Over the past few years, Holly and I have been trying to figure out how to do philanthropy effectively.

We've made donations to various charities, but been frustrated by an inability to point at any tangible results from our donations.

It just kind of....goes into the abyss...

We know it probably helped somebody, but it kind of feels like a drop in the bucket.

We want our philanthropy to have a sense of purpose and to be able to know with confidence we are making tangible change.

Who'd have thought giving money away would be hard?

Generally, the options are:

1. Donate to large charities (no sense that you really made an impact, no way to point to any specific results).

2. Do it yourself and hire a team to vet individual opportunities (which is expensive and eats into amount you can give).

We figured screw it, we'll do it our way, and started our own foundation.

We call it The Tiny Foundation :-)

Holly and I care about a lot of different topics.

A few that are top of mind include funding science, journalism, social justice, and child protection.

We realize that hiring experts in all those areas to ensure we were giving money away effectively would cost a fortune...

And we want the maximum amount to go to the causes themselves.

So, we decided to do something really simple:

Just give money to people we admired and let them decide.

Each year The Tiny Foundation will give sizeable grants ($50k-$1MM) to people whose work we admire and ask them to fund something important.

It could be their own project. A colleague's. Something random they think is important. Anything that does good.

It's that simple.

For example:

Our friend Dr. Rhonda Patrick ( @foundmyfitness) is an accomplished scientist and educator (and one of the smartest people we know).

We literally just texted her and said "Hey, we want to give you $100,000 to donate. You can fund anything you want."

That's it.

She knows better than we ever will what will make an impact in her space and who needs the money most.

So, now we're funding a really cool study at UCSF by @DrAshleyMason around using whole body hyperthermia (using sauna) to treat clinical depression.

We never would have thought of that, but it's amazing research.

While most of our grants will be one-time donations to universities, researchers, and individuals causes and charities, we will also be making investments in for-profit entities that sustainably promote social good.

Our first of these initiatives is our Tiny Journalism Fund, where we will be helping foster independent journalism in Canada.

We think a strong independent press—especially doing investigative work—is key to the future of Canada.

But we also worry that a donor model will result in organizations that are reliant on constant inflows from wealthy philanthropists like us.

Ultimately, we believe that, given the incredible new slate of tools at their disposal (web, podcasting, newsletters, etc), independent journalism is financially viable again.

Most just don't realize it yet.

So we want to build some examples for everyone to look to...

We want to invest in the best independent news organizations in Canada, get them to profitability, then reinvest any profits we earn into funding more and more great journalism.

Our goal is to support 20+ independent Canadian news organizations over the next decade.

Of course, we do not (and cannot) personally profit from this in any way.

We also get zero influence over the organizations we invest in (non-voting shares, no editorial influence).

So, on that note...

I'm excited to announce that the Tiny Journalism Fund just made its first investment of $1,000,000 into @Canadaland.

Canadaland is doing important work.

Since 2013 they have been covering the Canadian media with a critical eye and broken many national stories.

Most impressively: they have done it on a shoe-string budget, profitably supported by advertising and audience support.

We are huge fans of Thunder Bay, their podcast series which investigated the deaths of seven youths in Thunder Bay, Ontario, revealing shoddy police investigations, and systemic racism, facing Indigenous youth, their families, and communities. https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/id1438924421

Over the next three years, our investment will enable them to fund season 2 of Thunder Bay and significantly increase their budget for original reporting.

We could not be more excited to help @CANADALAND get to the next level and give Canadian journalism a badly needed boost.

Is there somebody who you think we should fund?

Here's a few areas we are focused on:

- Independent Journalism (especially in Canada)
- Social Justice
- Child Protection
- Medical Research

But open to anything.

Learn more at http://www.tiny.foundation