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“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed individuals can change the world.  Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”  - Margaret Mead

In case you hadn’t heard, this week’s Social Media Breakfast (SMB) in Boston was pretty special.  In keeping with the season, the theme was “Social Media for Social Change,” and indeed, according to my colleague Bob Collins, “It was an amazing event and a real-time proof of concept that demonstrated the power of rallying and engaging a networked community.”  Why all the fuss?

Bob joined Beth Kanter, the expert on social media & non-profit, to ask Ed Nicholson, director of community & PR at Tyson Foods, to present a challenge to Boston’s Social Media Breakfast community.   

The Challenge: Would Tyson Foods donate 100 lbs. of food to The Greater Boston Food Bank for every single comment left on their Hunger Relief website?  After all, the idea was not untested — a similar campaign had been successful at the Austin and Bay Area SMBs.  We just wanted to see if Boston could do a li’l better!

Within 3.5 hours of launching the social media experiment during the SMB on December 10th in Cambridge — our local community had rallied their online pals to generate over 550 comments on Tyson’s Hunger Relief website. 

Due to the dramatic first wave of comments, which did indeed outstrip the Austin and Bay Area drives, Tyson decided to double-down on their support.  In the end, Tyson Foods has pledged to provide 70,000 lbs. of food — the equivalent of approximately 54,000 meals — to the food bank.

Truly, Twitter is a wonderland.

To quote Tyson’s Ed Nicholson:  “Should anyone doubt the incredibly powerful community among you, point them to this effort.”

UPDATE:  Also during the “Social Media for Social Change” breakfast, a few great charitable sites were called out that might be of interest to y-o-u this holiday season.  
 
The Give List — 71 ways you can give without opening your wallet.  
 
Network for Good — “Gift Cards.”

This entry was posted on Friday, December 12th, 2008 at 10:09 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.