Promoting philanthropy

Abstract

Among other things, a user can navigate a database of philanthropic charities systematically to select a set of charities of interest, by interactively specifying in any order a succession of one or more (e.g., up to five) different criteria to narrow the selection from more general to more specific. A result of applying each of the criteria is displayed in real time to the user.

1 .- 29 . (canceled) 
     
     
         30 . A machine-implemented method comprising:
 maintaining a database of philanthropic charities in which each of the charities is represented by values for attributes, the attributes including fields and subfields in a systematic taxonomy for philanthropic charities, and other attributes, the attributes comprising values, the values of at least one of the attributes being organized in a hierarchy, and   exposing the database online to users to enable the users to select and alter the selection of sets of the charities of interest based on the attributes.   
     
     
         31 . The method of  claim 30  in which the database includes all charities of potential interest to online users. 
     
     
         32 . The method of  claim 30  comprising enabling the users to select and alter the selection by specifying values or ranges of values of the attributes. 
     
     
         33 . The method of  claim 30  in which the attributes include one or more of locale, revenue, age, people served, and field. 
     
     
         34 . The method of  claim 30  in which the philanthropic charities exclude nonprofit organizations that are not engaging in private initiatives for public good that focus on quality of life and depend on charitable donations. 
     
     
         35 . The method of  claim 30  in which the philanthropic charities comprise some but not all of the non-profit entities that are listed by the Internal Revenue Service as eligible for favorable tax treatment. 
     
     
         36 . A machine-implemented method comprising:
 deriving information about not-for-profit entities from tax filings;   based on the derived information, selecting a collection of the entities, the collection comprising only charitable and para-charitable entities; and   systematically organizing the information about the selected entities in the collection according to values of one or more attributes of the information.   
     
     
         37 . The method of  claim 36  in which the collection includes all charitable and para-charitable not-for-profit entities in a defined geographic region. 
     
     
         38 . The method of  claim 36  in which one value of each of the one or more attributes describes each entity. 
     
     
         39 . The method of  claim 36  in which the values of the one or more attributes are arranged in a hierarchy. 
     
     
         40 . The method of  claim 36  in which the collection is accessible on the Internet. 
     
     
         41 . The method of  claim 36  in which the tax filings comprise Internal Revenue Service tax filings. 
     
     
         42 . The method of  claim 36  in which the one or more attributes include one or more of locale, revenue, age, people served, and field. 
     
     
         43 . The machine-implemented method comprising:
 storing information about tax-exempt entities in a database;   maintaining in the database a subset of the information that excludes information about non-charitable entities;   systematically organizing the subset according to one or more attributes, the one or more attributes having values;   displaying the subset to a user; and   allowing the user to navigate the subset based on a selection of the values of the one or more attributes.   
     
     
         44 . The method of  claim 43  in which the subset includes information about all not-for-profit entities in a defined geographic locale. 
     
     
         45 . The method of  claim 43  in which the one or more attributes include one or more of locale, revenue, age, people served, and field. 
     
     
         46 . The method of  claim 43  in which the entities are identified from tax filings. 
     
     
         47 . The method of  claim 46  in which the tax filings comprise Internal Revenue Service tax filings. 
     
     
         48 . The method of  claim 43  in which one value of each of the one or more attributes describes each entity. 
     
     
         49 . The method of  claim 43  in which the values of one or more attributes are arranged in a hierarchy.