A long time ago, I read Thomas Friedman's "Lexus and the Olive Tree".

He describes the Electronic Herd as millions of people "sitting behind computer screens all over the globe, moving their money around with the click of a mouse." He talks about how the herd can literally transform economies overnight -- from distant computer screens in cubicles and basements around the globe.

Next week, it is likely that Kiva will be featured in both the Wall Street Journal and on a segment on BBC radio. Listen, Kiva cannot scale fast enough to handle the oncoming herd. We WILL scale to meet the demand, but not at the pace that modern technology has demanded.

So I will sit behind this screen and face the herd. Wish me luck.

I've been out in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania now for almost a week. I find myself spending every other Christmas and every other Thanksgiving in Pittsburgh since I got married. One of the best things I get to do when I come out is to visit Sandra (Mom) Jackley's first grade classroom.

This year I was here for the last school day of the year so we got to have an assembly. We all sat down and obediently sang to the tune of the music teacher's animated powerpoint presentation. It's amazing how well elementary kids can sit up straight on hard gym floors for long periods of time. I remember doing that. It's also amazing how well they all sing together. I detected no inhibition and no attitude from the near 200 suburban Pittsburgh 1-3 graders on the floor.

We sang a few secular Christmas carols, then a Hanukah song and then....a Kwanzaa song. I had never sung a Kwanzaa song, but these kids had. In fact, they all seemed very well acquainted with Kwanzaa. Segueing from Christmas to Hanukah to Kwanzaa was effortless in that gym of 200 (mostly Caucasian) kids.

As a suburban 1-3 grader of the 1980's, Kwanzaa songs never reached my elementary school. In fact, Kwanzaa never hit any of my schools up until college at Stanford in the late nineties. I have reached this point in my life knowing little about Kwanzaa. Lately, in an effort to relate better to Africans, I’ve tried to learn more about anything African that I find.

I showed my ignorance on a phone call two nights ago with Moses who lives in Uganda. I thought maybe that Kwanzaa was widely celebrated in Africa. Apparently, as I have learned, this is not really the case. Kwanzaa is mostly celebrated by African Americans and other Africans who do not live in Africa. We were in the middle of talking about Christmas and how his family celebrates it. He was telling me that his family goes out to an adjacent rural village and has a feast with many relatives all together.

Then I asked him, "And do you celebrate Kwanzaa?"

"Kwanza?", he replied.

"Yes, Kwanzaa, the holiday?" I said.

"Yes, Matt. Kwanza is, you know, the first time. When you celebrate a kwanza, you are celebrating the first of something."

It became very clear after talking more that Moses' Kwanza was very different than the Kwanzaa I was talking about. He was talking about the Swahili word “Kwanza” which means “First”.

Then I told Moses, as I was reading about Kwanzaa on the internet. "In America, Kwanzaa is a holiday celebrated by African Americans to celebrate African Unity and cooperation. It is also to remember the oppression suffered by millions of Africans over many centuries."

"Ok, Matt, this is a very good holiday then. Let us celebrate Kwanzaa this year then together." He responded.

I instantly agreed and I am, as we speak, celebrating a modified Kwanzaa. Let me tell you though, that it is difficult to properly celebrate Kwanzaa unless you know where to look. This website has good instructions on how to prepare for Kwanzaa. If you start late, as I did, it is not easy. I am not trying to do everything perfect. In fact, I am just trying to do the candle ceremony. Even this, I have found out, is not easy to prepare.

The site says that the Kwanzaa candle ceremony calls for "seven candles, one black, three red, and three green". The problem here is the black candle. Ever try to find a black candle in the suburbs? Name a chain store and I bet they don't have a black candle. I even tried Michaels and JoAnn Fabrics. Each store had TONS of candles -- none of them black. The closest they had was the dark blue “Moonlight Musk”.

The staff at Michael's showed me how I could make my own black candle by buying a brick of wax, a mold, a wick and some dye. I decided just to cover one of my other candles with black clay they sold me. The absence of black candles in any major store makes me wonder though: How do most people celebrate Kwanzaa in this country? Do people have to just go to Afro-centric stores? Do the chain stores in other (more diverse) neighborhoods carry different colors of candles? Do people, like me, make their own black candles? Do they order online?

Whatever holiday you are celebrating, have a good one.

I burned through about 10 of these cards in the month before I went to Africa. When I got back, I stumbled onto something more affordable: UnionTelecard.com . UnionTelecard.com effectively ended my hobby of card collecting. With its simple web-based shopping cart and rock bottom prices, it just didn't make sense to go looking for zebra cards -- no matter how pretty they were. UnionTelecard.com changed the way I communicated with Africa.

When I returned from the trip I had a new hobby -- I spent every night writing PHP code in my bedroom. I was trying to create a little website that would enable me and my friends to lend to some of the business people Jessica and I got to visit in both Kenya and Tanzania. We had visited a random subset of the businesses started by VEF and it seemed like *every* one of them was an incredible success. I sat in these interviews, often in mud huts. Jess had several metrics she used to judge a business' success. Did the business still exist? Did the entrepreneur keep a savings account? Did the entrepreneur take sugar with her tea? I couldn't seem to find a catch. Helping people start businesses was just working.

So I got home and talked about the idea with David. David was quite a hacker himself. Each night David would stay up late helping me make a PHP/MySQL system like we use on Kiva.org. It's not rocket science, but it was my first web app. I had been programming for TV up until that point in my life. I made the app pretty fast, but it would be a year before we actually used it. It seemed like there were so many hoops to jump through to do something that was so simple at first. I just wanted to loan to some of the people we had met and document it online.

The biggest worry? Legal concerns. When Jessica came back we started setting up meetings with lawyers. This was a smart thing to do, but man was it deflating! Here are some examples of what we heard "You can't just let people loan on the internet!" and "Why don't you just go talk to the Google guys and get money from them?" and "Why don't you go work for someone like the Red Cross?" and the more usual "This just sounds really complicated."

If I had to do it all over again, I would have just started. This blog is definitely not about advice, but here is some anyway. If you have an idea you are passionate about, just try to start now. You will learn so much more from trial and error than by getting permission from everyone you know. Try and readjust. If you are doing something truly new, you will never be able to figure it all out before you start. I've learned more in the last three months than I had in a year and a half before that time.

Jess and I got married in August 2003. Before that, we took a 13 week pre-engagement class at our church. Yes, that's right. 13 weeks. This wasn't even for marriage, this was just for engagement. Did we learn much? Yes. Did we follow all of the instructions? No.

One of the things they make you do is talk about things. The obvious things, the big things like kids, money, family, and well, you know. We scored pretty well on our "tests" -- pretty well.

There were, however, a few concerns. We had this workbook. It was pastel green and pink and had pictures of happy couples on the front and childish cartoons throughout. I think it had a chapter named "Life Goals". Hitting this chapter about midway through the course was like hitting a fence. We had to answer all of these questions and write the answers in the workbook. This week, we had the question: "What are your Career Goals?

Matt 's Answer: I want to live in the Bay Area and work for high tech startups.
Jessica's Answer: I want to go to Africa and do micro-finance.

Ouch. That seems like a pretty big disconnect. You can imagine the concerned look of our classmates after our presentation. Hadn't you guys worked this out yet? Despite this eyesore, we passed the class and had a great engagement.

Fast-forward to Feb 2004 -- 6 months after the wedding.

I am living in Noe Valley. My flat-mate is this cool guy David who I met on craigslist. He smokes in the backyard each night and we talk about Burning Man. I'm subletting our guestroom to him for three months. Where is Jess? In Africa doing microfinance. Where am I? In the Bay Area working for a high-tech startup. D'Oh!

Another thing that pastel book tells you is to "Spend as much time together as you can during the first year of marriage." On this point, we weren't doing the best job at the moment. Certainly, Jessica's 3 month trip to East Africa wasn't the kind of thing suggested by the book. I was going to join her for about a month -- the middle month. So I had these one-month bookends to hang out in San Francisco and talk about neon-light installation art with David. It was like nothing had changed.

What did I do? I walked around a lot. I thought about Jessica, I missed her. I found myself trolling liquor stores in the Mission. It's not what you think. I was looking for PHONE CARDS. I became a phone card expert. These are the cards they sell behind the counter next to the bad magazines. You can find them in the Mission because that is where the immigrants are.

Each phone card is different. Some have connections fees, some have disconnection fees. Some charge by the minute, some charge by the 5 minute chunk. They all try to rip you off in some way and offer rates which turn out to be HALF of the real cost. Some work especially well for Africa, but most don't. You have to read the fine print. One thing they all have in common -- cool pictures. The Africa one's are especially cool. They got zebra cards, rhino cards and pretty much any big game animal card you can think of. I collected them like baseball cards.

And then, after I picked up the best card, I would call Jessica on the walk home through the Mission. This was a great feeling. Like a prize for finding the best card at the best liquor store, I got to talk to Jessica for a sizeable amount of time. As I walked down Valencia Street, I would hear sounds of sirens (in my neighborhood) juxtaposed with the sounds of roosters (in her neighborhood). I wonder what was louder -- nighttime in the Mission or morning in rural Kenya? Both can be loud.

1) New Businesses/New Regions

Village Enterprise Fund has posted new businesses in Dodoma, Tanzania and Kakamega, Kenya. They went up last Thursday night late. I intended to send out a general announcement to the new Kiva users, but stopped myself after seeing they we mostly all funded in less than a day. I guess I will save that announcement. Rowland Amulyoto is overseeing the VEF loan operation in Kenya and Richard Mazengo is doing so in Tanzania. Rowland is the former marketing manager for Kenya Breweries and Richard is an esteemed Pastor in Dodoma.

2) WSJ Interview

I had my biggest interview to date, the Wall Street Journal. Maybe I will see myself drawn in pencil?. Nope, I don't think so. They said I was one of 13 people interviewed for this article and have a good chance of not getting in it at all. Oh well, I'm not sure what Kiva would be able to do if we got in the WSJ soon anyway.

3) Kiva Gift Cards

Why wasn't I blogging last week? I was making the gift card feature. More complicated than I first thought...

4) Beta Round of Loans is Over

Jessica and I first started Kiva with seven businesses in Tororo. Yesterday, they all paid off their loans. I want to congratulate : Justine Onyango, Geoffrey Obanja Jasu, Apollo Olweny , Eunice Oyuk, Christine Awora , Elizabeth Omalla and Rose Athieno . It will be interesting to see what the Kiva beta round lenders decide to do with the repaid money.

There has been a power outage in Uganda which has delayed a Kiva announcement for a few days. Right now, they could really use this.

For two years I took the TiVo shuttle from the Caltrain on my long trek from Noe Valley to beautiful Alviso, California. As of recently, those days are behind me.

I developed a lively relationship with the TiVo shuttle driver, Marty. He listens to a lot of talk radio and would punctuate a point with an upward pointed index finger and a call to "read between the lines Matthew!". He's older than me and speaks with authority. We fought a lot -- and the drubbing noise of Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage and Bill O'Reilly provided the perfect soundtrack. I'm sure the other shuttle riders loved hearing this chorus.

One term I heard a lot, from both Marty and the radio hosts, was "bleeding heart liberal". From many folks, I've learned that this is something you definitely don't want to be. If you are, you should downplay it -- especially in the micro-finance world. You need to be doing this for better reasons than a simple bleeding heart. People with good intentions have made so many mistakes. The landscape is littered with projects that sprung from bleeding hearts. It is with fear, then, that I wonder if I might possibly be one.

I'm a novice -- on so many levels. I was in Africa for three weeks. I am not an expert in Micro-finance. I don't have an MBA and I glaze over once talk turns to currency risk and waterfall debt. I am not competing with you if you are playing the game of who knows more about this industry. You win. If you took the time to find this blog, you probably know more.

So here I find myself dedicating my career to this concept. It has all been a blur since that time. So right now I find myself trying to put together the pieces. What just happened? Am I doing this for the wrong (stupid liberal) reasons? I think there is a section on our website about how we started. Maybe I will check that out...

Upon reflection, I think it has a lot to do with connecting people and crossing a boundary. It was thrilling for me to connect to small business people in Africa and realize that their stories were very similar to people I know. It was also shocking to hear success story after success story -- I wasn't necessarily prepared for that. Lastly, it was fascinating to see that the marketplace there is much like here, but a lot less efficient and lacking infrastructure. It was the similarities that got me interested.

Then I guess there are the huge disparities which made the similarities all the more striking. One day in Tanzania, Jessica and I were driving past a hillside filled with maybe 100 workers squatting on the rough terrain. When we got out of the car we realized they were all crushing rocks with hand tools to make gravel. Wow. All day every day, just crushing rocks by hand. I have never shaken a more callused hand in my life. Can you imagine what would happen if someone pulled up to that hill with a rock crushing machine? How much does such a machine cost? Certainly less than a few months of the combined labor of 100 workers.

I don't know where my efforts will lead me. I hear from naysayers most every day. I've heard dissenting voices frequently for 2 years. I hear your arguments and I understand them. I hear how you would do it differently and sometimes it makes great sense. Also, I see how there are a handful of related startups coming out in 2006 and I wish them all good luck. May we all succeed.

Finally, I admit it. This is a decision I made mostly with my (bleeding?) heart.

I've been having occasional sporadic communication with Christina Riechers, a Stanford grad who now is working for Village Enterprise Fund (VEF). Village Enterprise Fund is Kiva's first partner -- an organization on the ground working with us to conduct loans in Africa. I can pretty much say I am in awe of the work Christina is doing. After graduating from Stanford, Christina decided she wanted to spend a year in Tanzania evaluating the effectiveness of VEF's work there. Not your average path to say the least.

What has she been up to? Christina has been tracking down many of the businesses funded by VEF in Tanzania and conducting detailed interviews. This is similar to the work Jessica did two years ago. VEF has been around for 15 years and has started over 9,000 businesses (primarily through grants), so to effectively evaluate these businesses, she must track down a random subset. Many times this means venturing out to very remote areas and looking for people who have no permanent address. Having just a name, you can imagine this takes a lot of asking around.

In October, Jessica and I heard this from Christina through an email forwarded by Brian Lehnen:

"...although Tz (Tanzania) data will still be flowing in for a bit, here's a piece of excellent—amazing, really—news: of the 71 businesses we've interviewed thus far, NONE have failed. Some have changed businesses when they saw their first or second wasn't profitable,but all are continuing in some manner!!!"

I think the reaction of everyone within VEF was that it is amazing to get a quantitative, independent proof of something we have already seen: small business formation truly works in East Africa.

Today I got another message from Christina:

"I just wanted to send you a quick note to let you know that we've just finished up 3 wonderful days of VFC training here in Dodoma with all of the East African VFCs! This morning Pastor Onyango made a presentation to them about Kiva, and encouraged them to start looking amongst their businesses to find ones that perhaps would be ready to take out a Kiva loan. They were excited about Kiva, and are looking forward to finding out more as it's structure unfolds and playing a role in Kiva's entrance in East Africa! I must go at the moment, but wanted to let you know that all is well and your army of supporters has just multiplied over here!"

To clarify, a VFC is a "volunteer field coordinator" for VEF. VEF is able to make an incredible impact in communities through the work of hundreds of VFCs. When I first went to Africa it struck me as interesting, that, in such poor areas, volunteerism is so strong. However, what I learned was that, especially in rural impoverished areas, community involvement is very strong. Volunteerism is a natural extension of that. As Kiva begins to work with VEF in countries outside of Uganda, it will continue to benefit from the enormous network of volunteers that VEF has created over a 15 year period.

Thanks Christina.

I used to think blogging was a tool best used in the Doogie Howser way. For those unfamiliar with Doogie, he was a child genius/doctor in the early nineties who had his own show. He was quite a reflective boy and ended every episode with a touching text comment on his computer.

For Doogie, blogging was a nice thing to do after being betrayed by his girlfriend Wanda -- or when he had a hard day and had to drill a hole in his friend's head at a ski trip. Doogie would sort through his problems and post his insights onto the blue screen. He didn't have a nice text editor (or even Windows), but he didn't need it. The kid was a BOY GENIUS.

Unlike Doogie, for a long time I ignored the art and science of blogging. I was either too proud or scared to try it, and admit I was a little skeptical - even jealous? - of those who had mastered it. This all changed in late October 2005.

As some have heard, last month I was hit over the head with that blunt object called the blogosphere. For a few days I walked around in a daze, needing someone like Doogie to relieve the mounting pressure in my cranium. I had to quit my job it got so bad. Now you will find me at a cafe drinking Coronas or coffee, depending what time of day. I might be there ALL day.

Let me say thank you to all the writers who have so thoroughly discussed Kiva. Your thoughts have been inspiring and your imaginations have wandered places we did not anticipate. We have learned a lot from you and reading your blogs has been important to us -- both here and in Africa. I now see blogging for what it is -- a powerful weapon that can wield enormous change. Sometimes getting hit over the head can be a good thing.

Lastly, I maintained a partial list of the blogs and am listing them below. These are the ones I found in an hour search, although there are probably twice as many out there.

www.worldchanging.com
psdblog.worldbank.org/psdblog/
www.nextbillion.net
www.xigi.net
boingboing.net
www.dailyKos.com
www.eurotrib.com
www.solutionsmag.net
sauntering.blogspot.com
sethgodin.typepad.com
www.larw.com
extempore.livejournal.com/friends
www.brianbaute.com
bohellz.blogspot.com
www.marginalrevolution.com
fjarlq.livejournal.com/friends
antoniofumero.blogspot.com
www.peacockcapital.com/blog
www.jonessoda.com/main.html
www.godspeedcomputing.com
www.entrepreneur.com/blog/0,6834,,00.html
www.mfisn.com
www.poil.ca
catless.ncl.ac.uk/bifurcated/rivets/
weblog.sinteur.com
www.bubblegeneration.com
www.greensboro101.com/localblogs.php
www.myleftwing.com/showDiary.do
catless.ncl.ac.uk/bifurcated/rivets
www.hotsaucelive.com
blog.thylmann.net/2005/10/kiva_the_africa.html
businessworks.ideologicllc.com/
dignifieddevil.blogspot.com/
www.treehugger.com/files
www.businessbricks.co.uk/
eventsmedia.blogspot.com/
www.tobiasbuckell.com/
blahsploitation.blogspot.com/
awilum.com/?p=37
www.licquia.org/
www.brainfuel.tv/
www.canopyblog.com/
audiovisualvision.blogspot.com/
grahamglass.blogs.com/
dignifieddevil.wordpress.com/
pandemicsoul.com/blog/?p=63
mbwana.blogspot.com
leftinthewest.com
spaces.msn.com/members/myelectricmayhem/
mathewgross.com/community
sonipitts.blogdrive.com/
www.personal-loan-blog.com
deed.squarespace.com/the-digest/
www.kn.com.au/networks/
www.blog.thesietch.org
theescape.typepad.com/escapees/
whywy.blogspot.com
posteverything.blogspot.com
makingmoneyontheinternet.creditcardmoney.net/
spaces.msn.com/members/MoooonRiver/
www.boosman.com/blog/
ming.tv/
bizzbangbuzz.blogspot.com
shetterly.blogspot.com
community.cerado.com
www.business-opportunities.biz
www.licquia.org
www.corprew.org
enrevanche.blogspot.com
yourleaders.org
nostarwhere.blogspot.com
www.livejournal.com/users/sophy/
againstthegrain.blogs.com/ttsu/
firepoll.typepad.com/fireblog/
wetware.blogspot.com
bambitroll.blogspot.com
nomadlife.org
www.bertramonline.com/
andthennothing.net/
www.newswire.poormojo.org/
weblog.randomchaos.com/
spaces.msn.com/members/checkraise/
www.worldtrans.org/
businessknowledgesource.com/businessnews/
brokekid.net
www.juicydlinks.com
livinginmonrovia.blogspot.com
culturalcanaries.blogspot.com
ayanaf.blogspot.com
www.yeaton.net/
www.ruk.ca
oraibi.blogspot.com
www.livejournal.com/community/__whatnow__
wandering-woman.blogspot.co
www.jacobgrier.com/blog
temp.starklawlibrary.org/blog/
walkereconomics.blogspot.com
blockzone.blogspot.com
www.spirithouse.com.au/spiritblog
plasticsnow.blogspot.com
theobvious.typepad.com/blog/
www.moleskinerie.com/
www.livejournal.com/users/foobarintel/
www.canopyblog.com/projectcanopy/
loan-mortgage-blog.info
www.nerdshit.com/wordpress
therealslingsandarrows.blogspot.com
www.livejournal.com/users/sari_sweets19/
mortgagediscover.com/moneyloans
relaxedfocus.blogspot.com
kmblogs.com/public/blog/85436
homeschoolresource.blogspot.com
www.personal-loan-blog.com
www.livejournal.com/users/aimeegee/
pandemicsoul.com/blog
www.livejournal.com/users/noumignon/
www.kenyanpundit.com
www.socio-kybernetics.net/saurierduval/
blogboing.com/index.php
smlpr.blogspot.com
mathewgross.com/community
monassar.blogspot.com
colinstalkback.blogspot.com
snarkmarket.com/blog/
www.livejournal.com/users/zoarre/
leads-blog.com/genealogy-leads
www.thelodown.org
www.pamrentz.com/index.html
rakingleaves.blogspot.com
beyondbricks.ecademy.com/module.php?mod=blog
ecademy.com/module.php?mod=blog
1ntr0sp3ct.blogspot.com
saelaenc.blogsome.com
www.kn.com.au/networks/
www.livejournal.com/users/jeerudoesntknow/
complicationsensue.blogspot.com
theescape.typepad.com/escapees/
www.livejournal.com/users/kimbellina/
plusnine.twoday.net/
phlipsrants.blogspot.com
orangefinance.blogspot.com
blogs.salon.com
www.cmdr-fire.co.uk/blog
complicationsensue.blogspot.com
phlipsrants.blogspot.com
houshuang.org/blog
spaces.msn.com/members/myelectricmayhem/
audiovisualvision.blogspot.com

"And Matt, one day you may want to leave YOUR responsibilities to work on Kiva full-time," said Moses on this very same phone call.

Now this caused me to panic. Never had I been called out like this to make a sacrifice of such magnitude. I can't quit. Not now!

It happened. Last week I resigned from my day job at TiVo to take Kiva to the next level. The closest thing I have ever felt to this (although different in many ways) was the feeling I got when Jessica and I decided to get married -- stepping into a void of committment and surrender.

The same pattern emerged in both decisions -- I was struck with a deep sense of rightness about a version of the future but couldn't step up to the committment at first. Then, later, in a moment of weakness I admitted to myself what I had gotten into and jumped.

I know that getting married to Jessica was the best decision I have ever made.

I spent today at the UN in NYC, at the "Year of Micro-Credit" Forum. Quite an experience for a chap like me. Here are some highlights:

Paul Wolfowitz: Finance is a private sector activity. Micro-Finance, as part of this, should be primarily a task of the private sector.

Simon Willis of Cisco: Virtual Collateral is an important idea in Micro-Finance (not the name of the next Hollywood sci-fi thriller). It is the idea that by simply tracking loan recipients, you are creating a situation where they have something to lose -- their reputation. Maintaining a record of identity is now within our grasp. He also adds that "Money transfer is just another form of information transfer."

There are thousands of MFIs (Micro-Finance Institutions) out there. Only a small handful have a credit history that qualifies them for true investment capital. The rest demand subsidies from aid organizations. This raises the question, how do we address the needs of Micro-Credit organsizations who have no credit?

The 100 million offered by the Omidyar family for Micro-Finance is 40% more capital than has ever been raised for Micro-Finance investment in all of history. This is causing major waves and more investment capital is sure to follow. Where can all of it be placed?

There are several thousands of MFIs in the world. Only 20 are to the level that they can raise their own money from the capital markets. There are only 100 that are considered "well-run".

Rory Stear of the Freeplay group: Only 20% of inhabited Africa has electricity. The average annual income in Rwanda is $203. Radios are key for communication in Rwanda. To power a radio for 5 hours a day in Rwanda costs $24 per year. The cheapest radio costs $12 to purchase. His company makes radios which can run for much cheaper using human (windup) power.

Princess Maxima of the Netherlands is real and not a fictional character. I saw her with my own eyes.

On the average, an MFI needs to dedicate 22% to administrative costs. Vikram Akula has lowered the overhead of his bank, SKS of india, to 6% through the extensive use of MIS systems in cooperation with Visa.

Raghuram Rajan of the IMF proposes a day when we remove the word "micro" from Micro-Finance. We should look at Finance as a spectrum of services that extend to the poor and rid ourselves of the chasm between Micro-Finance and Finance. Let's not kill the plight of the poor with kindness.

Dress code is not optional at the UN if you want to fit in. I should take this to heart.

Asli Demirgug-Kunt of the World Bank remarked that in Uganda, you must earn 20x the country's average GDP per capita to open a bank account. Banks in Africa are some of the most conservative. Banks in India take on much more risk when dealing with the poor. Why is this?

Richard Weingarten, Executive Secretary of the UNDP, remarked that Africa has seen reverses in major indicators during the last decade. For instance, life expectancy has decreased to 46 years old from 50 years old in the 1990s. He adds that Sub-Saharan Africa is now the primary focus of the UNDP.

Mantra of the day: Micro-Finance must be a profitable business if it is going to survive. There is a new crop of investors out there who want to invest in this industry but are demanding increased accountability. Although this is the overriding theme for the Forum, I ran into several detractors who worry about the pitfalls of emphasizing profit to the extent which it is currently being emphasized.

Here's one of the main reasons I started Kiva: I love the stories and I desire the information. In the past 5 years or so, my mind has developed a real thirst for regularly updating content. I find it in the news, blogs, email and bank statements -- and now Kiva.

I was reading a recent blog entry about Kiva and the author said there was something addictive about it. In a way this was affirming: 1) it indicates that other people are experiencing Kiva in a similar way and 2) it shows that, at least for some, info about a poor entrepreneur's daily activity is considered "content".

Okay, pro bono does not necessarily equal pro slowmo, but it can definitely lead to it.

If you are relying on someone to do work for you pro bono, you might find yourself working with someone who is a pro, but who operates (for you) in slow mo. Any offer help you is pretty much only as good as the size of the will of that person to help you. Gauging that is almost impossible at first.

The worst part is, once you enter into a pro bono agreement with someone, you have no control over the schedule. If you try calling your volunteer and getting upset, you will probably stop yourself before you start. It feels pretty ridiculous to pressure someone who is helping in their spare time and out of the goodness of their heart.

When you are starting an organization that wants to do good work, you will talk to hundreds of people who want to help. They DO want to help. But what good is having a hundred bite size, often incomplete chunks of help? This might cost you more than just paying ONE person to do a great job.

You are finding me at an interesting time.

We just launched Kiva. Kiva is a startup focused on connecting lenders with micro-businesses online. We provide the world's first and only online micro-lending opportunity and just opened to the public 3 weeks ago. We have now started over 30 businesses in Uganda and are scaling at a rapid pace. This is too much to summarize in a blog entry, so to find out more, go here. A HUGE blog, Daily Kos, covered us today. Thank you Daily Kos. In a couple of hours, your members funded every business we currently have. It was an incredible day.

Kiva is all about connecting people. Let me now introduce you to the people who are responsible for Kiva.

Jessica, my wife, and I came up with Kiva together. Kiva is a manifestation of what can happen when two people love eachother, spend every moment together, and allow imaginations to go places together that would have never been explored alone. For this reason, among others, it has been an amazing experience.

Moses Onyango is a man I met in a Nairobi hotel 1.5 years ago, and serves as a representative for Village Enterprise Fund (VEF) in Uganda. Moses has enabled us to work successfully with our first partner, VEF. He has been simply brilliant in finding successful businesses around Tororo and Soroti Uganda. He talks about goat herding and fish mongering the way a VC talks about semi-conductors and solar power.

Brian Lehnen is the head of VEF in the US, and has opened every door for us to run a successful online micro-lending operation. I first ran the idea past Brian in March 2004. "Nothing you just said sounds impossible" he said (this was the most positive thing I had heard yet). Brian has gone out to lunch with us on a regular basis for 2 years and is the reason we went to East Africa in the first place. VEF has started over 9,000 businesses in East Africa. I have a lot to learn from this man.

This blog will most likely be a mixture of my thoughts of what is happening now mixed in with stories from the past. It will chronicle what happens as Kiva goes from a beta-round startup with an important idea to a more significant endeavor with wider reach.

Thanks for reading.

Matt

I was on the phone with Moses the other night. We had a lot to talk about because that morning he had sent me an email saying he had quit his job. The note was ambiguous. I got him on the line:

"Yes, Matt. I have met with the elders of the church and I told them I have resigned as Pastor. Now I feel much better. My duties with the church were like a weight dragging me down. I can now fully dedicate what is in my heart to Kiva."

This was a moment where, in the past, I might have panicked in light of this huge sacrifice. Instead I just listened for more.

"I am off to Tanzania."

This project has definitely taken on a life of its own.