Nathan writes, "Wanting a more immediate and responsive way to do something about the outrage a friend and I felt every time we read about the latest assaults on civil liberties, I built an Amazon Dash button that sends $5 to the ACLU every time I press it. Repurposing the technology to do good, not just buy goods."
Nathan had to kludge a way to auto-submit the ACLU's donation form, making this a little tricky to repurpose to give to other orgs (e.g. EFF, Southern Poverty Law Center, Council on American Islamic Relations).
Two days later the IoT button arrived and I dove into the work of hooking it into the script I'd built. It's supposed to be almost plug-and-play, with a helpful iPhone app to connect and set everything up, but the app was never able to complete the process. After hours of frustration and troubleshooting, I eventually got the IoT button registered manually and linked it to the script I'd written. Another test, another $5 to the ACLU.
Finally, because looks rank right up there with function, I designed a graphic for the button, printed it, and stuck it in place so it looks more like a real Dash button.
The button resides near my laptop now, every press sending another $5 into the fight. Sure, I could set up a recurring donation every month, but then there's not the tactile thrill of the press and I wouldn't have learned my way around this technology.
The ACLU Dash Button
[Nathan Pryor/Medium]
