Last week I stumbled upon a new iPhone app called CauseWorld, which allows users to check in to places and receive Karma points. The points can then be donated to nine potential causes including Support A Classroom, Give Clean Water, and Donate A Book. The model is basically Foursquare with a charity tie-in, allowing users to gain badges while giving back to charity through small micro actions. The app is free and sponsored by Kraft Foods and Citi. There’s also a feed via Facebook Connect which allows you to publish your donations to your Facebook wall.

CauseWorld is a great example of brands connecting with causes and amplifying their message through social media. In December, Foursquare launched a cause campaign with CampInteractive sponsored by Pepsi that donated $0.04 for each check-in. While the program was a great way to bring CampInteractive’s cause into the mainstream and align Pepsi, the CauseWorld app takes it a step further by allowing consumers to choose what cause matters most to them, and amass ‘do-gooder’ badges.

Another solid example of brands aligning with causes to rally consumer participation across social media is the Chase Community Giving program, which just announced their winners (congrats to my peeps at Invisible Children, who won a $1 million donation). The program gained over two million Facebook fans, and aligned cause with 500,000 charities that participated for a chance to receive $25k, $100k, or $1 million grants. In total, Chase Community Giving handed out $5 million to a variety of worthy organizations.

The beauty of the program is it unlocked the potential of these charities’ reach through social voting, with top charities generating over 100k user votes and rallying their fans to support their cause in a central social space. Excellent use of tying together social media, cause, community and a brand under a single campaign.

Twitter has teamed up with Current TV  to allow viewers of the presidential and vice presidential debates to Tweet  their opinions and have them appear live onscreen, giving the TV audience unprecedented access to commenting on the nation’s political discourse.

These aren’t the days of 3 TV channels anymore. So why are some brands still acting like it is? You can’t just put out an ad and expect people to watch it. Today people get their TV online, with DVR or Tivo, on iTunes, or not at all. These days you have to grab people’s attention and intrigue so much that they choose to watch a brand’s message. These days it’s all about choice and interaction. Viewers need to be engaged or they’ll completely ignore the message. It’s been happening in politics for years. Young people have been tuning out because their voices weren’t being heard. Politics was old news in a modern world. But now with things like the YouTube presidential debates, candidates utilizing the web, CNN’s iReport, and now Twitter/Current TV’s debates, people are reengaging in politics. This is the “me” generation and it’s about time “they” realized it.