Good Intentions in 2010

Posted on December 31, 2010 at 11:47 am

Looking back on 2010…

The year began with the earthquake in Haiti. For me this meant a flurry of news interviews and blog posts to get the word out about smart giving after a disaster. My hope was to help prevent many of the problems that arose after the 2004 tsunami. The most popular posts by far were Do’s and Don’ts of Disaster Donations and Choosing organizations to donate to after a disaster with the blog receiving thousands of hits each day.

Word reached the US State Department and FEMA, which both made numerous visits to Good Intentions in January. And while I have no absolute proof that my blog led to George Bush’s statement:

“I know a lot of people want to send blankets or water,” Mr. Bush said. “Just send your cash”.

I do know that the White House visited Good Intentions prior to Bush’s speech. This led to a mention in the New York Times. While it was great to be in NYT, I was surprised to find that a post in Marginal Revolution sent twice as much traffic to my blog. In any case, January was the busiest month ever for Good Intentions.

In March, a series of emails I wrote to the Huffington Post criticizing their Impact section led to an invitation to blog for them. Although I occasionally submit posts, I have a hard time getting excited about it. For every good post that’s hidden in the side bar, five questionable articles are splashed across the main page. I also still have serious criticisms of the editors of the section – CauseCast, which often do not reveal their financial ties to the nonprofit organizations they promote.

In April, just as things were settling down after the Haiti earthquake, 1millionshirts popped onto the scene in a Mashable post. This led to over 60 posts from a wide variety of bloggers, and a few snide responses from 1millionshirts. The heated debate led to an international round table and coverage in TIME magazine. Jason eventually decided to call it quits and focus on other ways to help. My guess is that the 1millionshirts kerfuffle will make it into future development textbooks. It has also led to the twitter shorthand “#1million…” for whatever bad aid idea pops up.

In September I wrote the post Whites in Shining Armor. The term has been surprisingly popular and has shown up in Foreign Policy, Christian Science Monitor, and most recently in ABC’s the Drum. It even inspired a blogger to change their blog’s name to Whites in Tarnished Armor.

In October, in response to numerous readers’ questions, I wrote a post criticizing TOMS shoes. This led to an interesting discussion in the comment section and has been unexpectedly popular. The post has been shared over 100 times on Facebook and, three months later, continues to receive hundreds of hits each week.

Throughout 2010 numerous natural disasters have made it into the news. The earthquake in Chile, the flooding in Pakistan, the volcanic eruption in Iceland, the earthquake in New Zealand were just a few of them. I find that I have my own early warning system, immediately after each new disaster, hits to my post Why are there so many natural disasters lately? spike.

2010 was a big year for Good Intentions are Not Enough, 2011 is shaping up to be an even bigger year as I move Beyond Good Intentions. But that’s the subject of another post.

Happy New Years everyone!

« Natural Disasters and Haiti   •   Whose Volunteer Experience Is This Anyway? »