Online giving sites: why cheaper isn’t always better

Update: Third Sector reports that Help for Heroes has not stopped recommending Justgiving as the Times article suggests. It is, apparently, trying to keep its donors better informed about the funding models used by different online giving sites.

Just a brief post in response to this piece in the Times, which gets it right then gets it wrong about online donation websites.

It starts off by covering the decision by Help for Heroes to stop using Justgiving.com as its online fundraising site of choice. This is because Justgiving is a commercial organisation, not a charity, and takes a 5% commission on donations (taken out of Gift Aid where possible), which it uses to generate profits.

Read the rest of this entry »

Reaching for the moon again

News that lunar soil holds more water than previously thought has got journalists looking again to a version of the future that has belonged to the past for a long time now. The Times piece is fairly typical:

The discovery has fanned dreams of establishing a manned Moon base.

Scientists have long hoped that astronauts could be based on the Moon and use water found there to drink, extract oxygen to breathe and use hydrogen as fuel.

Read the rest of this entry »