Social Entrepreneurialism
(a new form of microfinance, and social business making tools for everyone)

Selfport’s “social entrepreneurial tools” are set in a rich social network, and will offer a new form of microfinance, more like person-to-person micro-investment than micro-loans. It’s a for-profit (profitable philanthropy) business model designed to improve living standards anywhere in the world. 

The goal is to quicken the pace of socio-economic development, through making microfinance and social business more profitable and accessible to everyone.

I’ve been asked what an entrepreneurial tool is. One of the most famous entrepreneurial tools is eBay. Other examples include Skype with Paypal, Youtube’s partner program, blogging with adsense, Second Life, Zazzle, eMachineshop, to name a few. 

Kiva and Prosper allow interpersonal loans, but recipients still have to formulate a business, or use for those funds. Selfport will offer the tools to make businesses, so that more people can improve their circumstances with entrepreneurialism. These businesses could even be integrated with sites like Kiva and Prosper, to extend the scope of those services. The loan form of microfinance isn’t mutually exclusive from the new investment format Selfport offers.

Contests 
(people profiting through community made media)

One of the first entrepreneurial feature sets Selfport has rolled out is a subscription based contest platform. Entries include videos, writing, mp3s, etc. Businesses can directly sponsor (pay the subscription fee for) contestants, and pay incentives. Incentives, and mircro-payments for their entries, could be enough for contestants to live on. Other users can manage sponsorships, and get a percentage of the transaction. The percentages could become a full living.

This feature set is intended to make a community produced media/entertainment industry more profitable to more people. 

Community media makers can not only win money, but earn too, if they choose to make their content premium. Views then cost credits, a form of micro-payment. The reason this will work where other attempts at micro-payments for media have failed, is because credits are acquired by becoming an official “promoter” or “judge” of media. These are also contests, in which people can win and earn money for skillfully engaging with videos, music, writing, art, etc.

Contests can include music, dance, writing, graphics, reviews, documentaries, social businesses, green business and lifestyle, open mail (a feature that encourages people write to public figures or officials), broadcasts, educational videos… it is a long list.

Businesses can sponsor users on a local basis, so sponsorship works as a local form of advertisement, and sets the stage for many 1000s of people to win every month. And since players can win on a “most improved” basis, it levels the playing field…it is a meritocracy in which anyone can win. Anyone who wants to sing or dance or review restaurants or singers or whatever has the potential to win, and the motivation to play.
Social business contests

I want to emphasize the social business contest. Muhammad Yunus said for years he has been recommending contests of this sort. Using our locality based format, every city in the world could have dozens of social businesses, which could get promoted through our site, and supported through our sponsor tool, by conventional businesses, such as, say HP, or eBay.

Contestants, sponsors and managers get access to members-only wiki areas. In the case of social business, this works something like the services Endeavor or Ashoka offer, but is more open than the Ashoka fellowship program. In the case of, say, music, the members wiki offers services to help musicians advance their careers…some of which are tools that Selfport itself offers.

Other Entrepreneurial features
events
There are other entrepreneurial tools that are connected to the contest feature. For instance, events: users can create events for profit. Events can be of any sort, but by linking to the contests, users can spontaneously generate content. Again, events could make users a living wage…and help small venues too.

e-learning, teaching, consultation, etc.
There are various tools of this sort. Most important are e-learning and consultation tools, which also have applications for improving health care. These combined with our special rating system make a paradigm where education can become life-long, and knowledge can be a sort of commodity. 

NGO and government program integration
Existing non-profits, charities and government projects are integrated into Selfport with their own profiles. Our internal money system (integrated with Paypal) allows for convenient donations. Supported non-profits can show up in user galleries, which provides value to conventional business, as well as enhancing the visibility of the non-profit. 

NPO profiles increase transparency and public interaction with charitable projects. Non-profit projects again link to games, with contests for travel documentary makers, focused on non-profits or social businesses. 

Integration with the web 2.0 and mobile landscape, and other businesses

The Selfport model is interoperable with existing business in many ways. Many of our tools work as modules, which can also run on Facebook, Open Social, iPhones, etc. Businesses and users can make branded networks based on our software, similar to Ning, but with more profit components, and better integration with other networks. 

Existing businesses can own all or part of components such as contests (eg, social business/Ashoka, or Music /CD Baby, or Sony), which they can brand and even run at unique URLs. 

Scale

To give a sense of scale, since we are aiming to improve living standards for billions of people, 100 million would be a modest success. But if 100 million people each earned $10k average through Selfport, this would produce $30 billion in revenue, which could then be recycled through our platform to expand and offer opportunity to more people.