I’m assuming not all of you know GoodSearch yet. It’s a Yahoo-powered search engine, founded in November 2005. (According to Wikipedia, so don’t put your money on it :P)
GoodSearch has good intentions. Participating merchants, such as Target, Macy’s, PetSmart, Best Buy, Staples, Walmart, Toys “R” Us, Gap, Nike, Nordstrom, Apple, eBay, Barnes & Noble, Oriental Trading, iTunes, amazon.com, and many more donate a percentage of each sale to a charity or school designated by the user.
For heck’s sake, let’s say you like donating to your local YMCA. Well, you’d designate your Y as your charity of choice within GoodSearch, and every time you search using their engine, or their toolbar, a tiny little bit of money is raised for them. Here’s the chart they have on their site to explain GoodSearch donations:
Okay, so you’re probably thinking what I was thinking at this point… “Cool, this seems legit!”. Well, it probably is legit as a tool and on how it works.
I’ll tell you what I don’t trust, I don’t trust in some of the “charity” organizations out there that will probably see this as an opportunity to get a few extra bucks in their pocket.
Let me give you an example. Say you work at a Non-profit that is registered with GoodSearch. Your Non-profit has 150-200 employees. You make it mandatory that all of your employees use GoodSearch’s toolbar, and that every time they have to search online, they use that engine. Then, at the end of the year you get a nice “bonus” from GoodSearch.
I know this is a negative way of looking into things but trust me, some people will do that and they are probably already doing it. Big names have been found to have a lot of charity corruption, and don’t even get me started with the little unknown ones.
Don’t get me wrong people, I believe in charities and Non-profits, but I also believe that you have to know where you’re sending your money, not all of them operate the way you and I may think they do.
GoodSearch has a disclaimer under their search bar that reads: “Please use this site honestly. Fraudulent searches will result in your charity being delisted.” Do me a favor and stay away from GoodSearch corruption, and GoodSearch fraud. It’s a good concept that depends on good people being involved with it.
My two cents? I like the idea, but I think that there has to be some sort of accountability for where the money goes.
