According to the article, regular balls are already being donated but usually go flat quickly. This basically means donations are currently being wasted. If this wasted money can be redirected into something which will not be wasted, that seems like a definite win.

Further, balls are not just used for neighborhood games, but by organizations which use football as a tool for reaching other goals. If these organization are at all helpful, scrounging in the trash for materials to make balls is probably not a good use of their time. An organization may need dozens of balls, and if a trash ball only lasts for an hour (just a guess, I've never played football with a trash ball), then they may need over a hundred of them a day. The opportunity cost of the time spent making trash balls is probably higher than the cost of these balls, especially if they can truly last for years.

You could apply the same thinking about opportunity cost to the children's time. If play is important for children and if making balls out of trash is not play, then giving them more time to focus on play is a win.

Having cool things seems to be universally enjoyable. This gives the children something cool, probably adding to the fun of playing.

Digging in the trash is probably a lot less safe than playing football.

According to the corporation's website, 20 million deflated balls are discarded in Africa every year. If these balls last longer, there will be an environmental impact.

And finally, the main ways other charity attempts backfire (economic damage, not meeting the whole need [providing things the community can't maintain/support], giving a fish instead of teaching to fish, etc) seem to just not apply.

There's no doubt that kids will be happy if you give them a shiny new football. They'll also be happy if you give them a secondhand t-shirt or new pair of shoes. That makes for lots of donor 'feel good' and nice photos on your Facebook page, but that doesn't make it good aid.

If the priority here is to do something helpful for the developing world, and that's why they're willing to put all the required effort and money into this project, then why not start by asking the developing world what their pressing problems are? Ask a few developing country governments and see how many of them report a lack of good footballs as a pressing problem.

When people don't ask questions like that it's usually an indication that the aid is more about the donor than the recipient. This project sounds a lot like TOMS Shoes Buy One Give One which has been frequently criticized for being a donor oriented initiative with little long term benefit [1]. It might sound completely harmless to hand out free shoes to kids, but it ends up undermining local producers and sellers, and perpetuates a 'handout' aid culture.

[1] http://goodintents.org/in-kind-donations/toms-shoes http://www.nextbillion.net/blogpost.aspx?blogid=2345

There are no local producers of indestructible soccer balls. What will this undermine? I'm not trying to defend all comparable initiatives. I'm trying to understand the opposition to this particular one. Tom's shoes is a completely different issue.

Further, one cannot live on soccer balls no matter how indestructible. We aren't talking about giving out food for 10 years and then expecting someone to provide for themselves. We're talking about something that, where livelihood is concerned, is completely useless. A toy. I really do not see how giving a toy could create or perpetuate an expectation of handouts for any "real" aid. And I also don't see how handouts of toys can do any harm. I'm open to being corrected. I'm just letting you know why your argument hasn't convinced me yet.

Finally, asking someone what they want is not necessarily the best way to determine how to help them. I'm not suggesting that this is the best way to help. I'm just pointing out that, "If you want to help, ask, then do that," isn't foolproof.

Your argument seems to be that since footballs don't contribute to development, then this project won't do any long term harm or good. That just seems like a great shame to me - if we're going to invest all this money and effort, can't we find something to do that brings long term good? And something that won't perpetuate the common western view of places like Africa of hungry kids needing handouts.

But you're right that asking won't always yield the best solutions - let's say then you should spend sometime getting to know the place you want to help. Not convinced that has happened with this project.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oj__w87vkow&feature=plcp

"Social Mechanics: Bonding, Gratitude and Karma (Earthlings 101, Episode 7) "

Poor people are karma producers. Rich people are karma consumers. Rich people buy karma from poor people to make themselves feel better.

The whole Zog series is a fun (if a bit hard-line) presentation of evolutionary bio theory, in animated form.

Happy kids does not equal good aid? Really?

Handing out money to kids would make them happy too, but would also not be good aid

Sure first world quality soccer balls aren't necessary for children to have fun, but there is nothing wrong with an intelligent entrepreneur making them available to third world children.

If we all spent more time on projects like this instead of the next Twitter, or designing new weapons the world would arguably end up a better place.

  " If we all spent more time on projects like this instead of the next 
   Twitter, or designing new weapons the world would arguably end
   up a better place."

Doing something is not always better than doing nothing. As a matter of fact a great many things, perhaps even most, interventions do more harm than good.

I'd recommend starting off reading "White Man's Burden" if you are interested in the topic. For a more fun example, google "one million t-shirts for africa"

Unless money is diverted from more useful projects to buying balls?

I don't have enough information to say. Personally, I think this is a good project.

Fair enough. If this project siphoned off money that would have been used to provide food or medical aid then it could be seen as a waste. But it sounds like there is a mix of corporate sponsors providing money and a One Laptop Per Child style "buy two, get one" program for the general public.

It's like giving them a fish instead of a fishing pole… If we will provide them food, they'll grow even more dependent on us :/

Is that fair?

Is it as important as teaching children how to farm their own food? It is very difficult to learn when you are not having fun. Children -- even adults -- learn best from play. I don't see the harm in having something that brings the neighborhood kids together.

There's also a big myth that people of the Third World don't know how to farm, don't know how to feed themselves. In the past, NGOs have brought in modern farming technologies that ultimately devastated the local environment and the ability for the communities to feed themselves. It's been a big problem, it isn't just about those "lazy" and "ignorant" Third World farmers who don't know how to farm and feed themselves.

Projects like the Open Source Ecology are much better suited for ... "teaching them how to farm their own food", and they need people. If you're concerned about this one entrepreneur and want to do something about it, see what you can contribute to OSE.

Twitter was instrumental to communication during the Arab Spring. In general, it has served as a very nimble and functional communication medium that has, in some cases, surpassed the speed and breath of news networks for covering events in real time.

Open and powerful platforms like Facebook and Twitter aren't just outlets for wasting your time, but can be used in meaningful and impactful ways. The game is far from over - we still need people to build products like Twitter .

People need to stop thinking of the developing world as a simple place with simple problems.

I went to a private school in England - about as far removed as the kids this ball is aimed at - and therefore for us money was never the problem, but sometimes due to various reasons we'd be playing football in school breaks using a tennis ball, and we'd much preferred to have a real football to play with but happened not to that day. That doesn't take away from the fact that we still enjoyed ourselves with the tennis ball, and no doubt if circumstances had required it we could have enjoyed ourselves with a self-made ball.

The current solution doesn't have to be unenjoyable for this to be a great improvement

If you're a kid anywhere, and you have a choice between a ball that bounces well and has a sweet spot that lets it leap off your foot and doesn't hurt or make you bleed when you get smacked in the face with it, you.will.prefer.that.ball.every.single.time.

This seems like a no-brainer to me. These kids don't need a regulation ball, and they deserve better than trash.

While this may be marketed on the basis of "Do it for the children," sport specifically and play in general are important mechanisms of adult social interaction. Futbol is no more a child's game than dominoes.

Tangentially related to this point, I've often wondered if this is simply a zero-sum game, and the unity you gain through supporting a particular team comes at the cost of disunity with supporters of other teams.

Sports team rivalries produce all kinds of stupidity the world over. People are routinely killed or severely injured simply because of the sports team they support.

Ah, how I wish I had been told when I was younger "no more Lego for you, you're having plenty of fun with the one set you do have". I needed to have my wings clipped for my own good!