Knowing and Making

I celebrate the good news that  Bletchley Park has been saved  by my new friend @Dr_Black among others. It's a good story and you should read it if you aren't familiar with the background. However, is it wise to announce and frame the news in this way? The post suggests an optimistic transition: I mentioned "Saving Bletchley Park" as part of this conversation and Simon said "...hold on, Bletchley Park is saved, there is no way we are going to shut now with all the support that we have. What we need to talk about now is Building Bletchley Park for the future". I sat there with a big smile on my face... Bletchley Park is Saved - It is no longer about *Saving* Bletchley Park but about *Building* Bletchley Park. It sounds great. But surely it is much easier to raise money to "save Bletchley Park" from an impending emergency than to "build Bletchley Park" for an undetermined future? I predict that, unfortunately, donations will fall if the...

From the Bloggers Circle : John Copps of New Philanthropy Capital is applying lessons from the record industry to charitable donations . Just as record companies are creating a wider range of distinct products, in an effort combat illegal copying and generate more revenue from devoted fans, charities should be doing the same to maximise their donations. An anonymous commenter points out that this is just price discrimination - and many industries have been doing it for decades. True enough, but there are lessons to learn from this. Price discrimination is less visible in either commodity or high-growth markets. If you sell commodities, it's harder to use price discrimination - although you will still see it on a smaller scale. The petrol market is fairly competitive, without many proprietary products, and thus there is far less diversity of price than in, say, the retail market for coffee. But because it is high-volume and the margins are small, 5p per litre of extra revenue for ...