Omidyar Network to fund PledgeBank outreach in the USA

We’re delighted to announce that mySociety has been generously awarded $100,000 by Omidyar Network, a mission-based investment group committed to enabling individual self-empowerment. The purpose of the investment, our largest to date from a philanthropic source, is to spread the use of PledgeBank.com to a host of community and grassroots groups in the US.

Omidyar Network invested in PledgeBank because it encourages collective effort by enabling users to rally the support of others through their own commitment to take action.

From starting new organizations, to giving blood, to volunteering to mentor others, Pledgebank has enabled people to do things they wouldn’t have done otherwise. Just this morning we were sent pictures of a protest in Brazil that was organised using PledgeBank.

What has been missing to date, though, has been any resource to spread the use of the tool to traditionally offline groups. Whether these are schools, community groups, NGOs, churches or neighbourhood watch groups, many could benefit from PledgeBank, but few have had the opportunity to hear about it. Therefore, PledgeBank is looking to hire an outreach coordinator who will travel around the US meeting groups, listening to their goals, and explaining how PledgeBank can help them, for free.

mySociety will be recruiting the outreach coordinator in the New Year. If you’d like to get in touch, perhaps to pre-book an appointment to meet or talk with the outreach coordinator, or because you know someone who could do the job well, please drop us a line to hello@mysociety.org.

3 Comments

  1. This is great progress Tom.

    Interesting that Omidyar is also behind NetSquared, a really neat project catalyst project.

    I’m sure you know the techsoup people behind it, but if not, touching base with them, and other Omidyar investees feels like a real priority for your US outreach person.

  2. Tim,

    Thanks for the comment. I’m the one working on the U.S. Outreach project for PledgeBank right now, and I’m headed to the NetSquared conference tomorrow morning! You’re right on target and, apparently, so are we…always a good thing to find out. I’ll be chatting with folks from CompuMentor (the org that houses N2), as well as the other 350 people attending the conference. Please do let us know if there are other meetings/conferences that are happening in the U.S. that we should be attending!!

    Thanks a million,
    -Heather