$10k Back to the Internet Donation

January 1st 2021

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2020 was a worldwide shitshow. The pandemic displaced team members, placed stress on families, and redefined what and where the day to day even is.

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Work goes on.

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As a company, we managed to double revenue for the third year in a row and raise some strategic funding. I'm still learning how to make a quality internet company. We wouldn't be where we're at without the technological progress and innovation from so many other people, projects, and organizations.

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This year at Hacker Noon, we decided to make our yearly donation $10k, choosing 7 established nonprofits that consistently give more value back to the internet, and 3 less established open source contributors that have a ton of potential.

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I'm publishing this list because:

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• whether it's $1k, $10k or $10M, I'd like to encourage other internet companies to make a yearly donation based on a small fraction of yearly revenue.
• offer an interview on the Hacker Noon podcast for any individual or organization who wants to match some of these donations over the next year
• and to ask, if you want to recommend a nonprofit or open-source project for 2021 or 2022's internet donation, contact us.

These nonprofit organizations and open source projects work towards economically sustainable ways to make a better internet. In one way or another, these donations follow the community-driven Hacker Noon editorial line, where writers and editors have collaborated to publish 75,000+ stories around topics like software development, startups, A.I., cryptocurrency, bitcoin, web development, business, marketing, machine learning, productivity, and more.

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Hacker Noon's 2020 $1k Donation Pledges:

Wikipedia. I saw Jimmy Wales give a talk once where he explained his first approach to a digital encyclopedia was to commission experts. That failure led to arguably the greatest crowdsourced knowledge the world has ever seen. Learn, learn, learn. What a knowledge source.

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FreeCodeCamp (donated in BTC). Learning to code can transform someone's economic potential. It's as close to digital literacy as one can get. FreeCodeCamp is very efficient when it comes to reducing the cost it takes to learn to code.

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EFF. Electronic freedom blurs governance laws. Digital privacy, free speech and innovation are rights worth protecting. Matching courtesy brings this donation up to $2k total.

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KidsTek. We are based in Colorado and improving digital literacy and technology acumen is core to the internet industry. KidsTek promotes digital literacy for high needs Colorado schools through technology education

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BitGive Foundation(donated in BTC). Leverages the power of Bitcoin and Blockchain technology to create lasting social impact. We are bullish on low transaction fees via crypto could become an engine for good.

GiveCrypto (donated in BTC). They distribute your cryptocurrency to impact communities and help drive the real-world utility of crypto. Good to see an organization leveraging crypto in the global fight against poverty and hunger.

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Black Girls Code. They increase the number of women of color in the digital space by empowering girls of color ages 7 to 17 to become innovators in STEM fields, leaders in their communities, and builders of their own futures through exposure to computer science and technology.

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Kat Marchán's Open Source Initiatives (donated via Venmo). Her work on npmjs changed the game. Kat's contributions help make Hacker Noon possible.

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Leah Silber's Open Source Initiatives. Her work has moved Rails, EmberJS, jquery and more, forward. Leah's contributions help make Hacker Noon possible.

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Tim Feross' Open Source Initiatives (donated in BTC). He is a self-confessed 'mad scientist' whose npm packages are downloaded 500M+ times every month. Tim's contributions help make Hacker Noon possible.

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Until next year... Back to the Internet!

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