Thus Spaketh Idd Salim

Let us get innovative

One of the good things about philanthropic efforts if that they gather support pretty fast. There is always the element of  human weakness/strength that makes one want to help those who are less fortunate, afflicted, down, struggling etc. This is a good thing. Kenyans are now doing what anyone would do. Help the hungry.

I am a very vocal and active supporter of the #KenyansForKenya initiative and so it gives me great pleasure to share with you (BizMinds, Thinkers, Bloggers, Techies, The Salim-amesema-nini-tucritisize crew and the lets-find-faults-in-everything-everyone-else-does-because-we-are-doomed-losers brigade.) some few ideas to scale the initiative.

Slowly, we are reaching the end of what The Media, Bob, Twitter etc can do. We are at 121.6 M according to The official #K4K site, which represents 24.32% of the target aimed at. User fatigue is checking in. Slowly but surely. As a friend of mine would put it, ‘wasee wanaboeka na hii story’.

A few positive things make me glee with hope, nevertheless:

• End Month – It is finally end-month/Start Month. A few checks are clearing this week. Bars like K1 are already getting all creative on this and are donating KSHS 50 for each bottle of beer bought towards the #k4k. People finally have some loose cash to spend 100 bob per day to #K4K is not such a BIG ask anymore.
• Corporates – EABL will donate KSHS 10M tomorrow according to a rumor Bob shared on twitter. We just need 9 more Corporates to do that and we will reach 50% of the target. The challenge falls to The Big Wigs.
• Ramadhan – Shari-Ramadhan is here. No indulgences to the non-strict conformist Muslims. More money is thence available and can be channeled here. Also, it is the Month of harvest of rewards from Allah. Anything good done in the Month of Ramadhan is rewarded 100-fold. This is a challenge to the Muslim community.
• Media Push – The media is still unrelenting. Pushing the initiative like they can and should. In as much as some dont-know-any-better presenters from stations like Kiss FM insult Arsenal fans and try to make it funny when talking about donations (Ignoring the fact that gunners run this country and hence compromising the initiative), it is all going on well. Kudos the media!!  On the flip-side It is seen as hypocritical and vain at times when some corporates donate, not out of heart, but for Media Mentions, photo-ops and New headlines.

“So,”,  you ask Batiatas-esquely, “what is this user fatigue thing that you speak of?”

User fatigue is a condition/situation where users of a service/product get tired of routine. Simple as. Facebook changes their site layout, wordings, CSS etc every 48 hours so as the give the impression of an evolving real-estate.

Wazi.