# Google offers $10 million to fund five good ideas to change the world - Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2008/09/29/google-offers-10-million-fund-five-good-ideas-change-world/ - Published: 2008-09-29T15:14:16+01:00 - Author: Howard Lake ![](https://www.fundraising.co.uk/files/images/news/Google_project_10_100_1222701221. gif) Google is offering up to $10 million to finance new ideas that will “change the world by helping as many people as possible.” Project 10^(100) is Google’s way of celebrating its 10th anniversary. The competition is open only to individuals but you can submit on idea on behalf of your company, charity or organisation. Google points out, however, that it can’t guarantee that the organisation will be selected to implement the idea if it is chosen. The [Google Blog suggests](http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/09/project-10100.html )“ Maybe the answer that helps somebody is in your head, in something you’ve observed, some notion that you’ve been fiddling with, some small connection you’ve noticed, some old way of doing something that you’ve seen with new eyes”. The competition offers a great opportunity for publicising a charity and its ideas. Broadcaster [CNN will be covering the project](http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2007/impact), including profiles of ideas and the people who submit them from around the world. Categories in the competition include community, opportunity, energy, environment, health and shelter. Ideas must be submitted by 20 October 2008. The public will be invited to vote on the shortlisted ideas from 27 January 2009 and Google will fund up to five ideas. www.project10tothe100.com * **[Knight News Challenge offers $5 million for digital community development](https://fundraising.co.uk/2008/10/03/knight-news-challenge-offers-5m-digital-community-development/)**( 3 October 2008) * **[SYFAB's digital makeover – September 2008 update](https://fundraising.co.uk/2008/10/03/syfab039s-digital-makeover-september-2008-update/)**( 3 October 2008) * **[A Guide to Local Trusts in the South of England](https://fundraising.co.uk/2008/10/12/amazon-241/)**( 12 October 2008) ## Comments ### By: admin - Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2008/09/29/google-offers-10-million-fund-five-good-ideas-change-world/#comment-3289 - Published: 2008-10-20T16:01:57+01:00 I’ve just posted my own idea to Google’s Project 10\. It’s one that I’ve sat on for 10 years. I tried to get one US children’s charity involved at the time but they didn’t bite. Let’s hope Google does. ### By: admin - Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2008/09/29/google-offers-10-million-fund-five-good-ideas-change-world/#comment-3290 - Published: 2009-01-21T09:44:38+00:00 Google has received over 100,000 ideas for its Project 10 initiative. Public voting on a selection of one hundred ideas will open on 27 January 2009, to narrow the ideas down to 20\. An advisory board will then select up to five final ideas. You can currently sign up now to receive a reminder email when it is time to vote. ### By: admin - Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2008/09/29/google-offers-10-million-fund-five-good-ideas-change-world/#comment-3291 - Published: 2009-01-28T11:38:59+00:00 Voting did not go live yesterday as expected. Google now says that the 100 top ideas will be announced on 17 March 2009 when public voting will open. ### By: admin - Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2008/09/29/google-offers-10-million-fund-five-good-ideas-change-world/#comment-3292 - Published: 2009-03-17T12:14:08+00:00 No sign of any announcements yesterday from Google. The current holding message says: “Due to the enthusiastic response we received, it’s taking us longer than we expected to review all the ideas. Check back later, or sign-up to receive an email update when we’ve announced the top ideas”. ### By: johnthompson - Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2008/09/29/google-offers-10-million-fund-five-good-ideas-change-world/#comment-3293 - Published: 2009-03-17T21:28:15+00:00 I wonder if the delay is more to do with Larry Brilliant recently announcing that he was stepping down and signalling that “Google might curtail its financing of nonprofit groups unless they are closely aligned with Google projects.”? [http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/24/technology/companies/24google.html?ref=business](http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/24/technology/companies/24google.html?ref=business) [http://www.changingbusiness.com](http://www.changingbusiness.com) Change today for a better tomorrow ### By: johnthompson - Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2008/09/29/google-offers-10-million-fund-five-good-ideas-change-world/#comment-3294 - Published: 2009-09-08T16:36:54+01:00 Looks like Google will move to the next phase of its Project 10 programme next month. The reason given for the delay on this is that had 150,000 responses! [http://news.zdnet.co.uk/internet/0,1000000097,39720792,00.htm](http://news.zdnet.co.uk/internet/0,1000000097,39720792,00.htm) [http://www.changingbusiness.com](http://www.changingbusiness.com) Change today for a better tomorrow ### By: johnthompson - Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2008/09/29/google-offers-10-million-fund-five-good-ideas-change-world/#comment-3295 - Published: 2009-09-08T16:49:24+01:00 Actually, it should be anytime NOW as the article I linked to was nearly a month old. [http://news.zdnet.co.uk/internet/0,1000000097,39720792,00.htm](http://news.zdnet.co.uk/internet/0,1000000097,39720792,00.htm) [http://www.changingbusiness.com](http://www.changingbusiness.com) Change today for a better tomorrow ### By: johnthompson - Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2008/09/29/google-offers-10-million-fund-five-good-ideas-change-world/#comment-3296 - Published: 2009-09-27T13:26:57+01:00 Well, Google has finally whittled down 150,000 submissions to sixteen "BIG Ideas" and is asking the public to help it decide which five it should fund by voting for their favourite by 8th October. Broad concepts include: "Work toward socially conscious tax policies", "Encourage positive media depictions of engineers and scientists" and "Make government more transparent". [http://www.project10tothe100.com/vote.html](http://www.project10tothe100.com/vote.html) [http://www.project10tothe100.com/](http://www.project10tothe100.com/) [http://www.changingbusiness.com](http://www.changingbusiness.com) Change today for a better tomorrow ### By: admin - Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2008/09/29/google-offers-10-million-fund-five-good-ideas-change-world/#comment-3297 - Published: 2009-09-27T15:34:03+01:00 Nice to see that Google has finally put the successful submissions to the public vote, six months after the last deadline it gave itself to do so (which itself was put back at least once). But, as [Simon Berry at Colalife](http://www.colalife.org/2009/09/24/google-back-off-from-original-vision/) points out: “Project 10 to the 100th has morphed. It’s not going to give 100 individual and amazing ideas the oxygen of publicity they need to become a reality. Perhaps that notion was just too innovative and too ambitious. It looks like we’re going to get a modest amount of additional funding with the traditional four or five key themes that existing organisations will bid for.” In other words, a major funding initiative has changed the rules after the closing date for entries, and it has taken six months to let bidders find out. I’d say it has caused a great deal of distraction to a lot of initiatives. Simon Berry concludes: “It turns out that Project 10^100 has been a bit of a distraction for ColaLife. We now need to move on and vigorously explore other options to make our idea a reality”. ### By: johnthompson - Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2008/09/29/google-offers-10-million-fund-five-good-ideas-change-world/#comment-3298 - Published: 2009-09-28T07:54:24+01:00 Looks like the posts may have been subtly moved to meet corporate goals after all. There does seem to be some “bending”, so some might see this as a kick in the teeth, others as “this is not what we thought is was going to be” and a few as “this is a classic example of late-onset-enlightened-self-interest.” As I said earlier in the year though: “I wonder if the delay is more to do with Larry Brilliant recently announcing that he was stepping down and signalling that “Google might curtail its financing of nonprofit groups unless they are closely aligned with Google projects.” If you look at the broad headings, many are very software, web-based…as are many of the published idea-snippets that gave rise to them. Very Googlish on the whole and it will be interesting to see the outcome of the voting. [http://www.changingbusiness.com](http://www.changingbusiness.com) Change today for a better tomorrow ### By: admin - Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2008/09/29/google-offers-10-million-fund-five-good-ideas-change-world/#comment-3299 - Published: 2010-09-24T17:06:55+01:00 It’s taken quite a bit longer but finally we have the five winners. The five winning organisations in the categories are: Make educational content available online for free [The Khan Academy](http://khanacademy.org/) Enhance science and engineering education [FIRST](http://www.usfirst.org/) Make government more transparent [Public.Resource.Org](http://public.resource.org/) Drive innovation in public transport [Shweeb](http://shweeb.com/) Provide quality education to African students [African Institute for Mathematical Sciences](http://www.aims.ac.za/) [http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/09/10-million-for-project-10100-winners.html](http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/09/10-million-for-project-10100-winners.html)