It is very sad to hear or report on the calamity that has struck Haiti earlier but what’s a bit heartening to see is that people are trying to support the people in the best of ways they can. Be it sending relief or having words of support on their Facebook profiles. It was even more interesting to see that notable people who run Facebook have taken an initiative to create awareness amongst people on what they can do to support those who are struck by disasters.
The page has been created by notables like Randi Zuckerberg, Andrew Noyes, etc and the initiative was taken soon after the first report of the Earthquake. We have seen how Facebook has been flooded with status updates regarding the disaster and things haven’t been slow. Rather there have been numerous groups already that have surfaced in the last 24 hours. The Global Relief Page hasn’t been created to muster donations, rather as a place where Facebook users can learn how they can actually contribute to the various causes out there. The page itself provides useful links and methods through which you can actively contribute to help the disaster struck people.
As of present the page reports that Oxfam America has raised more than $33,000 from Facebook Causes. This works simply in a manner that you buy a charity gift using Facebook Credits and that will used to provide a jug of clean water for one person. From the Wall Post:
You can now use Facebook Credits to buy a "Water for Haiti" charity gift on Facebook to benefit Oxfam America. Your purchase of this charity gift for 70 credits provides one clean water jug to earthquake survivors in Haiti.
Oxfam has 200 aid workers already on the ground in Haiti providing relief after the devastating earthquake. Your gift will go immediately to the most critical needs in Haiti.
Other than that the Wyclef Jean is promoting the cause of donating cash to the people in Haiti by sending a text message. This is done via its Yele Haiti campaign. You can also visit the site and help the survivors as well.
Overall this just shows another dimension of Facebook and how it is fruitful in actually creating awareness at large and making sure that the information is spread to the maximum and the platform being used to actually help people. As the platform grows, there will be more to the social network than just networking with friends, or marketing and it may very well become a major place to initiate a noble cause or spread the word about one. Our prayers for those who have suffered irreparable loss due to the earthquake.
1 Trackback or Pingback for this entry:
[...] Global Disaster Relief page on Facebook is definitely keeping us updated on what is happening at present about assisting [...]