• service
• volunteering
• web 2.0

Okay, I'm intrigued by The Extraordinaries. From the About page:

The Problem:
Busy people rarely volunteer. In the rat race of 60-hour workweeks, going to school, running errands, and driving kids to soccer games, many people wish to give back but only have small increments of free time. Most volunteer opportunities require training, vetting, and lengthy time-commitments. According to a January 2008 U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics survey, only 26% of Americans volunteered in 2007. Further, only 34% performed activities related to their occupational skills. Nearly half of non-volunteers listed "lack of time" as the main reason for not volunteering. In short, we live in a nation where the barriers to volunteering are too high and where we’re underutilizing the skills of those who overcome the obstacles to participation.

The Extraordinary Solution:
The Extraordinaries proposes to deliver skills-based volunteer tasks to people whenever and wherever they are available by mobile phone. Over 80% of the adult U.S. population carries a mobile phone in his or her pocket and the higher-end of these diminuative devices, so called “smartphones,” are as capable as any laptop computer. Nearly anything that can be done on a personal computer can be done on a smartphone. The Extraordinaries dramatically reduce the barriers to giving back by enabling people to volunteer on-the-spot and on-demand.

If microloans can work, why can't this?

Link via techPresident.

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