Award Winning Blog - Agitator

The Commitment Model and the Myth of Relationship Fundraising

The sector has spent decades preaching the gospel of “relationship fundraising,” as if donors and charities are star-crossed lovers who just need more quality time together. You know the script: deepen the bond, build the relationship, treat donors like friends. It’s tidy, it’s sentimental, and it’s wrong. The irony is that part of our work […]

Learn More December 1, 2025

You Are Already A Winner

By now you may have seen the story — a woman from Midlothian, Virginia, Carrie Edwards, buys a lottery ticket using ChatGPT and wins $150,000. But the remarkable part isn’t that she won. It’s what she did next. She gave it all away. Carrie, a 68 year old widow, said she heard the voice of […]

Learn More November 27, 2025

The Doom Loop Is a Media Problem, Not a Donor Motivator

If it bleeds, it leads, a cliche if there ever were. The usual interpretation is media force-feeding us a steady diet of misery and we reluctantly choke it down. But the more honest question is the uncomfortable one: are they shoving negativity at us, or are they simply serving what we reliably choose? A Russian […]

Learn More November 24, 2025

What Happens When AI Trains on the Good Stuff?

Readers think they can spot real writing, trusting their ear for voice, rhythm, style. They assume they know what human feels like on the page. So when a group of researchers pitted expertly trained fine arts writers against AI, the expectation was obvious, humans would win easily. And they did…in the first phase. When […]

Learn More November 21, 2025

The Unicorn We Need To Retire

I’ve been meaning to tell you something for a long time, and it’s time I finally say it out loud. It’s time to retire Renewal-as-We-Know-It—and the two donor behaviors that should replace the way most folks do renewals. It’s a confession of sorts—one part memory, one part reckoning, and a larger part responsibility. You see, […]

Learn More November 19, 2025

DONOR PRIVACY ALERT: AN OLD BATTLE, A NEW FLASHPOINT, AND A TASK YOU CAN’T PUT OFF

There are moments in this work when we don’t have the luxury of putting a thing aside, even for an afternoon. This is one of those moments. If you skim this post quickly, fine — but don’t delay acting on it. Not this time. Not with what’s at stake. An important federal case — Buckeye […]

Learn More November 17, 2025