Peter Boyle
$111, 045 in just 10 weeks — that is awesome! Thank you to all our readers and supporters who have helped make this happen. You have ensured that the dissident voice of Green Left Weekly will not be silenced.
We received 350 donations over this time, and 28 of these were donations of more than $1000. In addition, GLW supporters, particularly members of the Democratic Socialist Perspective and Resistance, organised fundraising events that brought in $21,409.
Over the course of the emergency appeal, 43 supporters decided to become Friends of Green Left Weekly and contribute a regular amount to the paper. If you would like to become a Friend of Green Left Weekly (agreeing to make a regular monthly donation) please visit our website at <http://www.greenleft.org.au/fogl.htm> or phone us on 1800 634 206 (free from anywhere in Australia).
Each week in this column you have read a selection of the many messages of support that have come in. A common thread in these messages was: "We need Green Left Weekly more than ever in dangerous times like these." We've been valued as a "voice of dissent", a "voice for the voiceless" and a "voice of resistance".
John Pilger, the renowned dissident journalist said: "Without Green Left Weekly, freedom of the press and public truth-telling in Australia would be gravely ill." And the Romero Catholic Community of Adelaide wrote us a fine mission statement, "Seek truth, expose the lies, educate and give hope".
Other prominent people who supported the appeal included: Jim Reid, Australian Manufacturing Workers Union printing division Victorian state secretary; Chris Cain, WA secretary of the Maritime Union of Australia; Tony Kevin, author of A Certain Maritime Incident: The Sinking of SIEV X; Ghulam Haider, asylum seeker and former Nauru detainee; Martin Kingham, Victorian secretary of the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union; Dean Mighell, Victorian secretary of the Electrical Trades Union; Kevin Bracken, Victorian secretary of the MUA; Ian Jamieson, co-convener of the WA MUA Port Committee; Peter Camejo, 2003 Greens candidate for California governor and Ralph Nader's running mate in the 2004 Us presidential election.
Now what? One supporter asked a question early in the appeal: "Even if you succeed with this emergency appeal, how will you ensure that Green Left Weekly does not run up another deficit next year? Should you consider raising the price? Or running more paid advertising?"
We will try not to raise the price because we use our individual issue sales to broaden the readership of the paper. Our objective is to get the stories and discussions in GLW out to as many people as possible. This is why we make the contents of GLW available for free on the internet, winning us a massive daily audience (averaging 10,000 visits a day). And given the message we publish, corporate advertisers are not exactly queuing up at our door.
So the way we will keep Green Left Weekly afloat in the future will remain the way we have done it since its inception in 1991. Roughly a third of our costs are met from sales and subscriptions. The rest comes from fundraising activities organized by our supporters and from donations. This is what Green Left Weekly's supporters have done for 15 years.
We've learnt something from the success of this emergency appeal. A task shared is a task easier to accomplish. So from January 2006 we will be organising our normal fundraising campaign through the pages of the paper, sharing our little victories and our challenges. And we are sure that Green Left Weekly's amazing supporters will keep the project going.
Thanks for the following donations that came in last week: Geelong workers $1000; Erin K $1000; Chris L $1000; Marcus G $1000; Steven H $100; Frank C $10; Damien R $200; Noel H $6; Peter H $20; Linda U $20; Steve O $250; Sam W & Janet P $500; John J $250; Warren T $10; Nicole H $70; John P $100; Chris W $100; Lara P $500; James C $25; Jo H $20; Nick E $410; Amy Mc $20; Alex M $100; Ognjen P $30; Kerryn W $100; anon $250; Brian Mc $10; Sept FOGLS $400; Andrew H $250; BH $100; Angie P $50; Sarah G $5; Hugh TB $30; Trish C $100; Michael D $50; Sydney Resistance $125; Paul B $250; Jostein K $100; Mike B $500; Anne C $20; Tom A $6; Sille S $200; Brianna P $200; Pat B $100; Margie W $100; Chris S $200; Dan B $50; Linda W $50; Ray F $50; Ed A $50; Kim B $30; Nat Z $400; Paul & Beryl T $20; Ben R $100; Sarah W $50; Dave W $100; Clayton D $100; Louise M $100; Catherine R $10; Margaret B $50; Roger D $70; Alistair D $8; Rory D $70; Brett K & Erin C $500;Peter R $50; Fay W $50; Brisbane GLW dinner $2500; Newcastle GLW dinner $470; Sydney fiesta $1000; Melbourne AFL grand final party $900; Adelaide DSP branch $600; Hobart DSP branch $300; Perth DSP branch $851.50; Canberra DSP branch $200; Wollongong DSP branch $848; Darwin DSP branch $26; Newcastle DSP branch $87.
From Green Left Weekly, September 28, 2005.
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