Our picks for the top nonprofit software news and articles for this month

Content Management Problems and Open Source Solutions (Optaros)

This extensive whitepaper gives an overview of 15 open source content management systems (CMSs) categorized by business need. It assumes a strong knowledge of the CMS area, but is a useful starting point even if you don't have a lot of background.

How to Choose an Open-Source CMS (ZDNet)

A good high-level overview of some of the considerations in choosing an open source content management system

Netsquared Interviews Nonprofit Internet Thought Leaders (NetSquared)

As part of CompuMentor’s NetSquared project, Marshall Kirkpatrick is interviewing nonprofit internet experts and nonprofit leaders who have been using advanced internet technologies.  He’s at 17 interviews and counting....

Bloggers Challenge Starbucks (San Francisco Bay Guardian)

An interesting case study about bloggers holding Starbucks responsible for their promise to provide fair trade coffee to anyone who asks for it.

Can Blogs Revolutionize Progressive Politics? (In These Times)

A detailed article about the effect of blogs and bloggers on politics and advocacy.

Mobile Politics USA: Stuck in First Gear (Personal Democracy Forum)

A detailed look at how The People for the American Way is using mobile phone text alerts to communicate with their supporters in real time.  

Foundation Uses Email Marketing for Good (ClickZ)

A short case study about how the Ryan Andrew Kaiser Memorial Foundation (RAKMF) uses email to increase awareness and donations.

BlackBaud Aquires GiftMaker Pro

Blackbaud, the company that makes Raiser’s Edge, has acquired Campagne, the company that makes GiftMaker Pro.  Blackbaud has committed to supporting GiftMaker for a minimum of two years.

Ditch Your Telephone for VoIP (TechSoup)

What is voice-over-IP technology?  How can you use it to allow your organization to make calls over the Internet for significantly less than the cost of a traditional phone call?

Marketing Wisdom for 2006 (MarketingSherpa)

Nonprofits and small businesses share a wealth of test results and lessons learned about email campaigns, search engine marketing, and website design, 

Summary of Nonprofit Browser Usage (Philantech)

Dahna Goldstein of Philantech provides the results of an informal survey of browser statistics for a number of nonprofits that serve other nonprofits, including CompassPoint and Innonet.  Detailed registration required.

Reviews:  Browsing for Browsers (PC Magazine)

This browser round-up provides reviews of Firefox, Internet Explorer, Internet Explorer 7 (beta), Netscape, and Opera.

CiviCRM Releases Version 1.3, Including CiviContributions

CiviCRM, an open source constituent database, released a new version that adds functionality to accept and manage online and offline donations, as well as improvements to the front end, custom fields, website integration, and CiviMail.

eTapestry Waives Setup Fee for Online Donation Tool

eTapestry, which offers one of the tools we recommended in our recent report Selecting an Online Donation Tool, is promoting their online donations service by waiving their setup fee and offering online donation functionality for only the 3.3% transaction fee.

Hosted Gmail – on Your Own Domain

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2006/02/big-mail-on-campus.html

Google is beta testing Gmail as a service for organizations - hosted on their own domains.  San Jose City College is their first trial run; they are taking applications for other organizations who want to be involved in the beta test.