Phrases like “capacity building” and “fostering innovation” are like nails on a chalkboard to Kivi Leroux Miller.

Ms. Miller, author of the blog Nonprofit Communications, says these phrases might make sense in a nonprofit board room. But they turn off those who are reading a brochure or a fund-raising appeal, the author writes.

“Never cut and paste your grant-application language into a marketing brochure for a program and expect it to work as is,” Ms. Miller writes. “You are speaking to two different audiences who need to hear about the program in different words and ways.”

So which phrases should you avoid? Ms. Miller points readers to the Communications Network, which offers a list of foundation and nonprofit jargon.

Needless to say, phrases like “best practices,” “synergy,” and “throughput” are not likely to fit into the, um, “paradigms” of an organization’s “stakeholders.”...

Planned giving officers and other nonprofit executives frequently point to the notion that the upcoming “intergenerational transfer of wealth” will fill charity coffers.

But it might be too early to start counting on those billions.

Robert Frank — the author of “Richistan: A Journey Through the American Wealth Boom and the Lives of the New Rich,” predicts in a recent interview with National Public Radio that the current generation of wealthy Americans will pass along 75 percent of their wealth to their children.

Kelly Kleiman, the Chicago consultant who authors The Nonprofiteer, says what’s left over is still “not a trivial sum.” But she worries that too many Americans are concerned more with taking care of their own than taking care of society.

“If three-quarters of everything is going to the kids, that puts [an end] to our sector’s hopeful notion that a huge intergenerational ...

Are some nonprofit executives paid too much money?

The question is front and center for the Internal Revenue Service, some charity watchdogs, and many reporters who cover the nonprofit world.

It is also very much on the minds of some bloggers, especially in the wake of recent stories that question the pay practices at the Citi Performing Arts Center, in Boston, and National Night Out, in Philadelphia.

Lawyer and author Jack Siegel, for instance, tackles the issue regularly on his blog, Charity Governance. Often, Mr. Siegel defends the rights of nonprofit groups to set the pay scales for their top executives — and for those executives to receive a competitive salary.

“We would be the first to argue that the government can set requirements for government subsidy without violating that Constitutional right,” Mr. Siegel writes in a recent post, which discussed the scrutiny...

Is it wrong for parents hosting birthday parties for their children to ask guests to give money to charity in lieu of neatly wrapped gifts?

A recent New York Times article suggests that the practice might actually turn off children to giving later in life.

But the anonymous author of The Nonprofiteer sees little downside.

In fact, she accuses the Times of being a party pooper.

“Making fun of rich people is great sport; the Nonprofiteer relishes it herself,” the blogger writes. “But making fun of rich people for being generous rather than stingy (the ‘John Edwards is rich so he can’t really care about poverty’ school of analysis) is just (sniff) tacky.”

The writer says incorporating giving into memorable events such as birthdays can help children learn the value of helping others and develop habits that will last a lifetime.

“If you tell a 4-year-old that birthdays are a time...

News that Carnegie Mellon University agreed to allow its campus to appear in the film Smart People is drawing debate about whether colleges and other nonprofit organizations are getting too commercial.

The movie deal has drawn some criticism — most notably from Jeffrey J. Williams, a Carnegie Mellon professor, in a recent opinion article in The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Mr. Williams described the film —which stars Dennis Quaid and Sarah Jessica Parker — as “a new step in universities’ adopting the ways and means of acquisitive corporations.”

But Dan Prives — a nonprofit finance expert and author of the blog Where Most Needed — writes that such arrangements are no cause for alarm.

“I don’t believe the claim that charity and nonprofit organizations are now or ever were a third sector, set apart from the public and private realm,” Mr. Prives writes. “They have always been...

The Internal Revenue Service’s proposal to overhaul the Form 990 informational tax return is generating plenty of talk throughout the nonprofit world.

The Urban Institute in Washington’s National Center for Charitable Statistics and Guidestar are hope to stimulate an exchange of ideas on its new Form 990 Wiki.

The site — modeled on the popular online encyclopedia Wikipedia — gives people a chance to review the new form and post comments about the proposed changes.

The effort is earning praise from Lucy Bernholz, a consultant to foundations and donors, who calls the revision a “once-in-a-lifetime” chance for the public to shape the way nonprofits report their financial information.

“The data on these forms is the primary source of information about nonprofits,” writes Ms. Bernholz on Philanthropy 2173. “These data are used by GuideStar, Charity Navigator, the Better Business...

Church officials need to do more to make sure that priests and other employees are properly taking care of the money they collect from their followers, says Dan Prives, a charity finance expert. In addition, they should disclose more information to the public about their finances, he says.

Mr. Prives, on his blog, Where Most Needed points to a recent case involving the Rev. Rodney Lee Rodis, a priest in Virginia who is accused of diverting money from his congregation to support his wife and three children.

The lawyer defending Father Rodis has filed a motion to dismiss the case, saying that the issue is a private church matter.

Mr. Prives, however, says that the case should continue.

In fact, a recent study by Villanova University researchers found that the vast majority of Catholic dioceses had discovered embezzlement by employees or volunteers from 2000 to 2005.

Such...

The environmental group Greenpeace is asking some of its bravest supporters to bare all for a campaign aimed at curbing global warming.

The organization’s Making Waves blog invites readers to strip naked next month on a shrinking glacier near Switzerland.

It hopes to get hundreds of in-the-buff volunteers to pose for a photo shoot with the noted photographer Spencer Tunick, who is known for staging large displays of public nudity.

“The message we want to get across is, ‘the human body is as vulnerable as a dying glacier,’” the organization writes on its blog. “Although lots and lots of people are talking the talk on climate change, real change continues to be painfully slow.”

Are provocative efforts such as this one help activist organizations spread their message? Or do they detract from their credibility? Click on the comments link below this post to share your thoughts.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals is finding out that supporters can also become critics when a nonprofit group makes it easy for outsiders to post comments on its Web site.

On Tuesday, the group’s director, Daphna Nachminovitch, posted a statement on the organization’s blog following the announcement that Michael Vick, an Atlanta Falcons quarterback, had been indicted on charges that he was overseeing a massive dog-fighting operation in Virginia.

The animal-rights organization has been largely subdued in its criticism of Mr. Vick. And some readers used the blog post as an opportunity to push PETA to be more vocal about Mr. Vick’s case.

“Why is this not plastered all over PETA’s homepage? When this first started in April I came to this site for more info and found nothing,” wrote one supporter, who identified himself only as Andy. “PETA, this is your opportunity to...

Two Canadian charities are taking steps to distance themselves from a company they had hired to conduct door-to-door fund-raising campaigns after a Toronto Star investigation found that the company was paying their fund raisers commissions based on how much they raised.

Sick Kids Foundation and World Vision Canada both admitted that they had hired the company — Fundraising Initiatives Inc.— and both told the newspaper that they were not aware that the company had been using a commission-based system.

Both charities dropped the company when they were confronted by the newspaper about the commissions.

Their responses have received mixed reviews.

“I’m disappointed both groups issued such weak responses without using this as an educational moment to discuss the need for cost-effective member- acquisition programs,” a anonymous blogger wrote on Don’t Tell The Donor, a blog about fund...