Thousands of non-profit organizations exist, and if you’ve ever tried to find one that you’re interested in you’ll know how much of a challenge it can be. Luckily, using an algorithm called Eigentaste, University of Berkeley researchers want to make it a little bit easier.

The site is called Donation Dashboard and it is exactly that. You start off by rating a small number of non-for-profits and once it has an idea of your “tastes” it presents you with a portfolio of causes that you might be interested in. The service covers four major aggregators and has 70 non-profit institutes ranging from the Red Cross to the NRA.

Eigentaste

Eigentaste uses the same basic principles that are used by sites like Amazon to recommend music and movies. This is a really powerful idea. The web has made it really easy for organization to create “false fronts.” By giving people the power to help filter the noise, systems like this could substantially decrease the amount of fraud and help legitimate organizations receive the help that they need.

(Image) (News Room)