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Send a $10 Donation by Texting ‘Haiti’ to 90999

redcross.org

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Re: Send a $10 Donation by Texting ‘Haiti’ to 90999

#11

Post by noodle »

patio11 wrote: post #9
noodle wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

are you certain that they aren't figuring in costs and billing you for $10+rates? while that would mean the end customer pays more, it does mean they would be getting more than a paypal donation.

Well, think that one through: if your advertisement says "Text 12345 to 45678 to donate $10 to the Red Cross", and you do so, and then your itemized cellphone bill says "Red Cross: $20", what is your reaction likely to be? Merchants foot the bill for transaction costs to encourage transaction volume. It is the same reason I quote my prices as $29.95 not "$29.95 plus whatever your credit card costs me to process."

i've already seen a non-red cross ad for the exact same thing, except $5 for hati, and the ad specifically stated transaction and standard data rates are added on top. looking for the ad now.

edit: http://twitter.com/RedCross/status/7720590281 edit2: beatten

Re: Send a $10 Donation by Texting ‘Haiti’ to 90999

#12

Post by cmelbye »

nazgulnarsil wrote: post #2

has this method of collection been tried before? if not I'm guessing this is an untapped goldmine for the right entrepreneur: set up charities with simpler donation vectors.

Wikipedia used this to raise donations for development on their new mobile friendly site. I don't think it's a new/"untapped" type thing.

Re: Send a $10 Donation by Texting ‘Haiti’ to 90999

#13

Post by jasonlbaptiste »

hey, ive been playing around with an idea:

pixelsforhaiti / adsforhaiti.org

get sites to donate a small ad block that links to a donation/ways to help haiti page. obviously fully nonprofit. list all other sites/companies involved like they did with the nomoreie6 page. thoughts?

Re: Send a $10 Donation by Texting ‘Haiti’ to 90999

#15

Post by dariusmonsef »

BEFORE you RT that RedCross donation message or donate any cash yourselves... please consider.

Red Cross is a giant beast of a company. It is $600,000,000 in debt. It has ridiculous overhead.

As fellow hackers... We're all trying to build startups/ideas because we think big companies are missing something... that we have a better way to do things... that we can build a better product.

If you want to help Haiti. Give directly. I spent 2 years building a non-profit (a start-up if you will) that sets up volunteer centers in disaster areas. We are a super lean organization with an executive director that takes a $0 per year salary.

Donations are being gathered to directly help the people in Haiti.

Donations Can Be Made Here: http://bit.ly/HODR_Haiti

Sorry to rant... but the RedCross-fest on Twitter right now is killing me.

EDIT: I created a new post with more info here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1051914

Re: Send a $10 Donation by Texting ‘Haiti’ to 90999

#16

Post by alnayyir »

dariusmonsef wrote: post #15

BEFORE you RT that RedCross donation message or donate any cash yourselves... please consider. Red Cross is a giant beast of a company. It is $600,000,000 in debt. It has ridiculous overhead. As fellow hackers... We're all trying to build startups/ideas because we think big companies are missing something... that we have a better way to do things... that we can build a better product. If you want to help Haiti. Give…

Thanks for your work, I despise the Red Cross.

Re: Send a $10 Donation by Texting ‘Haiti’ to 90999

#17

Post by dhess »

I was curious about how this service works, mostly to know where the money is actually flowing. I Googled for awhile and came up with nothing, but thanks to randomwalker's post in this thread (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1051844), I was able to dig up some info. I summarized what I found here:

http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/aoyin/text_haiti_t...

It's not definitive, but hopefully it'll help people make a more informed judgement about using this short code for donations.

p.s. this charity was mentioned on Reddit:

http://www.pih.org/home.html

I'd never heard of it, but the founder, Paul Farmer, has a long history of working in and for Haiti.

Re: Send a $10 Donation by Texting ‘Haiti’ to 90999

#18

Post by dariusmonsef »

dariusmonsef wrote: post #15

BEFORE you RT that RedCross donation message or donate any cash yourselves... please consider. Red Cross is a giant beast of a company. It is $600,000,000 in debt. It has ridiculous overhead. As fellow hackers... We're all trying to build startups/ideas because we think big companies are missing something... that we have a better way to do things... that we can build a better product. If you want to help Haiti. Give…

I wrote more info here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1051914*

Re: Send a $10 Donation by Texting ‘Haiti’ to 90999

#19

Post by albertsun »

I'm curious about what short codes can carry extra charges like this. For regular phones, people are generally aware that 900 numbers are toll lines and you'll be charged for that, but for these text numbers I don't know what the rule is.

Seems like there's a lot of potential for scammers to tell people to text a certain number without telling people that charges would apply. At the student newspaper I used to work for, we told people to text "follow name" to 40404 (Twitter's short code) to get text message updates with news.

Re: Send a $10 Donation by Texting ‘Haiti’ to 90999

#20

Post by mscarborough »

dariusmonsef wrote: post #15

BEFORE you RT that RedCross donation message or donate any cash yourselves... please consider. Red Cross is a giant beast of a company. It is $600,000,000 in debt. It has ridiculous overhead. As fellow hackers... We're all trying to build startups/ideas because we think big companies are missing something... that we have a better way to do things... that we can build a better product. If you want to help Haiti. Give…

Another option might be the IRC: International Rescue Committee, at http://www.theirc.org/

You can donate all of $5 in a similar manner by doing this: text 253-83 with the message 'haiti'. They'll send you more info and a confirmation request before you are billed the five bucks.

Friend of a worker there recommended it. I can't vouch for the organization and how they work, and agree with the parent post about overhead, but why not throw 5 dollars into an unknown, in a situation in a country that deserves so much better?

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