14 4 / 2012
Future of Pan Handling
I am attending a Hack-a-Thon / Collaboration Weekend put on by Creative Currency next weekend and wanted to get the ideas flowing.
I am most interested in the theme :
“How can tools like crowdfunding and microcredit be put to work for social service organizations and individuals alike?”
To start I thought about taking that and asking the question :
How to help homeless people get more money?
1) Make new revenue stream (selling a new service)
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/swsx-ad-agency-turns-homeless-wi-fi-hotspots/story?id=15910344
Goal of this prototype : create awareness by prompting the rich sxsw attendees to interact directly with the homeless
Next version - less about avocacy and more about money.
A) homeless person wearing sign that says - “WiFi by Hank J”
B) Donor turns on wifi and sees “Hank J” as a WiFi source.
C) when connected it prompts the Donor to donate money to Hank J via credit card to access the WiFi
- Maybe Small bio about Hank
- Donation optional?
2) Improve current revenue stream (pan-handling)
Problems with panhandling
Homeless person side :
- Less people carrying cash
- Have to physically get in donors way to get them to interact
- Have to defend / claim territory
Donor
- No transparency on what money is spent on
- No idea on how much money this person is makeing (is the homeless guy making more than me?)
- Afraid of interacting with the person
Prototype
Rules :
To be on system, Recipient people need to sign up.
- Includes Nick Name (public), real Name (private), Pic (Public), Usual locations (public)
- Each Recipient can only have one account
- Partner organizations sign up Recipients and are in charge of giving out money.
- Each Homeless person can only receive 1000$ per month.
- Money can only be spent on food and rent ( or maybe just tracking)
Donor UX
- Installs app
- Signs up and is asked to pay a 5$ per month subscription (only one subscription plan)
- Can search Recipient people by location or name ( homeless on the system wear a badge)
- Can give the 5$ in one dollar increments to 5 different Recipients - or just one.
- Can see how much money that Recipient has raised that month.
Recipient UX
- They sign up to the system
- They wear their nickname badge
- Each week they check in and get a distribution of the funds raised.
Organization :
- Partner with local organizations for funds disbursement and sign ups
- Internal funding :
- Donors who sign up and do not fully allocate their 5$ per month
- That money is divided in half
- Half is distributed evenly among all of the recipients who did not reach their monthly limit
- Half funds the internal organization
