"This event gives the ZURB team a chance to help a nonprofit get unstuck by giving back in the best way we know how - by helping them solve problems through our time and effort. We get to stretch and grow while sharing our unique skill set for designing things for people."

Many nonprofits, especially small ones, have a lot on their plate, and building a great Web portal often takes a back seat to more immediate concerns, even though a website might be vital. It's great of ZURB to offer their creative and technical services as a donation.

Check out this video from last year's event in partnership with Resource Area For Teaching (RAFT):

EFAC is essentially an affiliate advertising network that gives a majority (70%) of its profits to charity. With the popularity of social sharing on the Web and the rise of recommendation services, EFAC seems to be a perfect fit for the Web-savvy shopper looking to help raise money for a good cause.

The privately-funded startup is launching with 10 high-profile charities, including the American Red Cross, the Humane Society of the United States and Kiva.org. Other charities will be added to the site over time based on demand from user voting. Users can also earn points, badges and prizes based on their activity - a tenant of today's social Web that has been proven to drive deep engagement.

The company hopes to raise further private equity later this year and intends on using the money to develop mobile applications for both the iPhone and Android devices.

For example, a deal on canoe rentals might be tied to a campaign to clean up a river, a deal on bike tuneups might be linked to a campaign to donate bicycles to disadvantaged youth and so on.

But G-Team campaigns don't necessarily have to be focused on charity: they can be used for fun too, like organizing a flash mob or rounding up Groupon shoppers to use their coupon together on the same night at a particular venue.

Although the G-Team initiative was announced over a month ago, there has been little media coverage so far, likely due to its staged rollout. Initially, G-Team is only available as a pilot program in Chicago, but Groupon says it plans on bringing the program to more cities in the future.

The first campaign, just announced via Twitter and now available here, is raising money to support a local theater organization.

Groupon's Roots are in Community Organization

Many of Groupon's users may not realize that initiatives like these actually served as the roots of what became the discount shopping experience that's now practically a household name. According to the Groupon website, the organization grew out of a website called The Point, launched in 2007, which lets anyone start a campaign, but delays action until enough people have committed to the project. That same philosophy of collective power was later applied to what became Groupon, a site that offers a daily deal that's only available once enough people join that day.

With the G-Team campaigns, now hosted on The Point's site, there will be a "tipping point" that will need to be reached before action is taken. And anyone can apply for one of these Groupon campaign sponsorships, either as an individual or a representative from a non-profit or other local grassroots organization.

Explains Patty Huber, community manager for both The Point and Groupon, "First, we'll help you create a campaign page on The Point. Next, we'll develop a partnership with a Groupon merchant who will help support your campaign. Then, we'll promote your campaign along with the merchant's daily deal to our huge subscriber base."

G-Team campaigns, says Huber, are designed to benefit local communities, run for a limited period of time (usually a day), support causes that resonate with subscribers, aid specific projects and are organized around a "compelling story."

If you or your organization wants to be considered for sponsorship, the online application is available here.

Still, there are organizations such as Kiva, The Extraordinaires or SocialVibe and many others that do turn user microactions and technology to affect change and do good in very tangible ways. Those are just three of the tech nonprofit or philanthropic organizations I can think of at the moment, but we at RWW would love to know more. Tell us in the comment what your favorite tech nonprofit is and why.

SocialVibe is a company that helps brands and users create positive social change. In a typical SocialVibe setup, a brand "sponsors" users, who take small actions and engagements to raise money for the charity of their choice. In some ways, it's kind of like a broader-in-scope version of The Hunger Site, which gets advertisers to shell out cash to feed hungry people when users click around the site.

And The Extraordinaires is a program we just recently discovered while finding out how to help our readers use their personal time and online actions to help folks in Haiti. This site allows organizations to create missions. Users can complete micro-tasks from their mobile devices or computers toward those missions. Currently, the site has around 50 participating organizations and about 6,000 members who have completed in excess of 35,000 micro-tasks. Missions range from mapping safe places for children to play to helping first-aid responders reduce fatalities.

But there are many ways tech can be used to help others, not just the social media-focused, crowdsources companies we've mentioned here. For example, Inveneo helps to give access to information and communications technologies, including phones, computers and Internet access, to people in remote parts of developing countries. And there are many organizations focusing on getting tech hardware into the hands of those who need it, including students and injured veterans.

We'd love to know more about similar projects and organizations, whether large or small, new or longstanding. In this open thread of comments, please tell us your favorite nonprofit or philanthropic tech organization and let us know what they do. And please spread the good word and invite others to share, as well!

WordPress founder and Automattic founder Matt Mullenweg has just announced that his nonprofit, charitable foundation is officially an open shop. The WordPress Foundation is an organization dedicated to supporting and promoting the very mission of WordPress itself. Simply put, as on the Foundation website: "to democratize publishing through Open Source, GPL software." Everybody dance!

The point of the foundation is to ensure free access, in perpetuity, to the projects we support. People and businesses may come and go, so it is important to ensure that the source code for these projects will survive beyond the current contributor base, that we may create a stable platform for web publishing for generations to come. As part of this mission, the Foundation will be responsible for protecting the WordPress, WordCamp, and related trademarks. A 501(c)3 non-profit organization, the WordPress Foundation will also pursue a charter to educate the public about WordPress and related open source software.

Citing the Mozilla Foundation and the creator of the GNU GPL license as inspirations, the Foundation says its philosophies to serve the public good will require all its projects to be utterly free - as in beer and as in speech.

So far, the Foundation's projects include WordPress, its plugins and themes, the forum software bbPress and social network software BuddyPress. As for future projects, Mullenweg told us, "I think this year we're going to focus mainly on educational opportunities, ways to make rich educational material about publishing and development available to anybody, in any language."

All projects of the WordPress Foundation will meet the following criteria:

• The software should be licensed under the GNU Public License.
• The software should be freely available to anyone to use for any purpose, and without permission.
• The software should be open to modifications.
• Any modifications should be freely distributable at no cost and without permission from its creators.
• The software should provide a framework for translation to make it globally accessible to speakers of all languages.
• The software should provide a framework for extensions so modifications and enhancements can be made without modifying core code.

The Foundation will be setting up a donation process within the next few days.

WordPress fans (and others), let us know what you think in the comments!

As Twitter co-founder Biz Stone wrote in a blog post a few days ago, "People all over the United States are urged to honor Dr. King's legacy by making this holiday a national day of service." Stone reminded us of this wonderful quotation by King: "Life's most persistent and urgent question is: What are you doing for others?"
But often in my sojourn through the social Web, I find myself with no decent answer for that question as I watch hordes of well-meaning people throw their supposed social capital at hashtags and fan pages without doing anything more meaningful than that. What do you think: Is your "whuffie" enough of a donation to a good cause?

If the visibility of humanitarian topics in social media is any indication of a trend, we clearly love aligning ourselves with good causes, as well. Sometimes, it seems to me that the latest global tragedy or incurable disease is used as simply another hue on the social Web's palette - something we use to paint pictures of ourselves.

For example, in 2009, I saw waves of green Twitter avatars and locations of "Tehran" as #iranelection peaked on Twitter's trending topics. But what did any of us actually do to help the citizens on the ground there? The green pro-free Iran icons really did nothing to help the folks getting wounded and killed in Iran. And the new "censored" Twitter avatars we're seeing? Well, since Twitter's blocked in most countries that are aggressively censoring Web content, it does absolutely no good.

As Kiva fellow and social media philanthropist Sloane Berrent told me a few months ago, "People are so fast to click a button, and that can be great. Retweeting, forwarding and Facebook walls are great engagements. But what's more difficult is the donate button. That's the big hurdle and disconnect."

In other words, from Haitians to humanitarians, they all wish we'd put our money where our mouths (or status updates) are.

Our latest international disaster was Haiti's earthquake last week. I'm sure many of the folks reading this post did a lot to help via donations to the Red Cross and other organizations, but how often can we say that our social media or other actions are truly doing something for others? And how often are those actions as ineffective as a lapel pin on a politician or as meaningless as a prayer on the lips of a hypocrite? In many cases, the social media user is doing nothing for others, but is instead highlighting his own awareness and sociopolitical "involvement."

There are some organizations such as SocialVibe (scroll to the last part of the post) or Drew Olanoff's Blame Drew's Cancer campaign that allow brands to foot the bill for fundraising as users simply point and click their way through Web interfaces to show their support. And there's no doubt that social media tools have made it easier for struggling groups to communicate their needs for help. But by and large, I believe that our social media actions don't do nearly as much for others as they do for us ourselves.

Perhaps, before we fire off rant-replete blog posts or make our avatars into 50 x 50 pixel political statements, we should ask ourselves the question Dr. King posed so many years ago: "What does my action DO for others?" And on the flip side of that coin, "What does my action do for me?"

If the answers to those questions embarrass you, take a step back, make a sizeable donation to a related humanitarian organization, then post away and tell others how much you donated and to whom, and create channels for others to do the same.

What do you think? Am I completely wrong; is awareness and communication through social media the "new" currency for donating to a good cause? What points have I missed in my thought process? Let me know your opinions in the comments, and also share how you plan to make your actions count for others today.

For another perspective on this topic, see Mashable editor Ben Parr's column on CNN.com, or check out ReadWriteWeb's Charity & Social Good archives.

As "volunteering" is defined as "working on behalf of others without being motivated by financial or material gain," this seems like a strange use of the word. In the case of employees deferring pay, this seems more like an unfortunate burden rather than an act of volunteerism. If you're an experienced professional looking to stay sharp and you've got the freedom to contribute to actual volunteer-driven efforts or you'd like to try working for a cause-based organization, below are some great resources:

2. Care 2: Care 2 claims to be the world's largest listing of jobs with socially responsible companies. The site offers a list of environmental and renewable-energy related jobs including positions for design and construction specialists with LEED certifications.

3. Idealist: Idealist is a project of Action Without Borders and lists a number of job and volunteer opportunities for those looking to become change agents. The site focuses specifically on addressing social and environmental problems and volunteers can do everything from building a shelter in Ghana to becoming a board member with a North American environmental agency.

4. Volunteer Match: San Francisco-based Volunteer Match helps almost 70,000 nonprofit organizations provide direct services and advocacy to our communities. Whether you're interested in driving a Meals on Wheels van or trekking to Nepal to rebuild structures of historical significance, Volunteer Match offers a variety of options.

5.Nonprofit Technology Network: NTEN is an extremely well-known group in the nonprofit world. Their annual conference draws some of the industry's best cause-tech experts including my personal favorite, Beth Kanter. The job site lists IT support, development and media director positions with great organizations across the country.

6. Opportunity Knocks: Opportunity Knocks is a great place to find jobs in the non-profit sector. The site allows users to narrow search results down by salary, city and cause-related interest. There's also a resume tool where users can upload multiple CVs and apply to jobs within the system.

7. Treehugger: Treehugger is one of the leading green networks and was acquired in 2007 by Discovery to help power their Planet Green channel. The site has always offered a variety of tips and articles on sustainable living, environmental justice and holistic health. The jobs site offers volunteer and paid positions for companies and organizations who've made a real commitment to sustainability.

8. NetSquared: While not specifically a volunteer or job site, NetSquared offers cause-tech innovators the opportunity to contribute to global solutions. The site issues challenges to tech-savvy innovators, and volunteers answer the challenges with mobile SMS aid solutions, social action map mash ups and Twitter fundraising tools.

9. YouTube's Video Volunteer Program: As a project of All For Good, the YouTube Video Volunteer Program matches budding filmmakers with NGO's that require promotional or educational video material. Some of the current project applicants include Alaska's Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired, Heart of America's Warriors and Earth.org's Open Travel Guide.

If you've got additional volunteer matching resources, feel free to add them in the comments below.

Since ProPublica announced this policy, articles from ProPublica journalists have appeared in a wide variety of newspapers and online publications, including USA Today, Politico, Salon, The Denver Post, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Los Angeles Times, ABC News, and the Albany Times Union.

To some degree, ProPublica models an approach that could eventually help newspapers to stay afloat by pooling resources and making stories available across a wider network of papers.

ProPublica and Citizen Journalism

Just this week, ProPublica also launched a new citizen journalism project, the ProPublica Reporting Network, that invites citizens to "commit acts of journalism." As its first mission, the ProPublica is asking people to "adopt" a stimulus project and monitor it. Essentially, this project crowdsources investigative journalism, and given the scope of the stimulus bill, this might just turn out to be the only effective way of monitoring the efficiency of a project of this size.

Will More Projects Follow this Path?

It would be nice if other non-profit news organizations like the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting would adopt similarly liberal licenses, though for now, we think this is a great start. If you are aware of similar projects, please let us know in the comments.

That's just what the nonprofit Sunlight Foundation is aiming to make more possible with its work to make government and related data more available with its new Apps for America contest. More than 40 open source applications and websites making use of that data entered the contest and today the six fabulous winners were announced. We've got a five minute screencast tour of the winners below.

Fillibusted - a site aiming to hold filibustering Congresspeople accountable for their actions.

Legistalker - a site that tracks news, Twitter, YouTube and other online activity by and about members of Congress.

HelloCongress - like Digg for Congressional priorities, with a twist.

Know Thy Congressman - a beautiful informational pop-up about Congresspeople that you can invoke anywhere you find their names on the web.

Yeas and Nays - a sophisticated Firefox plug-in that helps you click-to-call members of Congress.

E-Paper Trail - a data rich site to compare and learn about Congresspeople.

There are also a number of Honorable Mentions included on the Sunlight contest page.

Some of these look more useful than others so far but with a little extra support who knows? It's an increasingly data-driven world, but in order to truly get the most value out of that data the web needs interface and mashup developers. That's why it's such a great idea for Sunlight to support these and other developers the way they do.

These days, everywhere you look it seems that some newspaper is closing its doors, stopping its presses, or maybe just going online-only. This sea of change is being heralded by some as the "death of journalism," a transformation that has been brought about thanks to the web. But is the web really killing journalism? Or, is it allowing an entirely new type of journalism to emerge?

At last week's Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco, we had an opportunity to sit down with David and ask him about the project, what's been happening with it, and where he sees it going. 

The "Death of Journalism?" Not so fast. We would say that the internet is leading us to the future instead.

About Spot.us

Spot.us is a non-profit startup which distributes the cost of hiring a journalist across a community of people. Based in the San Francisco Bay area, Spot.us has already funded stories where journalists have investigated things like the local police department, poverty issues, and city budgetary issues.

After a story is funded and the final copy is turned in, Spot.us will try to sell the first publishing rights. If that happens, then any money they make goes back to the original donors so they can reinvest in another story. If Spot.us is not able to sell the first publishing rights, they will then release the story under Creative Commons so anyone can publish it.

Spot.us is currently funded through a grant, but they also ask the community to donate an additional $2 when funding a particular story. This money goes to the organization itself and will hopefully allow it to expand to other cities. But, if you don't want to wait for Spot.us to come to your town, you can start your own version instead. The Spot.us code is open source, so you could launch a site like this for your own community.

In the end, what David Cohn hopes to prove is that, indeed, "journalism will survive the death of its institutions." With Spot.us, he shows us that there is another way to keep the industry alive, even after the papers fail.

What's it going to look like when mobile devices really change the world? A new effort to provide funding to mobile projects aimed at public good could give us a good look at the future. The nonprofit N2Y4 Mobile Challenge from Netsquared is accepting project submissions from mobile developers through this month and will provide seed funding to a handful of lucky winners. The submissions so far are quite interesting.

Here's a sample of what projects have been submitted so far.

Think about the billions of people around the world whose lives could be touched by apps like this. There are 4 billion mobile phone subscriptions around the world. There are only 175 million active Facebook users. The iPhone has a fraction of the users that mobile in general has or that Facebook has, but it's got all kinds of apps. What kind? Apple approved 14 iPhone fart apps in one day recently and I know, mobile world, that ain't the best you've got.

Check out some of our favorite submissions so far to the N2Y4 Mobile Challenge.

FloodSMS - Early Detection and Warning of Catastrophic Flooding via SMS is an early warning application for floods. It will push SMS messages to people downstream of a flood event giving them up to 24 hours advanced warning.

mStockGuru provides mobile medical inventory control for the 70% of the developing world that gets its medicine from "mom & pop" type kiosks.

FrontlineSMS Medic puts the FrontlineSMS system, an open-source, free SMS client, to use in creating and distributing medical records over mobile devices.

For more examples of mobile world-changing projects, check out Britt Bravo's list of nonprofit iPhone apps.

The winners of the N2Y4 Mobile Challenge will receive varying portions of $50k in total seed funding. Submissions will be accepted through April 3rd. Send yours in today and get ready to vote on which ones you think should get the money. If you've ever played the Ocarina on an iPhone, a few minutes of participation in this event online is the least you can do. The web is supposed to be a world changing phenomenon and mobile devices could be the ticket for billions of people whose lives have seen too little change.

What would you like to see developed on a mobile platform that could make the world a better place?