While reading Idealist’s newest idea for coordinating people, I got an idea for connecting volunteerism on the net to people who don’t use computers.
Problem: It’s hard to reach people who don’t use computers! Only wealthy organizations can afford bulk mail.
Solution: Anyone can post a card to be delivered to an area. They put in the info for the card and any additional information to “persuade” people to deliver it.
MailCarriers:
Anyone can go to MeritMail and “claim” messages for delivery. They print them out, cut them up and walk them to their neighbors mail boxes. They deliver only to their “block” or surroundings.
No postage – messages are printed on home printers, cut in half or quarters and then stuck in peoples mailboxes or front doors.
Merit Based – No spam (from the mail carriers perspective) gets through, because volunteers only print messages that they think have merit.
Cheap – You are only informing your neighbors so 10 sheets of paper and a little ink. Cost of distribution is distributed across a city, block by block. If you know 4 of your neighbors are on Facebook, then you “deliver” the message that way and only print out 6 hard copies for the others.
Opt Out – You can go and de-register an address and the system will advise MailCarriers to avoid that address.
Guaranteed Delivery:
Ya… no. Metaphorically, this works like the internet does… so packet delivery is not guaranteed. The internet works “100%” of the time (okay not really) because of all the routers and re-sending packets. Only when lots of MailCarriers are participating does MeritMail have a higher rate of delivery. But with one low tech system in place, the network effect would help spread the word and bridge the gap.
What do you think?
Nice! I could see that working. I can think of a few things that a site for this could do that would make it more compelling: Like mapping across registered 'carrier' accounts to see what kind of coverage is possible. Maybe carriers register with the kinds of issues they're willing to put time in for, then you get a topic/coverage map. I imagine that tracking 'messages sent' would be needed to prevent overlap, but also as a kind of whuffie for carriers...
@Ethan - Great ideas. I like bringing in whuffie. The more game like the site is, the more incentive there would be to deliver mail.