• Huffington Post is asking readers to vote on “the biggest game changer in philanthropy.” Candidates include New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, for his creation of a citywide service program, and Perla Ni, founder of the Web site Great Nonprofits.

• Andrew Wolk, founder of the nonprofit group Root Cause, advances the idea of creating common measurement tools tailored to an organization’s size and stage of development.

• While making changes to the nation’s health-care system is important, capping the charitable tax deduction to pay for the...

Does the nonprofit world need a good laugh?

Humor plays an important role in building identity, yet charities and foundations don’t seem to laugh at themselves very often, writes Gabriela Fitz, co-director of IssueLab, an online publisher of nonprofit research.

Do “we take ourselves too seriously (and then blog about it no less)? Or are we simply concerned that other people won’t take us seriously?” she asks on her group’s blog. “Or is it more evidence that we don’t really have a nonprofit group identity? I mean, a joke really only works when it resonates with the common experience of the audience.”

There are, of course, exceptions. Lolnptech.org makes fun of nonprofit...

• Howard Husock, vice president of policy research at the Manhattan Institute, writes on Townhall.com that “the stars are aligning for government to capture funds that would have otherwise gone to philanthropy and for government itself to pick charity winners and losers.” His concerns center on proposed changes to the amount Americans can deduct for their charitable gifts, the new White House Office of Social Innovation, and the Serve America Act.

• Several prominent corporate chief executives have sales backgrounds, so why does it seem that nonprofit chief executives usually are not former fund raisers? Sasha Dichter, director of business development for the Acumen Fund, raises this question on his blog.

• Bill and Melinda Gates continue to cite questionable malaria data as part of their new effort to promote U.S. foreign spending on global health, say William Easterly and Laura Fresch, of New York University’s Development Research Institute, on their Aid Watch blog. Read The Chronicle’s article about the Gateses’ advocacy campaign.

• While two recent reports present interesting information about the gender and ethnic diversity within foundation leadership, they fail to look at age and whether foundation chief executives are getting younger,

• Dan Pallotta, founder of a company that raised money for charities and author of a book on the nonprofit world, argues on the Daily Beast that sexism is holding back the charitable field.

• Andrew Taylor, director of a graduate program in arts administration at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, writes on the Artful Manager blog about an effort by several theater companies to develop a system of financing based on locally supported agriculture, by which a group of people promise to invest in a farm and share its risks and benefits.

• Arts organizations need to rethink how they approach diversity in their programming, Michael M....

• Board leaders need to effectively communicate a group’s mission to the public, work well with a chief executive, and be a major financial supporter, writes Alice Korngold, a charity consultant in New York, on a Fast Company magazine blog.

• The word donor is used to describe anyone who supports a charity, but the title should be reserved for contributors who give at least 10 percent of their household income to charity and meet other criteria, writes Greg Fox on the Donor Power blog, which is operated by Merkle, a fund-raising company.

• The traditional model of conferences — keynote speeches, plenaries, networking...

All four television networks this week are incorporating the themes of volunteering and service into the plot lines of many of their most popular shows.

To keep track of what’s happening — and to discuss how this effort is affecting the nonprofit world — the Chronicle is playing host to a daily live blog.

We invite you to report on how your favorite shows are highlighting service and volunteering and to share your thoughts on whether the shows are hitting the mark.

To join the conversation, click on the window below and follow along.

We’ll be checking in throughout the weekend to offer updates and post your thoughts on how the television world is taking part in this campaign.

Talking About Network...

If you find a $20 bill under a potted plant or a few dollars taped to a bench you may need to ask yourself: Is it simply good luck? Or is it a guerrilla gift?

A family in Vancouver, Canada, has created a media buzz with their “guerrilla giving” — leaving envelopes of money and other items at bus stops, in public parks, and other random spots around the city.

On a blog, the father, who prefers to remain anonymous, says he wants to revolutionize philanthropy. For one year, his middle-class family has pledged to give 10 percent of their gross income to strangers. The charitable project “calls into question our ego’s insatiable appetite for self-gratification. It lifts our sights to a higher vision,” he writes.

“We hope we could inspire others that we can all be...

• While the Corporation for National and Community Service sought to explain the new Social Innovation Fund during a conference call this month, Adin Miller, a nonprofit consultant, says “many significant challenges and questions remained unaddressed.” He lists the questions on his blog.

• Saying that the success of microfinance is often exaggerated, GiveWell, a charity research group in New York, examines on its blog six myths that donors should know before supporting organizations that provide small business loans to the poor.

• As the number of homeless people rises...

All four television networks this week are incorporating the themes of volunteering and service into the plot lines of many of their most popular shows.

To keep track of what’s happening — and to discuss how this effort is affecting the nonprofit world — the Chronicle is playing host to a daily live blog.

We invite you to report on how your favorite shows are highlighting service and volunteering and to share your thoughts on whether the shows are hitting the mark.

To join the conversation, click on the window below and follow along.

Day 4: Talking About Network TV’s Service Campaign