Kiva Blog
Join Kiva and Yoovolution in 3D!
We’re pleased to announce that Kiva’s President, Premal Shah, is teaming up with Yoovolution for a one-of-a kind event, the world’s largest professional and self development conference held entirely in a 3D virtual world. Together, we’re pushing the boundaries of online interaction and networking.
And, you’re invited to be a part of it!
This first ever event is open to the entire Kiva community and is not to be missed. You are on the threshold of a new world of social networking where connection and learning are unparalleled, enjoy!
In conjunction with this upcoming incredible virtual event with over 33 world-class speakers called Yoovolution, Premal will be sharing his insights on the future of micro lending, where Kiva is today, and how YOU can make a huge difference in the world ... all in a brand new virtual 3D environment - so you can enjoy it all from the comfort of your own home!
Kiva is one of the chosen charities to benefit from this event, so if you join us, you’ll be contributing to Kiva’s efforts as well.
Register for your free account now by clicking here!
We look forward to seeing you in 3D!
You are invited to Kiva's Fourth Birthday Party!
Join 4 community enterprises, Kiva, Hub Bay Area, GOOD Magazine and The David Brower Center, as we celebrate the remarkable achievement of 4 years and almost 100 million dollars in loans that Kiva has realized since its creation.
We're 4!
November 3, 2009
6:30pm - 9:30pm
The David Brower Center
2150 Allston Way
Berkeley, CA
Global Beats From Around The World
Baba Ken and the Afrobeat Connexion
Delicious Food Provided by Bay Area Favorites
and many more...
Drinks to Keep the Party Going
The Hub opened its' first US location in Berkeley, CA, joining a global network of 20 Hubs and 4500 social innovators around the Globe. Visit them in their new home at The David Brower Center, a platinum LEED certified building of 28 organizations focused on social innovation. We are also pleased to partner with GOOD Magazine, a catalyst for change through journalism and social media, to celebrate Kiva's 4th Birthday! Join us on November 3rd to learn more about how to join a Kiva lending group, jump onboard as a Hub member, and support the GOOD cause, all in the beautiful backdrop of The David Brower Center accompanied by hundreds of our closest friends!
Learn More About Us
Make sure to RSVP here as space is limited!
Stay Updated on Party News Through Facebook
Happy Hour in NYC this Thursday!
Calling all New Yorkers!
The Kiva New York Team is made up of Kiva lenders and volunteers, and they are hosting a happy hour event this week to bring together all lenders in the New York area. This event is open to anyone who is interested in learning more about Kiva, so share with your coworkers, friends and family in the area – they would love to meet them!
When: Thursday, October 15th (6-8:00pm)
Where: Revival Bar (near Union Square and subway lines 4, 5, 6, N, Q, R, W, L)
Visit their Facebook Invite: RSVP here!
Join the Kiva New York Lending Team to help raise awareness about Kiva. They hold monthly meetings to plan events and set goals for outreach in NYC. They’re interested in working with schools, colleges, and companies in the area, so visit their website here if you’re interested in having them help you set up an awareness event!
Visit their Kiva Lending Team page or check out their new website for more!
Live Love Lend - Party in Boston!
And, if you can't go to the event, but still want to help out, you can join the Lending Team called "Live. Love. Lend." All you have to do is go to the "community" tab, enter "Live. Love. Lend." in the search tab, join the team and start lending!
Come to Kiva's 4th Birthday Party!
In San Francisco we'll be celebrating this event by co-hosting a party at the Brower Center in Berkeley, CA, with The Hub Bay Area and GOOD Magazine. It'll be a chance for us to get together with members of the Kiva community - and the cool cats of GOOD and The Hub - to celebrate what Kiva has become over 4 years of work.
The party will be held in a few weeks (late October/early November), but although we haven't quite pinned down the date, we wanted to make sure you knew we have a celebration on the way. As soon as we have the details they will be shared here, on the Kiva Blog, so keep your eyes peeled as we will be asking guests to RSVP.
All four organizations are innovative models that have sprung from this same desire - that through collaboration we can create radical change! Together, we will share the underlying story of Kiva's milestone and the global inspiration it has created through pioneering community building for social change. YOU have played a critical role in helping to make this all possible and we're excited to celebrate with you! For those who are unable to physically attend our birthday party in Berkeley, but still wish to participate, we invite you to join our celebration in spirit on Facebook here!
Kiva staff 2006
Kiva staff 2009
Get your picture taken to support Kiva
Kiva Social in SF on 9/23
As of the 13th of September, Kiva Lenders have funded more than $91 million on Kiva. Now we need to countdown to $100 million! If you haven't already, make your guess here as to when Kiva will reach the $100 million mark. Or even better, attend our countdown party on Wednesday, Sept. 23rd.
And because one birthday party is never enough, we're also using this social as a pre-birthday party countdown. On October 8th, Kiva turns four, so join us two weeks before the big day to mark the event!
If you are in the San Francisco area, we'd love for you to join us as we celebrate all things Kiva and welcome in another class of Kiva Fellow trainees.
When: Wednesday, September 23rd at 6:30-9:30pm
Where: Circolo, 500 Florida Street at Mariposa, The Mission, San Francisco
Who: Kiva volunteers, supporters, lenders, staff, fellows, trainees, and friends
Why: What better way is there to celebrate two countdowns and a new Kiva Fellows class than to do so with the whole Kiva community?
SOCAP09: A Great Success!
Kiva Event tomorrow night in South Beach!
Yola matches your Kiva loans!
Thanks to Yola.com, Kiva will have a presence at SOCAP09 this week and we’re thrilled about the opportunity!
Kiva is proudly partnering with both Yola.com and ACCION USA to help talented entrepreneurs get online and grow their businesses. Since 2007, Yola has helped more than 2 million people build websites to grow their businesses and achieve their social goals. And now, with support from ACCION USA, Kiva entrepreneurs will benefit from their service! 
To celebrate this partnership, Yola will be matching all loans made on their Kiva Lending Team – up to $10,000 – between now and the end of SOCAP09 (Sept 1-3). And we want to invite you, as part of Kiva’s growing community, to take part in this matching program! Please go to yola.com/kiva.html to learn more.
For more information on the conference this week, check out the SOCAP09 website here.
Kiva Go Game For Good raises $1000 in London!
Thankfully, I hadn't just 'done a Ross', and even more thankfully, nor had I splashed out the extorionate amount of cash needed for a wedding in central London. I was in fact taking part in a Kiva fundraising event organised by The Go Game, a San Francisco based innovator in technology-driven teambuilding games.
On Saturday August 15th over forty people gathered in an (almost) secret location near Oxford Circus to take part in the game. Described only as a "hi-tech treasure hunt", attendees were eager to find out what they'd got themselves into. We were rewarded with a hilarious, fun, and surreal afternoon chasing through the busy streets solving puzzles, completing photo and video missions, talking to total strangers, singing to pirates, and chasing cows, brides, and fairies.
The event culminated in side-splitting video and photo presentation of the highlights of each team's efforts. Notable pant-wetting moments included a frankly scary reconstruction of the evolution of man in a city park, the best/worst chat up line of the day ("Do you like my t-shirt? Yes. Do you know what it's made of? No. It's made of boyfriend material"), a business model based on carrying members of the public across the street for a small fee, too many people in a phone box, human speedbumps, and a mad cow galavanting around the streets.
A huge thanks to everyone that took part, and special thanks to Mei and Chris at The Go Game for giving up their time and resources for free, and to the actors for forfeiting their dignity. Also thank you to Ahkun.org for shipping over some original Cambodian Kramas made by Kiva borrower Kakeda Sun to give out as prizes. A big apology to the man with the eyepatch who was unfortunate enough to be on the same street as our unidentified pirate actor.
The event raised $1000 for the Kiva Fellows Program and generated some great publicity. If you missed it, don't fret, just make sure you come along next time!
Kieran Ball (former Kiva Fellow)
Join Kiva at SOCAP09!
Social enterprise and innovation is on everyone's mind these days. The big question is how to figure out how to drive money towards it. Kiva was one of the first to bring attention to this trend and the SOCAP conference was the first of its kind to bring people together to talk about it.
SOCAP09 is a gathering of the world's top social innovators held on September 1-3rd, 2009 at The Fort Mason Center in San Francisco. Last year at SOCAP08, over 600 attendees from 26 countries came to discover the landscape of the social capital marketplace. This year, members of the administration and key players from the public and private sector will explore new strategies for success in the changing financial world. Premal Shah, Kiva’s President, is onboard to speak on a panel on "Community Driven Change."
Kiva is also linking up with Yola.com to serve as co-sponsors of the event. We're looking forward to the chance to participate in this conference for the second year running and hope to bring Kiva folks along.
And even better, there is a 30% discount for our networks using the code "KA30." So, register here by August 21st to take advantage of this offer! We hope to see you at SOCAP09!
Kiva Go Game Event in London!
Calling all Kivans in the UK!
The Go Game Event in SF was such a success that we’ve decided to host a similar event in a secret location near Leicester Square in Central London.
The more people that participate, the more money we can raise for Kiva, so help us tell all of your family and friends in the UK! It’s great fun for a great cause, and all profits go to the Kiva Fellows Program. We’re also celebrating the return to London of our friend Kieran Ball from his Kiva Fellow position in Cambodia!
What: Go Game for Good in support of Kiva
Where: Secret Location near Leicester Square
When: 2pm, Saturday, 15th August
Sign up now to create a team, join an existing team, or be placed on a team of other players. Once you’ve registered, you’ll receive an email a few days before the event with more details, including the secret starting location.
For additional information and registration, see here.
Spots are limited so sign up soon!
Paris Kiva Cup 2009
Over 200 people came out for the Kiva Cup in Paris on June 27th! We had volunteers from both Kiva Friends and the Kiva France Lending Team. The event was hosted by Les Condors 2000 and was considered such a success that the organizers have already reserved an even larger stadium in France for next year’s Kiva Cup! A huge congratulations goes out to the lead organizers for hosting such a wonderful event and Charlotte brings some of it to life for us here...
“The event was great! Everything went perfect: it was a warm day in a nice location, the soccer tournament was a lot of fun, and people enjoyed the music and drinks in the sun! We tried to make Kiva as visible as possible, with banners along the stadium and in the benches, and I set up a Kiva booth close to the bar with outreach materials in both French and English. We had a screen displaying short videos about Kiva and I set up my laptop to explain how to use the website. We also had a few T-shirts and a lot of stickers to increase Kiva brand-awareness. We are very excited for next year’s event, especially because we will have more time to organize it, and we plan to invite artists, singers and a lot of companies to support Kiva! We also plan to involve the three largest Parisian Business Schools because they each have a microfinance student group. Overall, we’re thrilled with the success and are already looking forward to next summer’s Kiva Cup!”
If this excites you and you’d like to be involved in helping to plan for an event, let us know! The Community Outreach Team is currently looking for star volunteers to host Kiva Awareness Events of different sizes and natures in their communities. Just e-mail kivacommunity@gmail.com for more information. Also, check out our calendar to see if there are any events coming soon near you.
Kiva + Atlanta + Picnic = FUN!
On Saturday, June 27th, Atlanta Kiva Lenders lending team proudly gathered for a picnic in a local park. In celebration of being one of the largest domestic “local area” lending teams on Kiva, dedicated Kiva lovers came together to socialize and set outreach goals for the future. The group had a raffle presenting the winner with a Kiva gift certificate and a special guest also joined them! Team captain, Liliane, wrote to us and explained:
"It was a beautiful, hot Atlanta day in the park and we had all come together to talk about Kiva! Many of our regular attendees, as well as some new lending team members joined us. It was exciting to meet a wide variety of Kiva lenders, with different backgrounds and varied skills sets. We discussed awareness events we might like to host in the late summer and early fall, when a number of festivals take place in Atlanta, as well as promotional products we might like to create, such as Kiva banners or T-shirts. And not surprisingly, all members enthusiastically vowed to double their recruitment efforts!
We were thrilled when a staff member from the Accion-USA Atlanta branch arrived! Jesse gave us a lot of insight into how things work at Accion-USA at both the client level and as an organization."
To check out the Atlanta team, see their Lending Team page or the Atlanta Team Facebook page.
This is yet another great example of a group of Kiva lenders who really care and who have figured out a way to use Kiva and its community to connect with people they otherwise might never have had the opportunity to meet!
If you would like to host an event with your lending team, or for people in your area that might not yet know about Kiva, let us know! We are looking for some spectacular volunteers who wish to help us raise awareness about Kiva in their communities around the globe! For more information or questions, contact us at kivacommunity@gmail.com and check the calendar for events near you!
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