Chapter 2: Overview, Trust and Safety, Climate, Government

Introduction

The Tech for Social Impact space is very broad. Many organizations are working on a huge array of issues. Over the next three chapters, we’ll do a crash course in some of the main areas that tech has been contributing to social causes.

Some of these organizations or cause areas might feel to you like they don’t fit neatly into the “social impact” label. That’s great! As we addressed in the previous chapter, there are many different definitions of social impact; the feeling that some of these stick out is a good indicator that you’re forming your own views on what does and does not fit into your own social impact framework.

Overview

Types of Organizations

Broadly speaking, there are a few common organizational structures of social impact tech organizations. The chapters are organized by cause area, but it’s important to also understand the types of organizations involved; many people are drawn to both specific cause areas and specific types of organizations when making career decisions. Here’s a quick intro to much of what’s out there:

Nonprofit: The most traditional of the social impact tech organizations. Popular examples include Upsolve, Recidiviz, or Career Village.
Government: There is a significant amount of effort happening in getting government to be more tech-forward in their operations. Nowadays, most federal governments and larger city governments have their own tech teams. This is also a section in Chapter 4.
For-profit: These are for-profit companies that have aligned their business incentive with a social impact incentive. Popular examples could include Watershed, Woebot, or Duolingo.
Big tech for good / ethical tech: Most big tech companies have ethical tech/tech for good teams within them such as Microsoft’s Tech for Social Impact Team, Google’s product inclusion team, or Shopify’s sustainability team.
Research: Many academic labs conduct research with social missions in mind, often either providing support to existing social good organizations or conducting novel analysis. Examples include Harvard’s Center for Research on Computation and Society and Stanford’s Internet Observatory.

Dangers of Technology

Center for Humane Technology, Key Issues Overview

Recommend time: 3 minutes The Center for Humane Technology outlines some of the key issues that the increased integration of technology into everyday life has brought about, including exacerbated psychological problems and a damaged democracy.

Center for Humane Technology, Ledger of Harms (skim)

Recommend time: 15 minutes This ledger highlights key factual findings about the harms of technology on youth, attention, mental health, and more.

Trust and Safety

Many tech companies, especially social media companies, have to deal with a significant amount of user-generated content, and it’s infeasible to monitor everything that’s being said. Thus, there need to be effective policies and automated methods that ensure what is being said is safe content for its users. This includes a number of different things such as content moderation and preventing harassment or fraud. Regarding content moderation, on social media, disinformation/misinformation spreads more quickly than accurate information, and disinformation efforts have been rampant in elections, climate change, the invasion of Ukraine, and more.