Hey Everyone,

A few months ago my good friend John Allen raised about $800 during his birthday for clean water projects around the world. I'm usually very critical of charities and very protective of my money, but this charity really looks like a gem.

My 28th birthday is coming up and I'm asking you -- instead of birthday gifts -- to give a little money to the Charity Water instead. It only costs $20 to give someone clean water for a year. That's such a small amount of money in America but it has a huge amount of impact overseas. To kick things off and show you that I am serious I just donated 4x my age: $112.

Why I think this charity is great, borrowing a few words from John: "Water was founded by an already wealthy couple, Michael and Xochi Birth. Michael and Xochi sold their company, Bebo, to AOL in 2008 and netted $595M for their share of the company. These are business people that clearly know how to get things done, not lifelong NGO bureaucrats: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Birch_(businessman)"

Charity Navigator rates them extremely high on finances, accountability, and transparency: http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=12548#.UeiYo2SgkaA

I hope you'll consider throwing in a little money. I've set the goal at $1024, which is enough to provide 51 people with clean water for a year.

- Jeremiah