16. Social Auctions & Simcha Registry
This evening’s triple-play (apparently it’s 31 Ideas, 1 Rushed Evening) will be capped with a completely new idea I haven’t even thought out a great deal yet, but I think has wide market potential, far beyond the Jewish community. I call it Social Auctions.
The basic idea? Create a Web site kind of like eBay, where users can auction off their belongings. But, instead of the seller getting the money from the sale, save for the shipping costs, it’s donated to a charity of the seller’s choice (from a selection verified by Guidestar). A similar concept exists with collective.give, wherein a group of photographers are auctioning off their works for charity.
Mash that up with another relevant concept (which could even be #17, but they work so well together): Create a tzedakah (charity) registry for simchas (celebrations). Instead of registering at “Bloomies” or whathaveyou, birthday boys and girls, brides and grooms to be, and all other revelers expecting gifts can direct their friends to a selection of charities they’d rather have their friends donate to. It’s kinda like Causes, but neither dependent on Facebook nor limited to one cause. You can list as many as you like so your friends and family can take their pick of the ones you’d like them to support. You could even give users a variety of templates for weddings, bar and bat mitzvahs, etc., so that they can email a super-personalized fundraising page to their friends and family.
That’s all I’ve got on that at the moment… I only thought it up a month ago. Parts of it I was thinking up while writing. We’ll see if it goes somewhere.
This marks the half-way point in this here blogging adventure, which has already been read by an astonishing 1,236 “absolute unique visitors.” Tomorrow, another one I’ll be thinking up as I’m writing. But then back to tachles…
