About Causes
Facebook Platform presents an unprecedented opportunity to engage our generation, most of whom are on Facebook, in seizing the future and making a difference in the world around us. Our generation cares deeply, but the current system has alienated us. Causes provides the tools so that any Facebook user can leverage their network of real friends to effect positive change.
The goal of all this is what we call "equal opportunity activism." We're trying to level the playing field by empowering individuals to change the world. Existing nonprofits must raise hundreds of millions of dollars and leverage massive direct marketing campaigns to attract members. We're democratizing activism by empowering activists with an arsenal of tools for users of Facebook who want to leverage their network on Facebook to effect positive change.
Any Facebook user with a little passion and initiative can create a cause, recruit their friends into that cause, keep everybody in the cause up-to-speed on issues and media related to the cause, and, most importantly, raise money directly through the cause for any U.S. registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit or Canadian registered charity. We process the donations automatically via credit card, tally the results, and report the donation activity via a public "scorecard" in the cause. This allows us to reward people who grow their causes, donate, and successfully raise money.
This is a natural evolution of social networking. Leveraging real world social networks is an important part of activism, fundraising, and political campaigning. This is especially true of grassroots activism, local-chapter style nonprofit organizations, and the walks/runs used by many charities to raise money. Given all this, it's a bit surprising that online social networks haven't been more aggressively leveraged until now.
Please visit our discussion and reviews page to provide us with your comments and suggestions.
Our terms of use can be found here: http://www.causes.com/pages/tos
Who We Are
Causes was co-founded by Sean Parker and Joe Green. In addition to being a co-founder of Causes, Sean is also a managing partner at The Founders Fund. Previously Sean was a co-founder of Napster, Plaxo, and Facebook. Joe comes from a background of grassroots organizing, having worked on the ground in political campaigns on the city, state, and national levels.
Causes is built and maintained by eight outstanding software engineers: Brad Fults, Fred Wulff, Jimmy Kittiyachavalit, Jon Gefaell, Kevin Ball, Kristján Pétursson, Okay Zed, and Ryan Kabir. The team is ably led by our Director of Engineering, Michel Weksler.
The look and feel is designed by Christopher Chan with inspiration and support from Josh Williams.
We also place a high priority on building and maintaining close relationships with nonprofits. This effort is led by our Nonprofit Director, Matt Mahan, and masterfully supported by Susan Gordon and Sarah Koch. Our user and nonprofit support is led by David Abramovich.
We are based in downtown Berkeley, CA, where our office is managed by Sydney Fleischer.
Nonprofit Partners
U.S. Nonprofits
Canadian Charities
Become a Partner Nonprofit
If you are a nonprofit that wishes to work directly with Causes, please visit https://nonprofits.causes.com/partners/new?.