ChangeInFocus.org

Kiva-Twitter Fundraiser!! Help Mouen Sory Support her 3 Children!

Wed, 19 Aug 2009 15:46:35 +0000

UPDATE: Congrats! We raised the full remaining $550 in a staggering 7 hours!! Thanks for all the help!

Let’s raise $550 in two days!! Support Mouen Sory and her 3 Children in Cambodia.

Mouen Sory in Cambodia

What do you do with repaid Kiva loan $$s? You launch a Kiva-Twitter Fundraiser!

After realizing that both Mike (@michealberner) and myself (@allenburt) had a total of $125 in Kiva credits from repaid Kiva loans, we decided to team up and support one very needy entrepreneur. Now, we are launching a IMPROMPTU fundraiser on Twitter to help Moeun raise the remaining portion of her loan!

Loan to Mouen Sory on Kiva.org

GOAL: Raise $550 in two days using twitter, email, facebook, and other social media.

HOW TO HELP: Visit Mouen’s loan page on Kiva.org and loan as little as $25!

SPREAD THE WORD: Jump on twitter and ReTweet!

DEADLINE: Friday, August 21st Midnight!! You only have two days!

INFO: Moeun’s Bio on Twitter
Moeun Sory is a 26-year-old fish vendor and the mother of three school-aged children. Every day in early morning, Moeun Sory and her husband always go to buy fish from the fishermen and they hurry up and bring their fish by motorbike to the market for resale. In addition, Moeun Sory’s husband also uses his existing motor to pick up passengers for fees. Moeun Sory is leading her investment more smoothly. She has a lot of regular customers who buy and eat her fish. She hopes to be able to look for extra income by using a Kiva loan to purchase a large quantity of fish to sell. She proposes to use the remainder of the loan to purchase equipment for her husband to begin fishing.
Lets reach $550 in two days and support Mouren and her 3 children in Cambodia!!

Build.Kiva Launches API Platform

Sun, 08 Feb 2009 00:13:15 +0000

It’s official! As of now, you can head over to Build.Kiva and begin shaping the future of this amazing micro-lending site. Kiva is calling out for all interested and dedicated developers to join their community and develop digital tools to promote the cause of lending to needy third world entrepreneurs.

“We created the Kiva API so that anyone with a good idea and some software savvy can help us expand the reach of Kiva, taking it into new environments and to new audiences, and creating new features for the Kiva community to experience our content in new ways. True to the name of our developer destination, we want you to help us build Kiva.org.”

So what does this mean for the average Kiva user, and how will the affect your experience? Well here is an initial vision from some of the early adopters of this API application:

an application for iPhone or Blackberry that let’s you keep up with Kiva on the go

a service where lenders can register for alerts on new entrepreneurs they want to fund

integration into a social network where friends can engage around each others’ activity and loan updates on Kiva

a map that simulates the realtime transfer of funds across the globe

So look forward to these applications and watch out for how Change In Focus utilizes these advancements on this site!

Thanks to TechCrunch for the information

A Fistful of Dollars

Fri, 16 Jan 2009 15:54:43 +0000

Micro-loans are changing lives around the world. From start to to finish, let’s take a look at how this remarkable process works, from London to Cambodia:

A Fistful Of Dollars: The Story of a Kiva.org Loan from Kieran Ball on Vimeo.

The micro-lending website Kiva.org has revolutionized the world of micro-finance by allowing anyone to make a life changing loan (as little as $25) to an impoverished entrepreneur.

Join our Kiva Lending Team and make a loan to change a life!

Kieran Ball is a Kiva Fellow stationed in Cambodia. You can find updates of Kieran’s work and the work of other Kiva Fellows at the Kiva Fellows Blog.