Choose Our Cause - Facebook application

[Guest]

.

[Robleh]

My name is Robleh, I am a Kiva lender and Chairman of the Hiran Community Education Project (HiCEP, http://hicep.org.uk). HiCEP was set up by my Dad, Daud Hassan Ali to provide education in Beled Weyne, his home town in Somalia. We started with a local library which opened in 1999, my Dad was a teacher and his ultimate dream was to set up a school. So when he retired in 2004 he went back to Somalia to get it going. It opened in 2005 and it was very successful, with more and more children enrolling each year. On 14 April 2008 the school was attacked and my Dad was killed along with the three other teachers, Rehana, Andrew and Gilford.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/15/world/africa/15somalia.html?_r=1

My Dad being killed changed my life. At the time, a friend and I were working on a startup company in our spare time. We decided to abandon the original project and do something to benefit small causes like HiCEP. An idea came to me when I was searching on the internet for a film to watch. I looked through my friends’ favourites on Facebook and chose a DVD because I knew the film was one a friend had enjoyed. This made me think that advertisers would pay a lot to advertise alongside a friend’s recommendation.

We now have working software which gathers together lists of favourite books, films, TV, travel, music and gadgets on Facebook. If a person is looking for something new this provides a simple way to search for friends’ recommendations. For sellers of DVDs, music, holidays etc having their name appear alongside the recommendation presents an excellent opportunity to make a sale so they are prepared to pay every time a potential buyer clicks on their advert. We share the revenue equally with our users who can donate their share to a cause they support. This payment is the origin of the money which will come to Kiva. All we need you to do is to add Choose Our Cause to your Facebook page and pass this message on to your friends.

We are still very small. My friends and I are working on this in our spare time and I am now getting the word out to as many charities as I can with the aim of building our user base. The more users we have the more times people will click on adverts and so the funds flowing through to Kiva and other charities will increase.

Please help us by adding our facebook application and spreading the word:

http://apps.facebook.com/chooseourcause/

Many thanks

Robleh Ali
chooseourcause.com

[Jill]

Speaking of thank you notes, speaking of wanting to give a plug for one of our Kiva Friends, and wanting to share with you another pretty special personalized expression of a person's gratitude, which turns out to have been from KF Robleh’s mom,  please, if you feel like it, check out this e-mail I just received.   I'd contributed what really was a very small amount mostly on a “whim,” very likely largely because one of those teachers that Robleh told us had been killed had been his dad, and well, let me just say that
it was his DAD.

Dear Jill,
I am writing to send you our most sincere thanks for your very generous gift to HiCEP of -----made via PayPal. Every penny is greatly valued and will be spent in Somalia to advance the work there. All tasks which have to be carried out in the UK are done by volunteers and the few unavoidable expenses such as stationery and postage costs are met from funds given specifically for those purposes.

To date all the gifts which have come in via PayPal have been from friends of my son, Robleh, who set up the website and installed the payment facility. It was a real thrill to receive your donation by that means as it is the first time that a person with whom we have had no previous contact has given spontaneously as a result of visiting the website. Robleh has surmised that your visit was a response to a message which he sent out to Kiva Friend’s Forum.

You may have gathered from the information which appears on the website that the work in Somalia is being maintained. In Beled-Weyne the school premises continue to be guarded. Repair work has been carried out on the roofs of two classrooms to rectify a problem which had resulted in lots of leaks. The new roofs are kept the water out during the recent rainy season. We are hoping it will be possible for all the other roofs to be fixed during the current dry season. This will depend upon the security situation. In recent weeks there has been fighting for control of the town.

During the last bout Hiran Public Library was closed briefly whilst the conflict was at its worst but quickly re-opened. It has now been operating for ten years, through many vicissitudes. We have nothing but admiration for the people who are keeping things going in the midst of a very difficult situation.

There are now four HiCEP sponsored students enrolled in the Teacher Training course at Amoud University. Two started their studies in October. One of them is majoring in physics and maths, the other in biology and chemistry. The two students who started the course in October 2008 both passed the exams at the end of the first year of the course, with one of them coming at the top of the class. The university is in the town of Boroma in northern Somalia where conditions are much better. The students recently sent us a photo attached to an email. It is of the four of them standing in front of one of the university buildings, with their study books under their arms. They all look really well and prosperous. Boroma must feel like a little bit of heaven by comparison with Beled-Weyne.

I have added your e-address to the HiCEP Supporters Group to whom I send out a couple of updates each year. If you would prefer not to receive those messages please let me know and I will remove your address from the list

I hope that you will enjoy your Christmas celebrations and that 2010 will bring many good things into your life.

Thank you again for your interest in and support of the work of HiCEP.

            With every good wish,

                        Margaret (Ali)


Good luck, Robleh -- to you, to your mom, and to your people.  Your dad would have been very proud of you.
Jill

[cjp1973]

Wow, Jill.  I have to say the note from Robleh's mom was so genuine and thoughtful.  I wish them the best of luck.  Had to go and throw a few cents in the pot, oops meant pounds in the pot, for the great work they are doing.  Who doesn't love a library  
Charmaine

[Wood Fairy Glenda]

Me too, Charmaine.  I'm not a member of Facebook, but after checking Robleh's post (the one that preceded Jill's), I found a way to contribute.

[Eli]

Me too, Charmaine.  I'm not a member of Facebook, but after checking Robleh's post (the one that preceded Jill's), I found a way to contribute.

Video and link here:

http://www.hicep.org.uk/

[Jill]

This is the video that is posted at Robleh’s family’s website, the site for their school and library project in Somalia.  It’s 8 minutes of his father talking, with just the most wonderful pictures of the school, of the classrooms, of the children sprinkled generously throughout.  The video was put together so it could be shown at the memorial they held for Robleh’s father and the other teachers who were killed in Somalia last year.

I only just now watched it.  It is incredibly poignant.  His dad had such vision.  He, obviously, was so tremendously intelligent, caring, committed.  Any one of us would have felt blessed just to have been able to know him, to have had the chance of learning from him.  The video was truly beautiful--just as his heart, so obviously, had to have been beautiful.  It’s all about love and caring and believing in a better world.

I (almost) dare you to watch it and to try not to be moved. 

I warn you, though.  It might cost you.
It’s sort of like – how could anyone possibly see this and feel this man’s hope, hope for his country, hope for the betterment of opportunities and life for the children of his country, Somalia, and not want to help perpetuate his dream?  I’m not sure, but I think that if you will take the time to watch it, to “feel” this man, to learn his heart, I think you’re going to find it close to impossible to resist.



Peace be with you, Daud Hassan Ali.
Peace be with your family, with your country, with all of us.
I sign with love,
Jill
Teachers Rock!



EDIT or, a P.S. I just realized that Robleh's original post was a lot about the Facebook Application that he and some friends put together, which application, ultimately, sounds like it could generate a lot of additional funding for charities and other non-profits.  I don't, myself, belong to Facebook and am so computer-and-other-technology illiterate that I wouldn't know an application if it came up and bomped me on the head.  Still, I was able to understand enough from Robleh's description to believe that the idea of his app was a pretty neat one and one that all you much more "with it" people might want to explore and promote.

[Robleh]

First of all many thanks to Jill, Charmaine, Janet and Glenda for your donations to HiCEP. Your gifts were extremely generous and unexpected. My Mum was delighted and surprised. HiCEP is a very small charity and until now all our donations have come from people we know in person. It is wonderful to receive gifts from across an ocean.

The circumstances in Somalia are very hard at the moment. Since my Dad was killed in 2008 there has been continuing instability. However we are determined to keep going and it is really thanks to Mum and our Treasurer Hilary at this end and my cousins in Somalia that we are able to.

Towards the end of the video of Dad that Jill posted he talks about his dreams for the future of the project. At the moment we have a small library which is open and primary school which we hope to reopen. Beyond that, my Dad's dream was to expand to build more classrooms and eventually a college. In the film he says 'the people who come after me', as his son that duty falls to me.

I have been lucky, my Dad came to the UK before I was born and I had the benefit of a good education denied to many children and young people in Somalia. The opportunities I had meant I was able to start an internet company which I was working on when Dad died. After that I wanted to use what I had learnt about technology to benefit small charities like HiCEP.

An idea came to me when I was looking for a film to watch. I was searching through my friends facebook pages looking for recommendations and when I found one I bought the DVD my friend recommended straight away. It made me think that advertisers would pay a lot to show a small ad alongside a friend's recommendation and it would be possible to share the advertising revenue equally with the user making the recommendation. So we have now built the facebook application which does that and all we need is for people to start using it. Jill said this:

EDIT or, a P.S. I just realized that Robleh's original post was a lot about the Facebook Application that he and some friends put together, which application, ultimately, sounds like it could generate a lot of additional funding for charities and other non-profits.  I don't, myself, belong to Facebook and am so computer-and-other-technology illiterate that I wouldn't know an application if it came up and bomped me on the head.  Still, I was able to understand enough from Robleh's description to believe that the idea of his app was a pretty neat one and one that all you much more "with it" people might want to explore and promote.

This is exactly what we need right now. We are in the very early days and to attract advertisers we need as many users as possible. If you have a facebook account please add the Choose Our Cause application to your account by clicking here:

http://apps.facebook.com/chooseourcause/

It works best when you have some friends also using it as you can only see their recommendations if they have also added the application. So please invite your friends.

I have always loved technology for the potential it has to change the world. Kiva is a great example and we hope to create another with Choose Our Cause. I know from HiCEP that small charities benefit the most from extra funds. I am now spending my spare time visiting as many as possible to spread the word about Choose Our Cause, so if you know any please pass on my email to them and I will get in touch: roblehdaudali@googlemail.com.

Many thanks again for your generous donations.

Robleh

[Robleh]

Hello folks

I have had a few bug reports coming through, when people are adding the app it is showing a blank page. Thanks to those who reported this, I have spoken with our developers and we are getting it fixed.

The joys of tech startups!

Robleh

All working again now, please feel free to take another look. Apologies for the hitches!