With this week’s announcement that Blackbaud will buy Convio there have been many questions whether this will be good or bad for the nonprofit organizations both companies count as their clients. We have often had clients and other nonprofit organizations we come into contact with us ask about the open source tools we specialize in, and how they compare with the proprietary tools or Software as a Service offerings that they’ve heard about. One very clear difference is that the open source tools don’t get bought up and consolidated.
At the end of 2009 when the Obama Administration came out with the Open Government Directive ( which I wrote about at the time ) I had some conversations with other consultants and thinkers in the nonprofit technology world about the idea of an “Open Nonprofit Directive” that would, in many ways, mirror the OGD. Two years have passed, and in the prognostications for the year ahead I’ve seen a number of references to “opening up” and increasing transparency in the nonprofit sector. Once again I am left thinking it is time for an Open Nonprofit Directive.
Why do so many organizations waste the opportunity to hook their email subscribers with the first line of the email message? I hadn’t really noticed this sooner because of the way I consumed email: through a series of complicated email aliases and gmail filters. Honestly, in Gmail, I was basically ignoring most solicited bulk email (organization email lists). But since I’ve been taking a first look at my email through my iPhone and iPad using the iOS mail app, I’ve begun to notice this shocking fact. Here are some facts about viewing email via the iOS mail app: Approximately 35 to 40 characters of a subject are displayed Approximately 100 characters from the top of the email message are displayed Two lines at 50 characters, and a subject of 35 to 40 characters. That’s basically a Tweet. And that (plus the “from” name) is all you have to get your reader’s attention and convince them to open the email message and read on. Why do so many emails waste this space with something like: “Click to view this email in a browser” (37 characters) “Is this email not displaying correctly? View it in your browser.” (64 characters) “If you’re having trouble viewing this email, you may see it online.” (68 characters) “Web version | Edit your subscription | Unsubscribe” (55 characters)
If it is to be believed, we may be totally out of luck as a species. Cell Phones may be the cause of the mysterious Colony Collapse Disorder effecting Bees in Europe and the United States. WorldChanging reports that bees provide somewhere between $14 billion and 92 billion in free pollination services. The WorldChanging article is very interesting and worth a read.