Two years ago I joined Kiva.

I have no good excuse for the fact that I only today started lending money there, but hey, at least I’m honest.

I’m kicking myself that it took me this long, because this is, quite frankly, a blast.

Here’s how it works: You’ve got cash in your bank account that you’re not using. (I know the economy sucks, but be honest with yourself here: you can’t spare 25 bucks? Really?) What Kiva does is make it incredibly easy and efficient to let someone else, somewhere else in the world, put this money to work.

You get to build a portfolio of small businesses you have funded with micro-loans. You can lend as little as $25 to any individual business, and that can be a big chunk of an important loan. (It’s amazing how far your dollars can go in other parts of the world.) Then, over a period specified with the loan, you get paid back. It’s not a profit-making venture; you’re not making interest. Once you get your money back (which you almost always do), you can either re-lend it, or take it back and put it in your own bank account again.

There’s more to it than that—you get updates from the businesses you’re helping, for one—but Kiva has a great website and does an excellent job explaining the whole fabulous setup the’ve built. Check it out.

Today I lent business funds to:

• Corazon Abero – a fish and meat vendor in the Philippines
• Charlita Ending – a photo laminator in the Philippines
• Mirzorahim Rahimov – a flour and ice cream seller in Tajikistan

This is insanely cool. This is the magic of the Internet, people! You’ve got money sitting in your checking account doing nothing, and almost instantaneously you can move that money into the hands of a vetted, hard-working entrepreneur who can do something useful with it. Go help someone today!