Welcome to our 2017 End-of-Year Fundraiser!
Welcome to the Worldbuilders End-of-Year Fundraiser 2017! We have more lottery prizes than ever this year, as well as a bunch of cool stuff to talk about. Ready to raise some money for Heifer International?
If you haven’t joined us before, join us for a quick overview! If you just want to see what we’re up to today, feel free to scroll until you see the JoCo Cruise graphic.
Who gets the money?
–Heifer International.
For the next few weeks, everything donated to us through our donation page will go to our favorite charity, Heifer International, to support intelligent solutions to the persistent issues of poverty, hunger, and women’s empowerment. They have programs all over the world that help people help themselves by arming them with knowledge and the raw materials they need to get started on the road to success. For more information on what they do and how they approach problem solving, visit heifer.org.
How does this fundraiser work?
–Work? It’s fun!
Well, we like to make things fun. That’s why, to encourage everyone to donate, we have a huge library of books, games, art, and other cool stuff that we’ll be sending out at the end of the fundraiser. We’ll add new stuff every day of the fundraiser, so feel free to watch the prize pool grow. You’ll have a chance to win something just by donating! For every $10 you donate through our donation page, we’ll enter your name in the lottery one time. If you donate $50, your name is in five times for a greater chance at winning something.
When you donate, you’ll see a confirmation page (above) that asks what you’d like to win. It’s a way for you to specify you’d rather have books, or you’re more interested in games and jewelry, or any combination. Check any categories you’re interested in, and we’ll do the rest.
But it gets better!
Can I win something really weird?
–You bet you can!
But you have to sign up for it. Most of the stuff in our lottery is something your average geek (like us) will find cool, like a book they haven’t heard of or a game that has wide appeal. But we have a few items that are more specialized, like a manuscript critique, Kingkiller collectibles, True Dungeon goodies, and more. For those items, we’ve set up Team Pages where you can donate. You’ll still be entered into the main lottery, but by donating through a Team Page, you’ll unlock the opportunity to win the specific lottery items listed on that page.
Some Team Pages are set up by our supporters, too. Some of them have their own lottery items, and some don’t, but all the money raised goes to Heifer International, and everyone who donates through those pages is entered into the main lottery. So if you want to get your office, book club, school group, or coffee klatch together to raise money as a team, email us and we’ll help you get set up!
Do you still have auctions?
–We do!
We’ll have some of the strangest stuff up for auction, including a lot of the critiques and tuckerizations and a bunch of collectibles and original art. Everything we make in the auctions goes to Heifer as well.
What if I don’t have any money?
–No problem!
Take care of yourself first. We’ll still be here. But if you’d like to pitch in and ride the wave, we’d love it if you spread the word. Hop on Twitter and Facebook and tell everyone what we’re doing! We’ll be tweeting and posting during the fundraiser as well, so if you follow us, all you have to do is share and retweet, and more folks will join the fun!
So what’s going on today?
–We’re glad you asked!
Remember when we said we had some weird stuff in the lottery? Well it doesn’t get much weirder than the JoCo Cruise! If you like 10 days on a cruise liner filled with geeks like yourself playing games, telling really bad, clever jokes to each other, listening to catchy, geeky live music all the time (seriously) and generally nerding out about all our favorite things, you probably need to go on the JoCo Cruise.
Wouldn’t it be great if you could win a cabin on the cruise? YOU CAN. JoCo Cruise has donated a balcony cabin for two for us to include in the lottery! Now, you’ll still have to get to the dock, which means booking your own flights and hotel stays as needed, but the cruise itself is covered (this includes meals as well, though there may be extra charges for some drinks). If you’d like to be in the running, make sure you check the box for the JoCo Cruise when you get the little questionnaire during your donation checkout.
If you’re more of a stay-at-home-and-read person, you might want to know we added a bunch of awesome books from Subterranean Press to our Lottery Library, including an auction for one of everything they published in 2017!
Subterranean Press is a publisher that does exclusive editions of literary fiction across the board, from pulp classics to modern epic fantasy. They do all their own typesetting and design, choosing premium materials for their books, and almost everything they do has a limited run option, from signed books to lettered editions in leather slipcases. These are all beautiful hardcover books you’ll be proud to add to your home library.
Sub Press is one of our very first sponsors, and they’re the publisher who took a chance on Pat’s not-for-kids kids’ book, The Adventures of the Princess and Mr. Whiffle. So it’s sort of a tradition that we launch our fundraiser by featuring some of the nicest books we’ve ever seen, and only coincidentally that those happen to be Subterranean Press books. Check out our Lottery Library to see what they sent us this year!
If you’d like to stay on top of things, here’s links to all the stuff you might be interested in:
Our Blog (you are here)
Pat’s Blog (where he talks about us and Heifer)
Pat’s Twitch stream (where he does the same, but on camera while playing games)
Our YouTube channel (where you can see goofy videos from years past)
A video of Neil Gaiman singing
Thanks so much for joining us this year. Check back here for updates and more coolness as we add things to our Lottery Library and talk about all the folks who donated stuff for you to win!