Using social media for a noble cause

A couple of years ago, a lady on my Twitter timeline came up with a novel idea to celebrate her birthday — she donated for a charitable cause through a web portal. She kept sending reminders and updates about her set goal of $100 paid to assist in providing water for villages in Africa.
The idea was catchy, the cause was worthy and the organization collecting the funds was authentic with validated background, sadly however, I’ve never seen such an idea catching up, getting recognition and popularity on the local social media scene.
Our view of charity has not been changed for so long; despite the rapid social and technological shifts we had witnessed in our daily lives, charity remained exclusively in giving to the poor either directly in the form of money, food or clothing, or through the handful of charity organizations we have in the country.
The way these organizations operate either in management or fundraising offered great resistance to time and change; for them, there is no way but the old way, as long as “some” money is coming in, all things are OK. Obviously, they are missing great opportunities, untapped chances available to them online and through social media.
A recent report about online donations in the United States, published on Forbes, shows that in 2013, more than $822 million was raised online via 8.3 million donations. The report shows that the top donating cities are where young, wealthy and tech savvy individuals live. For example, Seattle, the city topping the list in terms of given donations, has given $53,542 per 1,000 residents, that’s about $53 per person. Such number demonstrates a very important feature of online donations; due to the huge number of potential donors who can be reached through different social media platforms, even small amounts of gifts can make a difference.
It is no brainer then that in a country scoring high in social media presence like Saudi Arabia where giving charity is part of its religion and social norms, online donations could be a viable option. At least such efforts, if existed, would return some refreshing breeze to the Saudi social media scene that a lot accused it of being full of nonsense recently.
The real challenge, though, would be organizing and licensing such initiatives and keeping them in check. The easiness of being notable on the Internet could give a lot of organisms living in the dark the chance to jump in and play the card of charity to serve different dubious intentions. Nevertheless, controlling such online donations channels and making sure they pour in their intended purposes is still possible once desire and will are available.