With Change.org, the computer became a strong tool to create changes around the world. But millions of computers stay inactive for hours, in offices and houses worldwide. So what if we could use them to help too?

So we created THE MINING SCREENSAVER. A screensaver that mines cryptocurrency to fund social causes.

Every time you get out of your computer, it will dedicate its processing power to solve blockchain operations. Each operation completed generates fractions of cryptocoins, donated to the Change.org Foundation.

Our solution works by connecting all the users that installed The Mining Screen Saver into one cryptocurrency mining pool. We were able to do this by adapting the CoinHive Mining Pool API.

Besides the software, there’s also an website about the initiative: www.theminingscreensaver.com. Users who want to contribute just have to download a desktop software, available for Windows and for Mac.

Development and Launch happened very fast. Now we are scheduling a global alignment to spread the word about The Mining Screensaver. Everyday a new change.org office hears about it and shows interest in helping with our campaign.

Scalability is one of the premises of this project. It was designed specifically to work with a partner that has a high reach, like Change.org and their 200 million users subscribed under their platform.

Over the next weeks a Open Source version will be available, so other social initiatives or organizations can adapt our code.

Our potential to impact this industry is real. This is not a one shot initiative, this is a project that can generate continuous support to Change.org, and in the future, to others.

The project relied on the use of two already existing and common technologies to create something totally new and innovative, capable of transforming how people help fund Change.org and, soon, other organizations.

THE MINING SCREENSAVER is a way to transform millions of inactive computers worldwide into tools to generate and donate money, by mining cryptocurrency together and multiplying their processing power while they are in screensaver mode. This creates a constant flux of donations with a single click.

14 March 2018 – Ideia was aprooved

15 March 2018 - Research and Information Architecture

23 March 2018 – Content and Key Visual development

09 April 2018 – Software and Site Development

20 April 2018 – Tests and Bug Fixes

27 April 2018 - Launch

In a moment where awareness about cryptocurrencies reached an all times high, Change.org was facing a loss in their engagement and funding. Aware of our needs and our scenario, we came up with a solution, adapting a cryptocurrencie mining pool to create effective and continuous funding to the Change Foundation.

One of our main concerns about developing a software for Windows and Mac, was to assure our users that we were providing a safe and good experience. In order to do it, we had to overcome a few limitations during testing and development both regarding security settings and Windows Guidelines conflicts with Java and Cryptomining.

Our budget to develop this software, website and contents were around US$8,000.