The Ampathy
Foundation.
They came to him - one of the original pioneers of impact technology - because the problem was now systemic. Misinformation had become the greatest threat to humanity, and mistrust a feature, not a bug, of the systems producing it. To fund their work, Brian founded the Ampathy Foundation. A new model was born.
The Foundation founded and funded the Starling Lab, now a joint initiative of Stanford University's Department of Electrical Engineering and the USC Shoah Foundation. The Lab is migrating the Shoah archive of 55,000 Holocaust survivor testimonials onto the Filecoin blockchain - the largest migration of historical media ever committed to a decentralized, incorruptible ledger.
Two major accomplishments followed. The Foundation and Starling Lab created Rolling Stone's "The DJ and the War Crimes," an immersive investigative project that received a News & Documentary Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Interactive Media. And when Russia invaded Ukraine, the Lab applied the same authentication methodology to evidence of alleged Russian war crimes - submitting to the International Criminal Court a cryptographically verified dossier documenting deliberate attacks on Ukrainian schools in Kharkiv, in what was reported as the first blockchain-authenticated evidence of its kind submitted to any court of law. The dossier sits on Filecoin -the same decentralized infrastructure preserving the Shoah archive.
The Ampathy Foundation began when a group of technologists, watching trust collapse across the institutions that hold society together, sought out Brian Sirgutz. Brian had founded Impact (acquired by AOL/HuffPost), where he served as SVP of Social Impact and Social Innovation for over eight years. Under his leadership, the division grew to roughly 25% of HuffPost's traffic and revenue, pioneered the Affinity model as an alternative to attention-and-clickbait metrics, and helped HuffPost become the first digitally native platform to win a Pulitzer Prize. Inside the winning series - David Wood's "Beyond the Battlefield" on wounded veterans – Brian embedded PayPal buttons so readers could support the vets directly, with no nonprofit intermediary. That button became the seed of Ampathy.
From there, the Foundation has grown into a 501(c)(3) public charity and donor-advised fund sponsor that has moved more than $10M in Impact Capital™ since 2022, in partnership with leading philanthropists, family offices, and brands deploying Affinity Capital™ - our reframing of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) - across civic engagement, humanitarian response, and cultural preservation.
In one recent deployment, a coalition of prominent philanthropists - two of them Giving Pledge signatories -routed $4M+ through the Foundation to engage Gen Z in civics, driving 600K+ opt-ins, a 12% SMS conversion rate, and a 500% lift over benchmark Instagram CPA.
Brian's mission to make helping easy and accessible was forged years before the Foundation existed. On September 11th, he watched hundreds of people lay down their lives for others. He set up the supply chain between the three distribution points at Ground Zero, walking the pile with fresh coffee and food for the days and weeks that followed. He also watched the rest of the country - grief-stricken, willing to help, paralyzed in front of televisions with no clear way in. That day defined everything that followed. There are 9/11s happening every day around the world, he came to realize. Why do some receive an emotional response while others do not? The internet has since perfected Buy, Pay, and Subscribe - it never built the rails for Help.
The Ampathy Foundation is the connector between intent, empathy, and impact- infrastructure that lets generosity reach its destination at the speed of the internet.
As a tax-exempt fiscal sponsor, the Ampathy Foundation receives and remits charitable contributions on behalf of corporations, family offices, brands, and individuals - contributions that are irrevocable and tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law. The Foundation is stewarded by SDG Global Impact Fund, Inc., a Wyoming-based 501(c)(3) sponsoring organization that retains full legal control and grantmaking discretion, consistent with IRS requirements for donor-advised funds.
The Foundation supports bunching and multi-year giving strategies for itemizers navigating the new 0.5% AGI floor on charitable deductions under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), effective January 2026.
Coming Q4 2026
Stewards will receive real-time grantmaking visibility and impact reporting directly through the Ampathy platform - replacing the quarterly PDF with a live ledger.
Disclosure
Ampathy Foundation is a Donor Advised Fund ℅ SDG Global Impact Fund, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) charitable organization. All contributions are tax-deductible. No goods or services will be provided in exchange for the contribution.
EIN / Tax ID: 41-3966108
Please make checks and donations from DAFs payable to Ampathy Foundation and e-mail us: contact@ampathyfoundation.org
Ampathy Foundation c/o SDG Global Impact Fund, Inc. (Tax ID 41-3966108) is a Wyoming-based nonprofit public charity recognized as tax-exempt under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. Contributions to SDG Global Impact Fund are irrevocable charitable gifts and may be tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law. SDG Global Impact Fund retains full legal control and discretion over all contributed assets, including the approval and distribution of grants.
Ampathy Foundation c/o SDG Global Impact Fund does not provide legal, tax, or investment advice. Donors, advisors, and other parties are encouraged to consult their independent professional advisors regarding the legal, tax, financial, and philanthropic implications of charitable contributions.
Stewardship.
https://www.sdgglobal.org/about-us
(EIN / Tax ID: 41-3966108)
Click here for IRS Exemption Letter.
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