Good ideas often have strange beginnings. Our buddy, Roman Garcia came up with the name WhatGives!? and initiated the site nearly two years ago. (Just last month, our parent company Causemedia Group took it over.)
Later this week we’ll be launching a new feature called “How I Started” that will profile folks who are working for social good and their beginnings, and we wanted to give Roman a chance to reminisce about the formative days of WhatGives!?
Amazing what bad sushi and Nyquil can do, huh?. His story:
“Do you remember?
… that scene in Jerry McGuire? He can’t sleep , blames the bad pizza and comes up with the epiphany of his career. Yes, he ended up getting fired because of it, but not the point of this post.
I had a similar situation about 20 months ago, though my culprit was Nyquil and bad sushi. During that time I was part of the eBay Giving Works team and I was tasked with launching our first blog. I clearly remember being in a half daze fighting a cold and bad sushi and writing down “names” for what the blog would be called. I came up with some pretty bad ones, and my colleagues suggested even worse ones
. The end result was “What Gives!?”.
So how do I feel now that this site has been re-launched; bigger and better? I feel pretty ecstatic, so much so that I asked my friends behind the scenes to let me contribute to the greatest thing that’s ever come out my mind (aside from my killer blog).
What Gives!? was conceived to be everything that the site is still today. It’s about the good works that YOU do. And the best part is these good works can be things that have been done a million times before, or are still being conceived in your mind. Consider this the vehicle that takes you to where your good deeds want to be.
So please get out there and do some good. Then tell us about it, then do it again. Tell us your stories, and follow up with us. And if you want to meet up for coffee, don’t hesitate to ask.”
-RG
Thanks, Roman! Keep ‘em coming!
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Tags: blog, eBay, inspiration, social good, start, WhatGives!?
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This post was mentioned on Twitter by MjBubbles: Finally, the truth is revealed! How WhatGives!? got its start. (h/t @lifeinthekey) http://tinyurl.com/yghrpac...