Thursday, November 24, 2011

Minecraft Community: One of our Own Needs Help!

Achievement Get!

We have reached our goal!


Thanks to all of you in the Minecraft Community, we have surpassed our goal of $1375.00 by reaching $1386.00!


I've been asked to leave the donation button up for people who still want to participate. All monies collected will go directly to Mark Cooper to assist in his housing needs, but we have reached our current goal.


Reading Connecticut tenant law, he may still be forced to move, but will be able to pay the arrears, so it should give him 3 months if the rental company decides to still pursue eviction.


I would like to thank every single one of you who Tweeted, Retweeted, posted video, auctioned items, and donated. This community showed its true nature today - a community full of caring individuals.


This is the true meaning of Thanksgiving, and this community has given one of its own a reason to celebrate this year.


Thank you all, from the bottom of my heart.


=Update #2=


SamCube of WonderCraft is auctioning two prints, one signed by Notch and one signed by Jens, to raise money to donate to Mark's living situation. Check them out here: http://wondercraft.net/?p=2627


=Update #3=


Thanks to SamCube and the folks that we kept the donation button open for, the Minecraft community has raised a total of $2288.68 for Mark's Eviction Fund! Mark has already received the first $1800 (which is enough to pay the back amount, and perhaps the legal fees), and I'll be sending the rest later in the week (waiting to clear eChecks and handle possible reversals, of which we have had a couple).


Thank you all for opening your hearts (and wallets!) this holiday season for one of our own!


See Mark's response here: http://astragali.efx3.com/2011/11/24/mind-utterly-blown-and-then-some/




-Original Blog Post-






It's Thanksgiving Day in the USA, and most of us will be sitting down to a meal with family today. While we do this, and give thanks for what we have received in the past year, one of our community members is facing eviction.




Mark Cooper, known as Astragali, The Minecraft Scribe has provided a source of information and humor to the Minecraft community on his blog since February 2011. He is the English language translator for SamCube's Wondercraft, responsible for vetting contributions to The Shaft Podcast (where he has appeared as a guest as well), is a player in The Unholy Triumvirate's Minecraft a Trois LP/gameplay series; has appeared as a guest/done voice work on the Pretzelcast, The Half-Bakes, Chick with a Pick, and much more.


Unbeknownst to most of us (because who likes talking about the bad stuff?) Astra lost his job late in the summer, after having his hours cut to so few that it was unsustainable. After a couple weeks, he was able to obtain another job, but the damage was done - between the cut hours and weeks with no pay, he was in the hole to the rental company. Of course, he went to the landlord and arranged to pay the back rent - since he was now working again, this was no problem, right? At the time, the rental company was absolutely fine with this.


Apparently, not any more. When he came home last night, the rental company had posted an eviction notice. The only way Mark can keep his housing is to come up with $1375.00 by the court date, which, at this time, we don't know when it is (but we can speculate between 10-30 days.). Unfortunately, this amount is impossible for him.


After finding out, friends burned up the Twitter main (and DM's) last night, looking for solutions. This is what we came up with:




So this is what I'm asking: please donate to keep a roof over Mark's head.


Please help if you can. I know some of you have been to Minecon, and are strapped. I know that it's the holiday season and you have to do things for your family. I know the economy is bad.


But please, if you only have a dollar or two, please, please donate. Use the Paypal donation button below.


Donate to help someone who has provided the community with information, humor, friendship, and joy.


Everything donated will go directly to dealing with Mark Cooper's housing needs.


Thank you, Minecraft Community!



25 comments:

  1. so sweet. Its great to see this kind of love in the MC Community.

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  2. i would love to help you out but my mum has put a password on the paypal to stop me from spending money. if it was some other form of paying (other than paypal) i would gladly help out

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  3. There is a 405 ( Method not allowed) error on your page that Paypal redirected a donor to after donating. Cheers.

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  4. Done what I could. I hope he doesn't have nay problems to cash out of PayPal

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  5. Thanks, Daniel - I'll check with Paypal. It's supposed to direct back here. It may be having a slight overload problem at the moment. :)

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  6. I hope you can get through this ordeal Astragali... I never had the honor to meet you, but I hope that one day, I will be able to... Wait... you live in CT right?

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  7. Notch is the fucking millionaire, why doesn't he bail him out?

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  8. Donated my symbolic dollar. Happy thanksgiving! (Although we don't celebrate it in Belgium ;))

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  9. hope everything turns out ok man.

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  10. I am donating some cash to help Mark out.I would not want to be in his shoes and really right now at this time of the year being winter.Not wanting to be out on the street living in a old abandoned car or something.No way!Sorry to hear this Mark but hopefully this issue will be resolved quickly if we all lend a hand.:) Jackie

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  11. Here's to being thankful for having a roof above ones head. Donated :).

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  12. Steam sale sucked yesterday. So I'll help a guy out why not

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  13. Notch retweeted this. Glad I am able to help out.

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  14. You guys could also set up an adf.ly link or two for him, that way people without spending money could still help him out!

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  15. @nightrder1195 That might give people the false impression that they are helping his cause by more than they are and be less likely to actually donate, when in fact ad.fly pays out very little. I think it's better to keep it donations-only.

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  16. @awkisopen adf.ly operates on an exponential growth function for how much money it passes out. It's true, you get very little money in the beginning. But the more people you get to click your link in a short amount of time, the amount of money you get goes up - exponentially.

    Plus, what's wrong with giving people the impression that they are helping his cause?? If someone has no money to donate, not even a dollar, but they can click a link and make him just a small amount of money, what's the problem with that? It even says " I know some of you have been to Minecon, and are strapped. I know that it's the holiday season and you have to do things for your family. I know the economy is bad." in the post. So what's wrong with giving people who can't donate a way to help out?

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  17. Everything will work out in the end Astragali. I made my donation of $20 as it was all I can afford right now. Wish it could be more for you. No one deserves to come home to an eviction notice on Thanksgiving holiday.

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  18. Hi there, congratulations and I hope all goes well!

    I just wanted to say that many foreclosures today aren't being done completely by-the-book, or are downright illegal. You'll find news stories all over, for example the problems with the recent MERS system.

    Unfortunately I wouldn't know where to start. There's a bunch of websites, but afaik they could all be scams or misinformed. Personally I'm a fan of Marc Stevens and he might be able to help or know someone who does.

    On the other hand, I understand if you're tired of this, and by all means let it go because it might not be worth the trouble. I don't know anything about your situation and I don't know if you're being treated fairly or not.

    Either way, it's a great thing you've got out of the fire. Take care and best of luck to you!

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  19. @nightrder1195 Because, more importantly than that, it will give those who CAN help out an excuse to not do so. Why go through all the effort of donating actual money when they can just click a link?

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  20. @nightrder1195 Also, please point us toward a source that indicates ad.fly pays out exponentially. A preliminary Google search reveals nothing on the subject. I admit I'm probably missing something obvious, but I'd be really interested in a source.

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  21. God, so so amazing to the people that wanted to help him out <3

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  22. Keep the donations coming for a little bit more, folks. He's going to have to pay income tax on the $1375, which could be as high as $400 more.

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  23. Actually, better consult a tax specialist. Re-reading the IRS guidelines for Gift Taxes makes it sound like he's off the hook.

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