Social Capital

Big Data and the Nonprofit Sector

February 1, 2013

Information for Impact CoverIn a new Aspen Institute report, entitled Information for Impact: Liberating Nonprofit Sector Data, authors Beth Novek and Daniel Goroff address the challenges of obtaining better, more usable data on the nonprofit sector to match the field’s growing importance in the US economy. Information for Impact, which was prepared for the Institute’s Program on Philanthropy and Social Innovation, details how information found in the Form 990, like other important data collected by the government, could potentially be far more useful if it were not only public but “open”—thus, searchable and interactive as opposed to the forms currently available as pictures that do not allow for easy data collection.

Watch the video below to see the authors as well as White House and philanthropy leaders talk about this groundbreaking research.

 

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Big Data and Nonprofit Sector

Discussion and report release on 1/31/13. Details here: http://www.aspeninstitute.org/events/2013/01/31/big-data-nonprofit-sector-liberating-data-impact

Storified by AspenInstitute· Fri, Feb 01 2013 06:30:45

Great to see this. RT @bethnoveck: Major foundations announce desire for irs to release their efiled data in bulk @AspenInstitute #990dataJacob Harold
I have longed believe we need a 3rd party platform-government can’t do it – Cindy Lott #mkts4good @aspeninstituteVictoria Vrana
The 990 isn’t everything – we should think broadly about a NPO portal that has all the information we need. #impactdreams @AspenInstituteMelanie Lei
@guidestar CEO and @fdncenter CTO @AspenInstitute talking about third party #opendata platform http://pic.twitter.com/NElVN74jBeth Simone Noveck
Instead of holding on to data – thinking about how to add more value – Danny Goroff @aspeninstitute @mkts4goodVictoria Vrana
New report from @AspenInstitute about IRS Form 990 data brain candy for all you datawonks http://bit.ly/UGIcYWCouncilofNonprofits