Via Cynical-C
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In past years I've liked Kiva gift certificates as holiday gifts. They avoid the deadweight loss of buying an actual gift, have the customizability of a gift card, and people can choose whether to lend the money out or just withdraw it and spend it.
But I'm annoyed by their new policy which says basically if you let money sit there too long, they're going to appropriate it as a "gift" to Kiva. This only happens under the following narrow circumstances, namely when a lender:
For many Kiva Lenders, the best part about lending is re-lending; $25 can be used to help multiple entrepreneurs over time.Some lenders haven't caught onto this part of the lending process, and funds from loan repayments are sitting idle in their Kiva Accounts, neither re-loaned nor withdrawn ... It seems a shame to us. Unused Kiva credit sitting idly in the system isn't helping entrepreneurs in the developing world
Part of why this annoys me is that I recently tried to make some loans and was unable to. Each time the loan would show up first as needing money then as fully subscribed. I actually wasted an hour on this. There were other loans that needed money, but they weren't the loans that I was interested in making, so I let my money ride.
I think it's good that Kiva is selective about the organizations it partners with, and understand that sometimes they'll have more money than loans to fill. But then why take the money from me?
I don't think I'll be giving more money to Kiva any time soon. The only question I have is whether I'll be pulling my current money out now, or turning it over and letting it ride once more.
posted this | this entry's link | 1 comment | Microcredit | Microlending
One of the consequences of being blog-free for half a year is the accumulation of old data -- bookmarks, feeds, ideas, reviews, etc. Normally when I'm facing an RSS feed with over 100 unread articles, I'll just give it up for lost and zero it out. It's the internet, right? There's always more of it. But today I started skimming through a year of posts from Things Magazine, a great source of interesting links. Here are a few things that caught my eye:
The History of Visual Communication. Antique Dental Instruments. I Love Typography. Twin Peaks, Then and Now. How Michael Finds Good Stuff on the Web. Douglas Coupland on Visual Thinking. Face Research. Morbid Anatomy. A Short History of Anatomical Maps. A Timeline of Lego Minifigs. The Evolution of the Front Page. The Green Knowe books, one of my favorite kidlit series, had a final book I didn't know about? The Paris Exposition of 1900. London Poverty Maps. UK Loneliness Map. New York's ugliest skyscraper. New York in Black and White. Digitally tracking nightlife in San Francisco. Fictional Cities and Towns. 72 Views of the Tower of Babel. Zeppelins! Fembots! The Circus! What can you buy for five dollars? Business cliches. Wal-Mart v. Starbucks. The pointless museum. A personal history of electronic writing. Suggested Donation, "a blog about Museums, Archives, and Libraries: and the poor suffering lot who work in them." 50 cult books. Survival tips for time travelling back to 1000 A.D. Throttling in Comics (a bit like Comic Book Bondage Cover of the Day.) How to Hack a Traffic Jam -- I've been using this method for a few years now, it's also safer and much calmer. PostCrossing -- get postcards from around the world, hopefully better than a chain letter promising same. Microtypography, Designing the new Collins dictionaries. The aesthetics of Star Wars, James Bond, and Bond Villains.
That is all.
posted this | this entry's link | speak your mind | Children's Books | Circus | Comics | David Lynch | Design | Ephemera | History | Imaginary Places | James Bond | Legos | London | Maps | New York City | Paris | Robots | San Francisco | Star Wars | Typography | Zeppelins
You can get some true randomness generated by atmospheric noise -- or, if you prefer, by radioactive decay, which would be more useful for deciding whether your cat is alive or not. Via MeFi
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Anh Cao, first Vietnamese-American in the House, and apparently our Philosopher-Congressman: "Life is absurd but one cannot succumb to the absurdity of it." and "I truly espouse Aristotle's definition of virtue: To walk in the middle line."
David Paterson, Governor of New York State and, apparently, our Gubernatorial Comedian: "I ask all of you to turn your plate over. There may be a gold seal on the bottom of your plate. If you have that seal, you will be the next senator of the State of New York."
posted this | this entry's link | 2 comments | David Paterson | New Orleans | New York | Philosophy
I just used Amazon's Universal Wish List feature, which lets you put items from other non-Amazon stores onto your Amazon Wish List. I must say this is incredibly smart -- even if some revenues go outside Amazon, it still makes Amazon the central place to go. It's like the part in Miracle on 34th Street where Santa Claus convinces the salesfolk at Macy's to send their customers to Gimbel's if they have a better deal.
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