Starting Line

Food Rescue Alliance hired two Research Assistance from the University of Colorado Boulder to explore how nonprofits might use Web Monetization. Our goal is to boost resiliency by diversifying how we fund our software (Rootable) and member organizations. Although we're focusing on our own needs, we hope whatever we produce will be useful to other nonprofits.

Our first goal is to create a one-page document explaining the basics of web monetization. What it is, how it works, who is using it now. Our audience is member organizations of the Food Rescue Alliance. It needs to be readable, visual, and accessible. Our first iteration is below, and hopefully, our next round of edits will simplify the content, focus, and remove jargon.

With that under our belt, we'll identify different models that might work with our multitenancy open source software, Rootable. What traditional nonprofit fundraising campaign models can we tweak to fit? Is there a social enterprise route? This step is more about identifying candidates than understanding them in detail.

After reviewing our list of models, we'll pick a couple to fully explore. We'll talk to FRA member organizations to understand their preferences. For example, how much should go to organizations and how much to alleviate the burden of maintaining software?

Our stretch goal is to pick one model and nail down some of the implementation details. If you have any ideas for us, we're open to input.