last night this happened

July 23rd, 2010 • posts i've written

In one month, 212 backers contributed $18,591 for the development of a book.

(about $16,200 after kickstarter & amazon service fees, if you’re curious)

It’s not lost on me that for most Americans that’s a majority of their yearly income and for most humans across the globe, that’s more than they’ll make in 3-5 years.

Your collective faith in the project and this money together amount to a considerable obligation to make this awesome.

After the funds clear in 14 days, they’re going into a new bank account that will only be used for direct expenses related to the research and development of the book. That’s a promise.

When I set up the Kickstarter page 30 days ago, crossed my fingers, and hit submit I had a healthy sense this might work, that there is far more value in our networks of friends and colleagues than we can possibly fathom right now, but I had no idea we’d raise this much together.

And frankly, I had no idea that this many people were this willing to put their faith in us (it’s not just me, people were clearly inspired by the type of people supporting the project).

So it’s a shared obligation – between you and I – to make this thing awesome.

Research is ramping up fast. Next week I visit Boston and Microsoft’s New England R&D office. I’ll be inviting the Editorial Board members into their private basecamp group soon, too (but it might take a little longer than I planned, I had no idea there would be over 110 of you).

Personally, I just want to take a second to be candid and tell you all how much this means to me. This is emotional for me. This outpouring of support has been more than enough to I think cure me of any remaining cynicism about people or life I might have been carrying around with me. I’ve been taking stock lately of my nomadic existence over the last 4-5 years, of the cities I’ve moved from, of the people whose names I have trouble remembering now, of the random tragedies I’ve seen befall people I love … and in contrast, this thing the internet that I’ve poured so much of myself into with a deep feeling that somehow I was building something with all of those sleepless nights hunched over my laptop, obsessed with something new, obsessed with building relationships with the brilliant people the web brought me access to. After every move, I tend to pair down what I own. I’m down to just a few suitcases now, I even left my guitars behind in Brooklyn. But as I was pairing down physical things, I was amassing more and more connections to people, connections that flutter between transient awareness and then gushing support like this. It’s a remarkable feeling to know that I carry all of you around with me in addition to my few articles of clothing, and I hope you start to feel just a little bit of what I feel after this experiment.

Related posts:

1. you did it!
2. why you should back the bucket brigade
3. 4 days left to back the bucket

Tags: bucket brigade

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