Running NaNoWriMo takes a lot of time and resources, and those people work hard. I always knew they did, but getting a glimpse of some behind-the-scenes stuff as an ML and a forum moderator has opened my eyes even more. I've donated every year that I've done NaNo, because I really believe in it. They give me so much that I want to give back. If every Wrimo donated just $10, then the fundraising goals would almost be met that way alone. It's understandable that not everybody can afford to donate, though.
I was perusing the ML forum on the site today, and I laughed when I realized that every poster has a halo (a sign you donated) next to their name. You never see that in the regular forum. And that's what got me thinking about all of this--seeing all of those halos lined up next to each other.
I started perusing the site, looking at the various things they've got going on, when I came across the "Donating When Broke" page.
At the bottom was a description of GoodSearch (quoted directly from the NaNoWriMo page):
This Yahoo-powered search engine donates a penny to the charity of your choice for every search you do. Before you start searching just put "The Office of Letters and Light" in the "Who do you Goodsearch for?" box. That will lock in NaNoWriMo's parent nonprofit as the recipient of all your searches from that point forward.
Goodsearch also offers an installable toolbar to let you search directly from your browser. There are versions for users with Mozilla Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Safari. You can download and learn more about the toolbar here, and you can go here to troubleshoot.
Cool thing: We've earned almost $2,000 in Goodsearch funds since we started this in 2007! If every NaNoWriMo participant switched to Goodsearch for November, we could pay for most of our expenses through Goodsearch funds alone.
I am so switching for November, and I hope that everyone who reads this blog will, too. All of the things we Wrimos use--the forums, the author profiles, the buddy lists, the word count widgets, etc. etc. etc.--all cost money, and I love the idea of giving back and help defraying the cost of the resources I use.
I'm not an official NaNoWriMo participant, but I'll use goodsearch from now until the end of November - thanks for the heads up!
Awww, thanks, Leigh! And I like that you do not-NaNo. Anything that gets you writing rocks! :)
Oops! Gotta add--I do a LOT of Google searches for work and for writing and just because I am insatiably curious--basically I am addicted to Google, lol. Since I read this earlier I've been using GoodSearch, and I've probably done 50 searches today. And GoodSearch is NOT anywhere comparable to Google IMHO. In a few cases, I gave up and went over to Google anyway.
But I am going to *try* to use it as much as possible!