Giving Back Through Web 2.0: Twilight Wish

I had the pleasure of seeing social media working to give back to the community in person yesterday while attending an event with the Twilight Wish Foundation, based out of Pennsylvania. Twilight Wish is an organization that works to recognize the contributions and honor the dreams of the elderly, using the web to connect them to their wishes.

Twilight Wish Foundation was started from a simple lunch. The founder of Twilight Wish Foundation saw four elderly ladies struggling to pay their bill for lunch, and asked the waitress to quietly let her pay for their meal, a meal that was under $20. The overwhelming gratitude the ladies had for being remembered sparked the idea for Twilight Wish.

Yesterday Twilight Wish had two presentations in my area, and I was fortunate to be able to attend one of them. Laura Fitton of Pistachio Consulting represented Twilight Wish Foundation at both events, and I was able to talk to her about what Twilight Wish means to her briefly, as well as get some footage of the event.

The wish I attended was for Helen G., former WAV in World War II. She contacted the Twilight Wish Foundation site to ask for large print reading material for herself and the rest of the people in her care community at Sunbridge. Twilight Wish Foundation was able to fulfill her Wish through Amazon.com, who donated a gift certificate for $1100 - enough to tide Helen and her friends over for quite a while with reading material.

Social media gets a bad rap in many circles for being an insular and self referential community. Twilight Wish Foundation is living proof that the web doesn't have to be that way. The majority of the elderly people in that room were tech savvy. A discussion on Silicon Valley gossip was going on when Laura and I walked into the room, and every single one of them knew what Amazon was and how to use it.

There doesn't have to be a divide between the web and real life. Twilight Wish Foundation and other organizations are using social media and the web to bridge the gap between dreams and real people. They aren't the only organization that is doing this kind of real world work with web tools, either. Social media driving giving and charity is becoming a new way for people to connect, and I was honored to be part of it yesterday.