[3] Philanthropedia was incubated at the Stanford Graduate School of Business starting in 2008 with the assistance of the Hewlett Foundation.

[4] In 2008, NKN launched its first cause, recommending 8 top nonprofits working in the field of education at the national level.

[5] In 2009, NKN officially incorporated as an organization, rebranded as Philanthropedia, under the leadership of Deyan Vitanov as CEO and Erinn Andrews as COO.

[2] Also in 2009, Philanthropedia released rounds of research on education, climate change, Bay Area homelessness[4] and international microfinance.

[2] Philanthropedia's methods of ranking nonprofits based on crowdsourced information was criticized by some experts in the field of WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene), including Marla Smith-Nilson, one of the founders of Water.org.