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Comment by RyanZAG | Hacker News Reader

Meh.

The Silicon Valley rich are famously stingy philanthropists and a defense I’ve heard more than once is that the tools they spend their time building are inherently good. “Why donate money when people can just download my app and instantly have a better life?”

Maybe I have a different view on the this from most on HA as I live in Africa, but products like cheaper cellphones have had a far more massive effect for the masses than a few philanthropists donating some money to charities. Charities in general have almost no effect on the ground.

Charity is not the way to make the world better. The only way to make the world better is by building methods for more people to take part directly in the global economy - and as Americans are now realizing, this isn't necessarily going to be a good thing for Americans who will only gain more competition.

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Philanthropy and charity aren't the same thing. The Gates Foundation does much, much more than just walk around handing out cheques. I'm not even sure they do charity in any significant way, but the money they're putting towards, for example, vaccinating large numbers against the rotavirus, is hugely effective in actually improving things. You can't partake of the global economy when you're shitting yourself to death.

Philanthropy and charity aren't the same thing.

I think they're more alike than different. They have in common the act of giving for the benefit of others. From the Oxford English Dictionary:

Charity. a) Beneficence; liberality to or provision for those in need or distress; alms-giving. b) Money, a gift, or other assistance to relieve need or distress. c) A trust, foundation, organization, etc., for the benefit of those in need or distress; such trusts, etc. viewed collectively.

Philanthropy. Love of human kind; the disposition or effort to promote the happiness and well-being of one's fellow people; practical benevolence.

The difference between the Gates Foundation and other charities is not that it does "philanthropy" rather than "charity"; it's that it operates on a much larger scale and with a greater emphasis on measurement and accountability than do most other charities.

Leave aside that I don't think the analogy to African aid is quite relevant here, I agree with you. Charity alone isn't necessarily helpful nor does it define the good a person has done. But the lack of philanthropy in SV is indicative of the attitude and culture I'm trying to describe: individualistic, not integrated into a diverse community, divorced from a sense of civic responsibility.

Does it have to be indicative of those things? To me, it indicates a data driven personality instead of an emotionally or socially driven one. Are they really divorced from a sense of civic responsibility? Don't they pay taxes and serve on juries? And, at the risk of placing data above my easily manipulated emotional state, where's your data?

"Give a guy a fish, and he'll have food for a day. Teach a man how to fish, and he'll have food for a lifetime."

This is why I really love the Kiva model: instead of giving money away, you instead become a 2nd/3rd world Angel Investor.

It also makes me think about Hans Rosling's excellent TED talk about population growth and globalization: http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_on_global_population_g...

I keep a bunch of money in rotation on Kiva myself. But it's not angel investing, it's just small loans for very small businesses. If a decent sized business showed up on there then they wouldn't get sponsors I think because they would seem too well off.

and actually angel investors or crowd funding for african tech entrpreneurs is a much needed thing right now.

I'd like to plug Zidisha ( https://www.zidisha.org )

It's a lot like Kiva, except there's no MFI acting as a middleman. Thus, borrowers pay far lower interest rates.

You see, borrowers of Kiva loans actually pay a lot in interest, with an average rate of about 35% - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiva_(organization)#Current_int... . At Zidisha, borrowers pay as little as 5% in interest.

Kiva has a pilot program inspired by Zidisha called Kiva Zip.

Disclosure: I'm on the board.

Charity isn't just about direct ROI, it's about the attitude of the people giving. I think that speaks to the idea of SV being in a bubble when a simple idea like charity is so easily dismissed.

>Charities in general have almost no effect on the ground.

I would point you to organizations like Charity Water (http://www.charitywater.org/) & Pencils of Promise (http://www.pencilsofpromise.org//) who are doing quite well at disproving that statement.

Founded in 2006 and 2008, so it actually clarifies his point - too often an established and older charity would focus on micro-optimization instead of disruption. Which would have more effect on quality of education in a third-world country:

- A charity that figured out how to ship thousands of textbooks in a single container, thus optimizing their shipping cost

- Kindle reaching $79 pricepoint.

- Coursera

Charities in general have almost no effect on the ground.

That's an extremely bold statement. Do you have any evidence to back it up?

Counterexamples are numerous: Carnegie libraries [1], needle exchanges[2], the Gates Foundation [3].... the list is long.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnegie_library

[2]: http://www.avert.org/needle-exchange.htm

[3]: http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Pages/home.aspx

If he's limiting his statements to Africa, the debate rages...

http://debatewise.org/debates/687-is-aid-killing-africa/

That's an interesting perspective. Though it sounds like Dambisa Moyo is singling out "system aid" between governments, not all charitable/philanthropic giving.

Hey,the problem is the reality is different... I'm an African too and charities, help, blah blah are failures!

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