Update #9 On the Making History Crowdfunding Campaign
THANK YOU to everyone who contributed to MAKING HISTORY on #GivingTuesday! 1% of what was raised will be donated to Pro Bono Speaks.
MAKING HISTORY reached 74% funding as s result of #GivingTuesday!
Funding is currently at 75%
In other news, I'm really excited about the first takers of my mini-ebook THE SECRETS TO THE SUCCESS OF MY CROWDFUNDING CAMPAIGN! For me as an author, it's always exciting to know that people are reading my work.
It has been quite a nonstop week! At the Taiwan Center's suggestion I arranged to have a translator with me at the talk that I was to give on December 4th. While I can speak Taiwanese and some Mandarin, it doesn't come naturally and it's easier for me to express myself in English. Kiki, who I met at the TAA-NY Dinner Discussion event where I spoke about the Story of Su Beng was kind enough to agree to translate for me. To prep her, I prepared some notes in advance for her. But I didn't get them to her until Monday because these days, I often find myself too distracted to sit down and focus on one thing as I try to keep up with all the social media that comes along with running this crowdfunding campaign, think about how to strategize my next steps, reach out to new contacts every day, answer inquiries, write thank you emails, and so on and so on.
Me with Patsy Chen and Kiki Lee (my friend and translator) at the New York Taiwan Center, December 4, 2013
On Tuesday I met with Sarah Williams, the Founder of Pro Bono Speaks to record a video about #GivingTuesday, then I stopped by the Taiwan Center to do a quick audio/visual equipment check for my presentation there on Wednesday, December 4. I had decided that I would show some raw video footage that I've shot of Su Beng during the talk, but I wanted to make sure that everything was in working order because the last time I gave a talk at the Taiwan Center, which was September last year, there were some technical problems and I wasn't able to show the video clips on the flat screen TV there. So I had to play the clips off of my little Macbook Air, and that really wasn't effective. It turns out that there had been a problem with the HDMI cable connection, and this time I found everything in working order.
So on Tuesday night I sifted through all of my video footage of Su Beng deciding what clips to show. By the wee hours of Wednesday morning, I had managed to figure out to import video clips from my miniDVs into iMovie and I had a string of video clips to show, but it was really raw. I had no time to "make it look pretty" by adding in any transitions, titles or subtitles.
At the end of my talk about Su Beng, the Taiwan Center presented me this wonderful certificate of appreciation. When I read what it said, it really made me I feel like everything that I've been doing has all been worthwhile. It's such a simple thing, but so affirming and encouraging.
It's gestures like this that really matter and help me to keep going. Single handedly running this crowdfunding campaign has been quite a test of personal endurance. These last two weeks have been the toughest ones so far. I think I say that every week, but things did get really intense around Thanksgiving. Don't get me wrong, there has definitely been a lot of really good news in the last two weeks- namely that FAPA-YPG is going to be an Executive producer of the short documentary of Su Beng and that the two additional Co-Producer credits that were offered on November 25th got snapped up just days after I announced that they were available!
I want to thank my personal support team, who I know prefer to remain anonymous. They are the ones who have been supporting me, and behind the "behind the scenes" of this crowdfunding campaign. They are a small group of personal friends, each of whom I simply asked to be there for me, to help, advise and listen to me throughout this campaign. Each in his own way has given me advice on this campaign early on before this campaign even launched, and during the campaign by helping with some key translation and/or with some of the strategic announcements made halfway through the campaign. Beyond that they've also given me a tremendous amount personal support as there have been some trying personal circumstances along the way.
This campaign has been about so much more than just raising funds to reach my goal, it has garnered a great deal of support for my work to document the life of Su Beng and already I can see how it is creating awareness both about Taiwan and Su Beng. I have personally received so many words of encouragement and even a handwritten note- from complete strangers- people who I'd rather refer to as people who I have not met yet. Though I have not personally met many of the people who have contributed to the MAKING HISTORY campaign, but I do sincerely hope that one day I will. And as I've said before, I believe that this is just the beginning of my relationship with the people- who have funded MAKING HISTORY, are following this campaign, and now interested in reading the biography of Su Beng.