In which my occasional faith in humanity is upheld

[madbaker]

I alluded to this briefly a while back. A couple months ago an online acquaintance of mine was attacked with an axe by her significant other, who then murdered their son. She escaped and called the police, and the perpetrator has been arrested and charged.

She's part of the group I belong to in an online game. The group immediately organized donations to help with her medical and funeral expenses.

One of the things I like about this game is that (unlike World of Warcraft, say) the game administrators prohibit trading in-game items for money. It helps keep it fun. My group asked the administrators for a temporary waiver on this policy so we could hold an auction for her benefit. They not only agreed, they actively lent their support. The outpouring of donations and bidding in the auction was astounding.

To quote a post from one of the organizers: "The GRAND TOTAL pledged by all of you fantastic folks, on all of the items that were auctioned off for the Andrew Bailey Memorial Auction is...

(this is drum roll worthy, but the forum lacks sound effects) $23,000 and change!

There were 417 items sold, and every single one of you was fantastic above and beyond our wildest dreams. I know we've said it before, but if you donated an item, if you bid on an item, if you told a friend about the auction, give yourself a huge hug from all of us who love Acey dearly and wanted to do something for her. You made a difference.

I hope I'm not overstepping myself to share with you something Acey said. When you think about what this has accomplished, you'll know, beyond a shadow of a doubt why we did this. It HAS mattered.

She was able to pay for Andrew's burial and funeral expenses, and also buy a headstone for his grave. YOU helped make that happen. Acey was able to take care of that and not having a debt hanging over her head where she really needs to be able to concentrate on healing physically and emotionally.

She will also be able to pay for a large chunk of her hospital bills. YOU helped make that happen. She won't have to see a hospital bill coming, repeatedly, month after month after month and relive the horror every time she opens it and has to remember what caused those bills, in addition to worrying about how it'll be paid. Instead, she will be able to start to rebuild her life."

And, from another: "This community has demonstrated that "video gamer" is not a synonym for "misanthrope." That today, we chose not to let a member of our family suffer alone."

Comments

[ornerie.livejournal.com]

I participate in an online community focussed on knitting of all things.

recently, the membership took it upon themselves to help buy the community folks a new server, and next thing we know we had raised $71,000. Over half of that was raised in a matter of days.

tons of stuff was donated (hundreds of dollars in gift certs to online yarn stores, actual yarn, knitting supplies, etc) as raffle prizes, etc.

its really rather mindboggling. and this community isnt even a non-profit. its a brand spanking new startup brainchild of a couple of 20-somethings out in Boston who quit their jobs to start this small business less than a year ago.

I am presuming that anthropology and psychology grad students will be writing theses on this phenomenon of on-line communities and the unfortunate marginalizaiton of a rather overlooked revenue stream by traditional marketing forces :)

[shadowwalkyr.livejournal.com]

Actually, WoW does forbid selling of in-game items for money and says so quite clearly in the Terms of Use (http://http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/legal/termsofuse.html) (see section 8. Ownership/Selling of the Account or Virtual Items).

Still, what you guys did was the right answer, and I have no idea if Blizzard would have granted you the same exemption.

Good show.