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| CURRENT SECTION :: News | UK's most visited IT Contractor Site - 250k unique visitors March 2008 |
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A new Faceboook-style website is linking social entrepreneurs, community organisations and philanthropic freelancers who all want to change the world for the better. Users of UnLtdWorld can search and share resources with each other, find socially-minded groups in their neighbourhood and crowdsource people for their own projects. A company spokesperson told CUK that their idea was to take the best bits of social networking sites, like Facebook, and develop them for people who want to make a positive social impact. To this end, users can post ideas on a comment ‘wall’, contribute to a shout box – a mini blog on social enterprise, share their project photos and, like Delicious, tag the content they post. From their own personal profile page, users can also spell out the social projects they are interested in, the projects they have live, as well as join groups or Q&As on social business. “While mainstream social networks boast millions of members, there is often a lack in the relevance of connections and content that is established, or can be forged beyond circles of acquaintances,” the site said. “UnLtdWorld is a community for social entrepreneurs, socially-minded people and socially-driven organisations that invest their efforts in changing the world for the better.” But the site is much more than just an online network for social enterprise: it also acts as a near real-time indicator of where social projects are located, their industry and their demographics. At the time of writing, the site’s research lab shows social projects through technology or the internet were the most popular, accounting for almost a quarter of all members’ projects. Environmental initiatives were a distant yet telling second, making them more popular than projects on social inclusion, education, health, housing, sports and criminal justice. “The value in making the information available is all about access to social insight, and is multi-fold,” said UnLtdWorld spokeswoman Rachel Slade. “It ranges from a general public better engaging with their local community to informing research, from supporting a social entrepreneur’s market research to helping organisations working in the sector to better target their areas of operation and intervention. “For example it’s extremely valuable for an agency to know that in a specific area recycling is a key issue and which services are available, or lacking, when it comes addressing that issue.” Successful projects enabled by the site include a group of Scottish entrepreneurs who arranged regularly meet-ups with UK magazines devoted to their cause. A group of architecture students from Sheffield uploaded and shared project ideas, to then engage with partners, financers and freelancers to enable project start-up. Meanwhile, early and pre-stage start-ups have found volunteers for their projects, while existing non-employers have sourced personnel, like a designer, a PR expert or lawyer, at affordable prices. “One of our key tools is the Neighbourhoods function that connects members together if they share similar interests or locations,” Ms Slade added. “This is the key…; as unlike other social networks that connect you with the people you already know, UnLtdWorld connects you with the people you need to know.” Mar 31, 2008 Email this article Printer friendly page Previous Page
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