Kiva.

I just made a couple of small loans to businesses in Azerbaijan and the Ukraine at kiva.org, a site that takes the microcredit concept to an Internet full of individual lenders like you and me. You pick the people you want to lend money to, they keep you updated on how they're spending their loan, and they pay you back later. I think it's a great idea. You might want to consider it among the charitable things you do this holiday season.