Try this: http://www.doinggoodfellows.org/
It's by a friend for this exact same purpose
Ask HN: How can I volunteer my software skills online?
31–40 of 62 posts
Re: Ask HN: How can I volunteer my software skills online?
#32(Disclaimer: not trolling.) Consider specializing in making money and donating the money to people who specialize in $PICK_A_CAUSE_DEAR_TO_YOU, if your primary concern is about impact and not about personal fulfillment. NGOs are often not well set up to metabolize the labor of developers, and at some things which you think are helpful will be perceived by the organization as a threat (e.g. at many organizations, anyt…
More in this vein: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effective_altruism http://www.jefftk.com/news/giving http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/handwritingwall https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/32lnif/im_peter_singe...
Although "effective altruism" sounds reasonable and should always be considered, it does neglect the human side of things. How many years do we add to the life of a lonely elderly couple by visiting them?
Re: Ask HN: How can I volunteer my software skills online?
#33(Disclaimer: not trolling.) Consider specializing in making money and donating the money to people who specialize in $PICK_A_CAUSE_DEAR_TO_YOU, if your primary concern is about impact and not about personal fulfillment. NGOs are often not well set up to metabolize the labor of developers, and at some things which you think are helpful will be perceived by the organization as a threat (e.g. at many organizations, anyt…
Relevant LessWrong article – Purchase Fuzzies and Utilons Separately: http://lesswrong.com/lw/6z/purchase_fuzzies_and_utilons_sepa...
> There is this very, very old puzzle/observation in economics about the lawyer who spends an hour volunteering at the soup kitchen, instead of working an extra hour and donating the money to hire someone...
> If the lawyer needs to work an hour at the soup kitchen to keep himself motivated and remind himself why he's doing what he's doing, that's fine. But he should also be donating some of the hours he worked at the office, because that is the power of professional specialization and it is how grownups really get things done. One might consider the check as buying the right to volunteer at the soup kitchen, or validating the time spent at the soup kitchen.
I think about this a lot.
Re: Ask HN: How can I volunteer my software skills online?
#34There are two big problems with your question:
a) By the time some NGO can specify requirements like "data analyst should do X to prove Y" they also have someone who can formulate those, i.e. some person who at least had some exposure to professional IT work. That person most probably has a list of 100 or so people s/he'll ask first (people known to work for the cause anyway are prime candidates).
b) "Perhaps you can share personal projects that you were able to use to help people and community around you."
Yes, I can but I won't: My stories don't help you except for maybe serving as inspiration. You can find enough inspirational stories via google, so I won't have to write down yet another one. But, much more important: NGOs are usually not set up to deal with any offer of help by someone who is not an expert in their specific domain. Your great ideas will be ignored simply because people don't have time to think about it. While you might see the potential "800% increase in revenue" (mentioned in another comment) the others won't be able to see it or won't trust you to stick to the project for long enough (drop out rates in NGOs are very, very high in my experience).
Summa summarum: Find a cause you want to fight for, make a list of NGOs in that area. Then: Try it and don't be disappointed if they don't see the value you could bring but only judge you according to what you do in their specific domains (i.e.: no praise for the idea of a souvenir shop of the dog shelter, lots of praise for walking the dogs). Once you found a pleasant environment to work in, start hacking it: Make PoCs at night, after doing the official work. Swear in your room at all those idiots who fail to see the benefit of your work but turn it into something productive; create some turn-key solution that creates some real benefit for the NGO. After doing this you will have a much better standing when you explain your next project idea - they might not get it, but they will trust your expertise enough now that they have seen that you deserve that trust.
Re: Ask HN: How can I volunteer my software skills online?
#35Here are a few ideas:
- Digital Service https://thedigitalservice.org/ (this was made by YC partner, Adora Cheung)
- Bayes Impact http://www.bayesimpact.org/
- DataKind http://www.datakind.org/
Re: Ask HN: How can I volunteer my software skills online?
#36One initiative that comes to mind is the Humanitarian Toolbox: http://www.htbox.org/
I saw Richard Campbell talking about the Humanitarian Toolbox at his NDC London keynote - seems like an interesting option if you want to use your dev skills for good causes. https://vimeo.com/204070784 .
Thank you for the pointer to the video - the guy really knows what he is talking about (at least it 100% reflects my experience)!
Re: Ask HN: How can I volunteer my software skills online?
#37If the project isn't primarily a software engineering/data analytics group, ask yourself what they'll do when you're gone. Its not unlikely that setting up something complicated can be short term profitable while you're around and long term a net loss after you're gone.
There are hacks against that such as doing grunt work where its not about the volunteer who is interchangeable with any other volunteer (perhaps installing wifi or cat5 cabling, whatever) or helping something with a closed timeframe (An election campaign has a clearly defined ending and presumably you can commit to not leaving before the finish line).
Your best bet would be to find whatever FOSS they use and then work on the FOSS project. Your research shows that people and community users of some FOSS project would really benefit from feature whatever or bugfix whatever or documentation whatever, so ...
Re: Ask HN: How can I volunteer my software skills online?
#38(Disclaimer: not trolling.) Consider specializing in making money and donating the money to people who specialize in $PICK_A_CAUSE_DEAR_TO_YOU, if your primary concern is about impact and not about personal fulfillment. NGOs are often not well set up to metabolize the labor of developers, and at some things which you think are helpful will be perceived by the organization as a threat (e.g. at many organizations, anyt…
Relevant LessWrong article – Purchase Fuzzies and Utilons Separately: http://lesswrong.com/lw/6z/purchase_fuzzies_and_utilons_sepa... > There is this very, very old puzzle/observation in economics about the lawyer who spends an hour volunteering at the soup kitchen, instead of working an extra hour and donating the money to hire someone... > If the lawyer needs to work an hour at the soup kitchen to keep himself moti…
The donations of the highly successful are the reason many NPOs and relief foundations exist. With capitalism it seems to be "winner takes all" where there's a first (and maybe second) place price, but not much after that. This makes the benevolence of the wealthy just as important as government aid, and in my opinion, a responsibility or duty of the "winners".
Re: Ask HN: How can I volunteer my software skills online?
#39Re: Ask HN: How can I volunteer my software skills online?
#40Check out https://www.catchafire.org
I haven't completed any projects yet but it integrates with LinkedIn and seems like a pretty good platform to find skills based volunteering opportunities.