
Ask HN: How to identify programmatic ways to help your community? - notheguyouthink
I&#x27;ve been seeking a method of helping my community within my skillset. Ie, yes, I could donate or donate manpower, but I&#x27;m specifically curious to identifying problems in my community that I can solve in ways that interest me and, hopefully also,  that I would be most helpful.<p>Now my &quot;community&quot; is a vague term here, but there&#x27;s no size limit. Big or small, I&#x27;m seeking to donate my time and genuinely help people. I say community, because I imagine local platforms are some of the least developed for. Hard to monetize so it doesn&#x27;t get attention.<p>My first thought is a classical problem I feel affects everyone. Information about laws, politicians, etc. I would write&#x2F;install a platform to manage data pertaining to my local offices, laws, etc. This also involves quite the time donation on my part, to obtain information, keep it up to date, moderate edits, etc.<p>With all that said, perhaps you have some ideas on how best to help the people around you with developer skillsets?<p>Thanks to any replies :)<p><i>edit</i>: Also, ideas on recouping or avoiding costs would be appreciated as well. Ie, using perhaps a free CDN to aggressively cache content and reduce billing, etc.
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mtmail
Have a look at
[https://www.codeforamerica.org/](https://www.codeforamerica.org/),
[https://sunlightfoundation.com/](https://sunlightfoundation.com/) or the
projects [https://knightfoundation.org/](https://knightfoundation.org/) has
funded. They look for ideas and help to develop and run (reusable) tools that
serve 100s of communities. As you can see from their websites they have
funding. Taking an existing tool, e.g.
[https://www.fixmystreet.com/](https://www.fixmystreet.com/) (source code
[https://fixmystreet.org/](https://fixmystreet.org/)), and running it for your
city might be a good start.

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omarchowdhury
You need a way to get people to tell you what their problems are, but without
them knowing you're looking for business ideas. If they know you're asking for
business ideas, then they might not give you problems, but what they think are
good business ideas.

