01/08/2014
This email is going out for tomorrow morning.
Urgent Fundraising Appeal for the History Commons
http://www.historycommons.org/fundraiser.jsp
Our funds have dried up. Please donate today what you can so we can continue our work. We are extremely low on funds, and this call for financial support is urgent. If we do not have funds to meet basic operation costs, we will have to shut down the site. The only financial support we receive is from online fundraisers like this one.
Derek Mitchell founded the History Commons in 2001 after the Bush administration began using the 9/11 attacks as a pretext for using America's military to redraw the Middle East. I came on board in 2007, after Paul Thompson saw my "This Far and No Further" timeline of events in Iraq and invited me to become a contributor.
Since then, the mainstream media has become the playpen of a very small number of corporate interests, and media coverage has been shaped accordingly. The History Commons is one of a small number of organizations trying to push back against corporate control of the media. While other such groups do excellent work, we modestly believe that in our own fashion, we do as good or better than any of our citizen-journalism colleagues in unearthing the truth behind the issues and events of the day. "We," of course, is "us" -- every single one of the thousands of people who have contributed their time, their research, and/or their financial support to pushing the History Commons forward. If you read the History Commons, use its information, contribute entries, spread the word on social media, or make financial donations, you are part of the History Commons. If you are reading this email, you are most definitely part of the Commons.
http://www.razoo.com/story/Turn-Every-One-Into-A-Muckraker/
Derek writes: "Since its founding, contributors have used the HistoryCommons crowdsourcing platform to document and investigate a number of issues -- the 9/11 attacks, the invasion of Iraq, privatization of seeds using genetic engineering technology, the ousting of Aristide, the oil-industry funded campaign to discredit global warming research, the Iran-Contra Affair, U.S foreign policy in Latin America, and much more." Recently we have focused on solar technology, the events of September 11, 2001, and the erosion of civil liberties in the US.
The History Commons was created in 2001. It has not been significantly updated until now. A new version of the HC crowdsourcing journalism app is being developed, and a new Web site/user app is being prepared to go with the new, cutting-edge app. Whereas the current app is difficult to use, the new app will make it far easier for people to use our database and collaborate with one another to document their own interests, or extend coverage already in place. It will also contain an API to allow others to create their own apps using the History Commons data and analysis capabilities.
But NONE of this will happen if the History Commons does not raise the funds to complete the project and keep HC online and active. Please donate what you can, not just to keep the History Commons alive, but to help it transform into a cutting-edge tool to retake history from the corporate "owners" and give it back to the citizens of the world, where it belongs.
http://www.razoo.com/story/Historycommons/share
You can also share our fundraising appeal with others, in formats suitable for Facebook, Twitter, mobile platforms, and more.
Thank you so much.
Michael Tuck
Content Administrator, History Commons
Development of the HistoryCommons 2.0 app is well underway and we hope to do a beta release soon. A lot of progress has been made and we are very excited.
