What the heck did I just say? NaNoWriMo! Otherwise known as National Novel Writing Month. Ever really wanted to write a novel? Ever really not had the motivation or support? Yeah, well you’re in good company.

Here’s the solution. NaNoWriMo is a prizeless competition of the literary. The quest is to compose a 50,000 word novel in one moth! November to be exact. It doesn’t have to make sense. In fact, one of their catch phrases is “It’s all fun and games until someone has to read it.” It’s true.

WHY DO THIS TO YOURSELF?

Well, my exasperated friend, it’s to break the boundaries of perfectionism. It’s so easy to stifle your creative flow by worrying about plot points or good names for characters. The point is the just write and write and write with no inhibitions. It’s wonderful once you get the hang of it! Sadly this does come around finals, so it’s easy to quit mid month. But you have to think of it in an optimistic light. 10,000 words is 10,000 words is 10,000 words. It’s more than you had if you hadn’t attempted the challenge. And you can pick it all right back up when finals have passed. It also brings to light the fact that a novel doesn’t have to take 10 years. You can do it in no time.

This annual experience of awesome is something I highly recommend. Check out there website and start cruising. Either start a NaNoWriMo of your own for this summer or simply communicate with fellow writers. If you put in your zipcode you can easily find others participating in the event. I’ve attended several writing stations through this. It’s so nice to sit around with fellow word enthusiasts and toss around ideas.

Rules:

Do NOT think about what you’re going to write before November 1st.

Do NOT over think your plot.

DO participate in writing groups.

DO create something romantic, comedic, adventurous, and thrilling.

Also, I realize it’s not November. But I really wanted to bring you all this information. Especially during the summer. Doing a NaNoWriMo in July isn’t forbidden, and is honestly better timing for most of us. Enjoy!!!

~Brittany

Its been a while since there has been an update on this event.  As of right now they are at $791,000+ with 35 days remaining.  They are still ahead of goal and looks like they will be able to meet it. The goal is 1 Million Dollars in 100 days for Save the Children.

If anybody that reads our blogs has donated then please please please consider this a job well done but the end is not here yet.  The end of these type of events are quite often when things begin to fall apart.

Thank you for all your support on this and keep up the good work.

~Peeta

(Source: opsharecraft.com)

Bitcoin - the peer to peer digital currency that’s a perfect fit for Online Communities.

Intro Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Um63OQz3bjo

Benefits of bitcoin:

——-Bitcoin is global.

Bitcoins can be transferred to and from anywhere with internet like email.  There are peer to peer nodes that support the bitcoin system all across the world.  When someone sends bitcoins, they are visible to the reciever instantly, and can be spent within about 15 minutes.

——-Bitcoin doesn’t discriminate.

There are no requirements like gender, age, credit history, or minimum balance.  All you need is an internet connection.  Technical users can download the client from bitcoin.org and create a bitcoin address.  Others can sign up for a free online wallet.  A 10 year old girl in Singapore can send and recieve 0.001 bitcoins just as easily as a 45 year old man in the UK can transfer 1,000 bitcoins.  You can literally get a bitcoin address and start recieving bitcoins from other people in the next 5 minutes.

——-Get rid of more than just the penny.

Bitcoins are divisible to 8 places (or more in the future).  The smallest unit is 0.00000001 bitcoin.  This can be expanded so for all practical purposes, they are infinitely divisible.  Carrying metal around be it penny, nickel, dime, quarter, or even gold or silver is a hassel.  With a mobile phone and internet access, bitcoin can be used to digitally pay for something at a brick and mortar store or restaurant.  The infrastructure is continuously growing around bitcoin with gift/debit cards coming onto the market and mobile applications being developed.  

——-Microtransactions for Commerce

With Paypal and credit cards, any transaction below 25 cents is impossible.  The Apple iTunes store doesn’t allow artists to sell songs for less than $0.69.  Applications can’t be sold for less than $0.99. The Google Play store has similar prices on music, apps, books, and movies.  Even gumroad won’t let you sell for less than $1.  These mostly stem from the problem of credit card and bank fees.  Bitcoin’s low fees open up a whole universe of possibilities in microtransactions that weren’t possible before.  Content creators can charge less for a song, and still make more money by cutting out a middle man (banks).  When prices are lower, sales increase.  What would happen if an artist sold a song for $0.20 or even $0.10?  These microtransactions could be the middle ground we need between the old media distribution model and full blown piracy.

——-Microtransactions for Charity and Crowdfunding.

Microtransactions can allow a large number of people to give a tiny amount to fund a project they think is worthwhile.  With Paypal, any transaction less than 33 cents goes straight to paypal’s pockets with none doing to the cause you wanted to donate to.  The Uncultured Project (UP) is one example of a cause that could benefit greatly from microtransactions.  Shawn Amed has recently been working in Bangladesh to build the John Green School so that more children can have a better place to study than fields.  Lately he has been having trouble raising money and the future of the school is uncertain.  He has said that $10,000 would help solve some of the problems he has run into.

Currently, Paypal is the best method to send a donation for most organizations and their supporters.  This is the method Shawn currently useds for UP.   What would raising money look like with bitcoin microtransactions?  Shawn has ~250,000 twitter followers.  Assuming 1/4th of those are genuine, how much would each one have to donate to raise $10,000?  Some would give more, some would give less, but on average, just 16 cents.  These followers are already interested in what Shawn is doing because they follow him.  They are priviliged enough to have an internet connection.  I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to say that they have a 16 cents laying around and would donate that 16 cents if it were easy to do.

Crowdfunding for future projects is becoming popular on fundraising sites like kickstarter.  Here too bitcoin can provide a benefit and lower the minimum donation amount.  More people will be able to support a greater number of projects by being able to split their money across more campaigns.  Raising funds for an anticipated product is another solution to piracy.

Kiva.org has looked into using bitcoins but they are still in a legally grey area.  Bitcoin suffers from the chicken and egg problem.  People don’t want to have bitcoins if they can’t spend them anywhere, and merchants don’t want to go through the trouble of accepting them if no one wants to spend them.  I think using bitcoins for the above advantages are as common sense as phasing out the penny.  For crowdfunding to work using bitcoins, everyone has to have at least a little bit of bitcoins.  There’s no minimum balance, and no monthly fee, so there’s not much harm in keeping a small amount.  Ideally everyone might have $5-$10 worth of bitcoin that they can use to spend on stuff on the internet.

Resources:

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/FAQ

http://www.thebitcointrader.com/2011/12/kiva-bitcoin-project-on-hold-due-to.html

https://twitter.com/#!/uncultured

~Sean S.

(Source: weusecoins.com)

Room by by Emma Donoghue

Rating 2/10

I can see what Donoghue was trying to do and for all intents and purposes, she did it well.

Room is the novel which echoes the Fritzl case; a huge news story from a few years back about a woman who walked into a police station in Austria and told them that she had been held captive in a basement for twenty-four years.  Room is about a young woman who was kidnapped some years earlier and has been imprisoned in the man’s garden shed. During those years she had a child, and the whole book is from the boy’s point of view.

I think if I had known that this award-winning book was entirely in the voice of an emotionally stunted five year old I would not have picked it up.

I know, I know, the whole point of the book was to see it from the child’s perspective, and while Donoghue writes as a five year old well there is a reason most of us can’t remember that far back. Our brains are too young and we don’t have a clue what’s going on. After about a third of the book the style stopped being quirky and just became a chore to read. I had to force myself to wade through the annoying repetition of a child to finish it.

And nothing really happens.

Sure, they escape the shed and the kidnapper gets arrested, and then they have to adjust to the outside world, but because it is from the child’s point of view it is nowhere near as interesting or engaging as a story like that should be. And that is about as far as the story goes. It’s nothing that anyone familiar with the Fritzl case or even anyone with the slightest bit of imagination could assume before even opening the book.

I’m not too sure why this book won so many awards. All I can deduce is that maybe we should all pick a news story, wait a couple of years so it’s not bad taste, and then write it from the point of view of the child. 

And they say YA is bad for the brain. Sigh. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going back to The Mortal Instruments series, because my mind has been sufficiently abused enough by the last few books that I hate children. Give me back my angst-ridden teens, for the love of all things unholy. 

 ~Cathy