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Comment by greenonion | Hacker News Reader

Maybe this comment is off-topic here but I can't help but feel that Watsi is in a way making all these individuals "compete" in terms of who is more likable, or whose situation is the worst, in order for them to get the help they need. Maybe I'm exaggerating but this model really troubles me.

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How would you change the presentation to avoid this effect?

If candidates were presented one at a time, perhaps contributions wouldn't come in as effectively. If I see only one person in need and they're 60% funded, what gives me the sense of urgency that I should help as opposed to the momentum that this person already has?

Watsi guarantees funding for every patient profile that's accepted, so donor bias doesn't impact who receives care and who doesn't. (http://blog.watsi.org/post/43199420898/watsis-operational-pr...)

Thank you for that link, I wasn't aware of that. Even though the reasoning behind their model is mostly logistics it is good to know that every person on Watsi will get his/her treatment regardless of when/if it gets funded.

I believe that information should be on a prominent spot on their website.

It is no worse than random selection. The blurbs are basically all the same fluff anyway.

The blurbs on Watsi are fluff? No they aren't. They're so much the opposite of fluff that if that's what you mean, I'm going to ahead and say you've never looked at the site. Each profile on Watsi lists the specific medical condition that an actual human being needs remediated. For instance, paraphrasing, "had half of body horribly burned in petrol fire".

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