Touched By An Angel (-Wish)

According to the web site Angelwish.org, “Every 60 seconds, a child dies of an AIDS related illness.”  The Angelwish web site (and accompanying organization) touches the lives of many, many children – and today, I’m proud to say that they’re my latest discovery.  Here is how the web site describes itself: 

Angelwish was created to put the power to change a child’s life in your hands. All you need to do is select where in the world you want to save a life and we will help you to become a digital Angel.

Select the following link to grant a wish on any of six continents:

http://www.angelwish.org/wish/index.php

What makes this site particularly interesting?  Well, the site’s database of listings is generated by crawling the wish lists that charitable organizations have published on Amazon.com.  We all have friends or family who have generated a “wish list” on Amazon, providing us hints as to what to buy them on their birthday.  Well, charitable organizations generate these lists as well.  Angelwish brings the charitable wish lists onto Angelwish.org by way of mashup technology.

David Berlind of ZDNET referenced this site in his weekly podcast, which can be found here:

 http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=5720