THE BIG BAD NEWS: I can sing a few songs about this. The Freecycle Network is a beautiful "new thing" which is growing like crazy (2300% in our first year). We've been around for a little over two years and we have nearly 1.8 millions members in over 50 countries of the world. In setting this up I vowed that this must be entirely nonprofit and not beholden to investors, etc. And, indeed, we are a nonprofit organization which is great - but it danged near cost me my entire retirement savings and the good will of some close friends and my wife to get there. Because we are some odd new "internet thing" the IRS 501c3 status has been pending for 1 1/2 years!! We can barely pay for bandwidth, let alone new website design. How does one fund social change on the scale of The Freecycle Network which grew huge overnight without being beholden to investors, advertising and consumption (we're about recycling and reuse after all)? We can't get grants and tax-deductible donations because we don't have the 501c3 yet. The snail world doesn't move as quickly as the internet.  This is a HUGE issue. We've been voted to PC Mag's Top 101 sites this month, but have no access to funding. There needs to be something akin to venture capitalists willing to fund ideas that they think will prosper, *up front*, but not for monetary capital gains but rather for social capital gains. What we need is a Social Venture Capital Fund. Social Venture Capitalists, where are you? Is it a new form of foundation? Is it a for-profit / nonprofit hybrid venture? Is it a Social Venture Capital Group funded by venture capitalists as a good deed? How do we get funding into darned good deeds on line up front? Maybe It is a nonprofit org itself that channels funds thru their 501c3 to startups?  I don't know the answer, but I do know the question.