Watsi Lands $1.5M Donation From Humble Bundle

http://thenextweb.com/insider/2013/12/16/healthcare-platform-watsi-lands-1-5-million-donation-gaming-startup-humble-bundle/

by minimaxir • 13 years ago

99 20 13 years ago

thenextweb.com

mmastrac• 13 years ago

This sounds really cool and exciting on the surface, but honest question: is there a conflict of interest when two YC alumni donate between each other? Is there any real issue here at all?

I don't know the answer to that one way or another, but I think it makes for interesting discussion.

sakai• 13 years ago

I don't think so – Humble Bundle is a for-profit company, of which YC owns (a small non-controlling set of) common shares. Watsi is a non-profit that YC doesn't own any portion of.

What HB does is really up to them – and donating to charity has always been a core component of both their business and mission/vision.

tptacek• 13 years ago

No.

nacho2sweet• 13 years ago

I don't think so. They are both networked into the same valley culture and would obviously have met and know each other's projects well. It would seem natural.

zachlatta• 13 years ago

Great for them! Watsi is doing great work utilizing the internet for good. I'm super excited to see where they go in the future!

mcintyre1994• 13 years ago

Awesome! From the article, Watsi have raised a total of $2.2 million including this, so this is huge.

msg• 13 years ago

Is this just a bottom line of their donations through customer purchases of Humble Bundles? That is, when people buy Humble Bundle X, they can specify the money goes to charity, the developers, or Humble. Watsi has been a featured charity along with the Red Cross and EFF.

Or is this a separate donation from the Humble Bundle leadership or such?

chaseadam17• 13 years ago

We've been a beneficiary of several bundles, and so far Humble Bundle users have contributed a total of $1.5M to Watsi.

ultimoo• 13 years ago

That is an amazing amount, congrats you guys! Also, thanks for the clarification -- somehow the article (perhaps unintentionally) reads as though the management of the Humble Bundle company donated from their own funds/profits.

lukethomas2• 13 years ago

To those considering donating to Watsi - the best part is when they send you an update on the patient's condition after surgery. The transparency is admirable.

xhrpost2• 13 years ago

Yes this is a good step in the right direction I feel. Personally though some updates would have been nice, I think there was at least 4 months between funding and hearing that surgery was complete for the patient I helped with. An earlier update would have been nice, was wondering what was going on for a while. Also they used the original picture of the patient rather than an updated one. Maybe I'm just being picky but I think those things could help improve the response that a donor feels from helping out.

lukethomas2• 13 years ago

Agreed - I just think it's lightyears ahead of other charities. Most of the time, I have no idea where the money even goes, which is really unfortunate (and makes me not want to donate to them)

davedx• 13 years ago

Yep. I tend to fire and forget with charity, and it's always awesome to get those emails and see you've really helped someone.

spIrr• 13 years ago

Does this raise a concern of people stopping donating to Watsi directly, since many, many treatments will be funded from this one donation and no unfunded treatments will be available?

jc00ke• 13 years ago

Good question. $1.5M is a lot of amount of money, but it will by no means fund all the patients, so there will always be treatments for donors to fund.

eterm2• 13 years ago

This is funding for the business side of Watsi, so that donations made for treatments can go 100% to the treatments.

gracegarey• 13 years ago

No, this is actually 100% for treatments, not our operations.

Watsi Lands $1.5M Donation From Humble Bundle

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