21st-century Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller

The announcement last week that Warren E. Buffett, the nation's second-richest man, would donate most of his $44 billion fortune to a foundation created by Bill Gates, the nation's richest man, sent reporters to the history stacks.

After all, the philanthropic pairing invited comparisons to Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller. As the wealthiest men in the country at the turn of the 20th century, Carnegie and Rockefeller embarked on huge, independent philanthropic efforts. Each gave away hundreds of millions of dollars in the last decades of his life. And each endowed a foundation that is still a philanthropic force.

The comparisons are apt, said Ron Chernow, author of "Titan," the magisterial biography of John D. Rockefeller. "Rockefeller and Carnegie were pioneers in big business, and so it was a natural and inevitable transition that they would be pioneers in philanthropy," he said in a telephone interview. "And, like them, Gates and Buffett, who were also pioneers, are focusing on issues with broad appeal and universal support."

Despite the similarities, Mr. Gates is approaching philanthropy in a fundamentally different way. Call it Philanthropy 2.0. Just as Carnegie and Rockefeller were influenced by the vertically integrated, industrial economy they helped to create, Mr. Gates's philanthropic efforts are defined and affected by the less hierarchical, networked economy that he helped to create. With its small staff, strategy of creating partnerships and focus on research and development, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation more closely resembles a 21st-century software company than a 20th-century philanthropy.

[Excerpt of article by Eileen Ambrose, The Baltimore Sun]