October 26, 2007

Skateboarding Dogs and Dramatic Chipmunks: I Love the ’00s

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When it comes time to commemorate the pop culture of the ’00s, I sincerely hope it doesn’t happen via a VH1 “I Love the ’90s” clone. I hope it is online, viral, and ADDed to the extreme—in short, I hope it befits this glorious decade.

Maybe it’ll look something like this…

If you can identify over 75 percent of the references in that video, you are basically Perez Hilton. If you can identify 50-75 percent, you win a free Nintendo Wii and a case of Sparks. If you can identify 25-50 percent, you need to use YouTube more. If you can identify under 25 percent, you can return to your volume of Elizabeth Barrett Browning poetry and not worry about it.

(This has nothing to do with social issues or political commentary. But if the squares at The Corner can post it, so can I.)

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WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

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