An idea for the Salvation Army

I admire that you're thinking and writing about ideas that you have. Ideas are what change the world, hopefully for the better. You have a great mind to be thinking of new ideas.
My reaction to your idea is mixed. Yeah, you might see a modest increase in donations gathering an email list. On the other hand, there are a lot of savvy computer veterans like myself who continually find themselves on new mailing lists (often without their knowledge) and who have limited time, therefore becoming weary of getting spammed by their friends and acquaintances and by every website they have ever shown interest in. It's almost like I can make a part-time job out of unsubscribing. No doubt, townhall.com will start spamming me and I will have to decide if I'm interested. I know this sounds Scrooge-like, but I am a generous person who does contribute to causes I believe in. For your idea to work, the email sent to people would have to be different than what we've seen in the past. And besides, the Salvation Army is not totally locked in the Dark Ages. They do have a website (tried getting on today and hung), a car donation program, and various other programs that I'm sure amount to more than pocket change.

I just read that they are trying something new...debit and credit cards at the buckets. They'll also take your gift cards; think of those cards that you spent some of, but left a buck or two on...drop it in the bucket and they'll get the cash off of it. For all those times that you don't have cash but wish you did. Hmmm...