You may have noticed the Fund-o-Meter has been getting very colorful lately. We've seen a heartening surge in donations from participants, and we've continued to add our non-donor income to the totals, including all the money from merch sales.

Our goal before December 1 is to fill up all the books in the Fund-o-Meter, pay for both NaNo and YWP, and raise enough money to spend 2010 working on all the improvements laid out in those books, including developing a year-round version of NaNoWriMo.

To make sure we get there, we're going to host an all-day online fundraising drive on Tuesday the 24th. For it, we've set ourselves the crazy goal of raising $100,000 in donations in 24 hours. The most we've ever raised in a single day is $30,000, so this is a little loony.

But we have faith. We also have a very special offer.

If NaNoWriMo and the Young Writers Program can raise $100,000 in donations through our online Donation Station on Tuesday the 24th, I will write a song about the fundraising drive—tentatively entitled "That Beautiful Tuesday"—and perform it on NaNoVideo with staff musical accompaniment and Lindsey doing an interpretive dance alongside us.

This video will be a keepsake that NaNoWriMo participants of all ages can treasure and wince at for decades to come. Better still, your donations will mean we can bring back NaNoWriMo and the YWP for another great year of inspiration and encouragement in 2010.

The drive commences at 12:01 AM Pacific on Tuesday the 24th and runs till 11:59 PM Pacific that night. Thanks for helping us in our wordy mission!

Chris