is erroneous.

Any project rooted in "social media" needs to start with baby steps. And, through these baby steps, do we learn lessons which allow us to do more and expand. Before you can multiply, you need to start with something to multiply with.

[sami2503]

I don't understand people who can dislike videos like this

[UnculturedProject]

@cclaireimpey The third part of this argument comes from my experience as an ethnic Bangladeshi. Aid isn't about the donor. Ultimately, it is about the recipient. And in Bangladesh, as you can see, doesn't trust orgs like World Vision. Partly because they are Christian and Bangladesh is a Muslim majority country. But also because they feel NGOs "eat the cash" through overhead.

We can address this on-the-ground concern by either the charity: water model or a newer fundraising structure.

[UnculturedProject]

@cclaireimpey I love your comment. And comments like these have helped me better articulate what I was trying to say in this video. It's a three part idea:

Donors like you are ideal. You understand aid costs money and trust the organization to segment your donation in a way that does the most good.

Some donors don't like this. Some, because of that, skew towards things like Charity: Water - where 100% of their donation goes directly to providing water w/o overhead.

But there is more.

[cclaireimpey]

I am a world vision sponcer and have been since 7th grade (currently 11th). I don't think that knowing the percentage of our donations, and where it goes is necessary. World vision does do ALOT for 3rd world countries, but it also does a lot for our own country by providing jobs. Let's just assume that 10% or more of the donations goes to buying office supplies or paying people's salaries, then so be it. I'm sure that World Vision, being a humanitarian organization, is not scamming any one but

[fate4204]

I want to know what country this is?

[TheMizDog]

you deserve more subscribers

[UnculturedProject]

@jammacdonald Hey do you know @Frezned? He did a great vlog about how World Vision sponsorship works. Basically, it's about helping an entire community - not just one child :) You should definitely check it out!

[jammacdonald]

thank you for the video. I am a world Vision Volunteer in Canada. I am taking international Business at Nova Scotia Community College and hope to build better futures for people all around the world. I sponsor a child in Mozambique and was wondering if you can do a vlog about World Vision's sponsor ship work. keep up the great work!

[MyCoolRedShoes]

I think what you doing is great. I think it will influence other small groups of other people who go on their own to help out the communities. I think the way you doing it is a good way youth groups could do it. I think if my youth group went and did it the way you have done it, we would get more hands on opportunities.

Your video is good. I think keeping it at a 5 minute time period is good. That way you don't go over bored and lose the watchers interest.

[TheSestren]

@whatsupmusic People can donate their hard earned cash to any charity they want - that's the beauty of it. If you would rather donate to local American charities rather than international ones that's entirely up to you.

[MrTechnicality]

@UnculturedProject youre right, i dont think worldvision will be the first to reach out after how succesful it has been, this shows that everyone is realising that internet is now becoming by far the most dominant media genre and that they need to move away from only using radio and television (for more witty banter add me on skype, same username)