What if you could donate food to the hungry, at no cost to you, simply by turning on your computer and clicking on a Web site?
Well, you can.
The catch: Even if you click on the site every day for a year, you’d be donating only $10.95. Would it be better just to scribble out a check for 11 bucks once a year?
That depends on how you look at it.
In just six months, a previously unknown computer programmer’s innovative approach to charity has won the Hunger Site a growing following around the world and raised $350,000 in food aid.
“I didn’t think it would get this big,” said John Breen, 42, the soft-spoken programmer who came up with the independent site and now runs it, by himself, from his small office in Bloomington, Ind. “In particular, I didn’t think so many people would come every day.”
Here’s how it works. Computer users go to www.thehungersite.com. (Some 250,000 people now do this on a given weekday, Breen said, though not all are daily visitors.) They click their mouse on a gray box that says “Donate Free Food.” Then a thank-you and the logos of a half-dozen advertisers or so pop up on the screen.
That’s it, as far as the computer users go. One simple click yields a flash of do-gooder instant gratification, a gimmick of sorts in service of the hungry.
The site tells computer users that their click (worth 3 cents) means they have just donated 1 1/2 cups of rice or other staples “to a hungry person.”
It is not that simple, of course, since food aid follows a complicated route to its destination and donations rarely flow directly.
Hunger Site advertisers write a check to the United Nations World Food Program in exchange for the exposure to all those eyeballs. The number of clicks — meaning pairs of eyeballs — determines how much they pay. Individuals can register one donation a day, no more, something Breen said he tracks. They can click on the company logos to reach the businesses’ Web sites, but that’s optional.
So far, the $350,000 raised by the site has provided roughly 1,200 tons of rice, wheat and other staples, according to Breen. He said he takes no money from the site. The project does not have the government oversight given non-profit organizations since Breen runs it as an independent venture.
Roger Donley, a 31-year-old trial attorney in Houston, has added the Hunger Site to his computer bookmarks.
“It’s awesome,” Donley said. He heard about the site the way many people do: A friend e-mailed him and told him to check it out. Donley, in turn, recommended the site to 100 people he sends jokes and messages to on an e-mail list.
Donley said he visits the site as a quick way to do a bit of good while he’s on the Web for work or pleasure. He sometimes clicks when he’s on hold during telephone calls.
“I wish more companies would sponsor it so it would donate more each time I click,” he said.
A flower delivery business and an educational games company are among recent advertisers, each paying half a cent per click.
And that yearly check for a mere $11 that could save the well-intentioned so much clicking? That would be fine if people actually cracked open their checkbooks, Breen said. Most don’t.
Plus, Breen figures there’s an educational value in people tuning into the site and learning about world hunger. If more advertisers sign up, he noted, each click will be worth more.
In the meantime, he calculated the value of all that clicking differently.
The way he sees it, if a person takes five seconds to click on the site, that’s like earning $22 an hour on behalf of the charity. “So unless you’re the CEO of a big company,” he said, “it’s a good use of your time.”
It all depends on how you do the math.
