2010 Community Enterprise Newsletter

Community Enterprise Newsletter

Winter Edition

Events  

• Feb 23 - Social Enterprise and Fair Trade
• Feb 27-28 - Social Enterprise Conference
• March 25 - Twestival
• April 8-10 - NTEN
  

• April 28-30 - SEA Summit

• June 25 - Nonprofit 2.0

Broadband/Tech Assistance

Application deadline March 1, 2010

Are you located in Chicago or Philly? ZeroDivide, partner Mobile Citizen is offering low cost mobile broadband & supporting technical assistance for non profits in these cities.

http://www.mobilecitizen.org/grantchicago

http://www.mobilecitizen.org/grantphiladelphia

Tech/Media Training Links

NTEN - great resources and blogs for using social media, trainings and webinars

TechSoup - product reviews, resource guides, trainings and discounted hardware and software for nonprofits

NetSquared - documents and discusses tools and initiatives from the “social web”

Technology and Haiti

The Haiti disaster has created a paradigm shift in how people donate to emergency needs.

Read Tim Wu's article on how technology is a key factor in disaster relief donations  

Video

 

 

Social Enterprise in 2010:

The Year of the Tiger?

It’s shaping up to be an interesting year for social enterprise. An uncertain economic climate is certain to dampen the mood of some entrepreneurs while the economy will  drive more interest in mergers and other forms of consolidation.

As traditional jobs remain hard to come by, new technologies, expanded support networks, and creative funding models should encourage experimentation, 2010 may prove to be …pardon the pun…an enterprising one.

Some trends and happenings to keep an eye on this year include: 

More Eyeballs and Feet:

While it’s still not a household word, social enterprise has finally made its way onto the radar screen of the Feds and many corporations, foundations, business schools, and nonprofits.

As the new federally sponsored $50 Million Social Innovation Fund goes live this year, it will have the effect of attracting more interest among foundations and nonprofits.

State governments won’t have much in the way of dollars to bring to the table in 2010, but legislation to support the adoption of new social enterprise legal entities (like the L3C mentioned below) will catch the attention of more legislators on the local level.

As social venture and sustainability training programs at the graduate school level  continue to flourish, more people will be jumping in and energizing the field. Link

Numerous business plan competitions  and increasing socially responsible investment dollars will keep social enterprise in the spotlight all year long. 

Social Impact Measurement Parade:

A flurry of recent work on social impact standards like IRIS and tools like Pulse and TRASI should yield fruit this year as more funders and ventures agree on a common vocabulary and more homogenous measurement platforms.

Connected & Open Villages: 

The Social Entrepreneur API  is a new pooled database providing information on vetted social entrepreneurs. Transparency is also on the rise. Entrepreneur Commons offers an open platform to attract loans and other forms of support for for-profit startups.  On the nonprofit side, existing databases of social ventures will likely evolve toward open ratings and review sites along the lines of Greatnonprofits.org

Let’s Get Physical:

Collaboration tools like Google Apps  and Zoho will be characterized by growing interest in shared physical workspaces and networking hubs. The Hub in the SF Bay Area, is growing rapidly and attracts a wide range of entrepreneurs and innovators in the social sector while Co-working spaces have been around for many years. These new physical locations will encourage more sophisticated collaboration “tribes” in the year ahead.

A Hybrid for Entrepreneurs:

As foundation dollars and private equity funding continue their awkward Tango, new hybrid legal entities and tax structures are emerging to bridge the gap. The L3C  (Low Profit Limited Liability Company), Flexible Purpose Corp, and B (as in Beneficial) Corp are all examples of new models  formalizing mixed funding schemes and triple bottom line legal designations.

Small is Still Beautiful:

Everything “micro” will be hot again this year in the social sector. Standing on the shoulders of proven micromodels like microfinance and microenterprise are a range of micro newcomers.

We will be hearing more about microphilanthropy, micropayments, microinsurance and microfranchising in 2010.

Mobile phones will help to push micro even further into the mainstream through transaction platforms for the underserved, including mBanking, mHealth, and mEducation.

Not Banking on the Bank:

This year peer-to-peer funding models made popular by NGOs like Kiva.org and commercial sites like prosper.com will expand as more and more entrepreneurs skirt traditional funding institutions and approach individual investors directly.  2010 may see the scaling up of new, large scale peer-to-peer funding models.

This could be the year that microloans give way to macroloans, leaving ventures with a fistful of dollars instead of pocket change.

Share Your Ideas

If you have information to share or have any comments, please post your thoughts on the ZeroDivide Facebook Page.

Software & Reviews:

Aspiration

Answr

IdealWare

Tech & Social Media Planning/Metrics:

TechAtlas

Wearemedia

Social Media Meetups:

Net Tuesdays

Tools, Trends & Innovations:

Techcrunch

Mashable

Engagenet

Wired Epicenter

O'Reilly Media

Blogs

Wild Apricot - issues and trends in nonprofit tech 

Nonprofit Marketing Blog - Nonprofit marketing expert Katya Andresen shares tips

Twitter 

NTEN Facebook

NPTag