SKIP Book Kickstarter

Wooo hooo!!!

Doing the "We get Kate's book" dance!  Woot, woot!

Jennifer Pomykaj wrote:Finally see a mention about the kickstarter in Justin Rhodes email I got this morning at 6:11. It’s a blurb at the bottom, but maybe it will generate  some attention. I’ve been wondering why I haven’t seen more support for Paul and his book from some of the people I follow in this space. Where’s Marjory Wildcraft? You had a book from Lynn Gillespie, where is her email blurb?

Mike, you’ve done an amazing job and your email got people looking again and making sure their pledges were right. So mission accomplished!

And I have to say that Nicole, you’re an awesome artist and I love your drawings!

Yay permies!! Here’s to the money rolling in for the final countdown!! Good luck guys!

Thanks Jennifer!  It took a while to establish communications with Justin but as soon as he heard from us, he was immediately on board.  Lynn Gillespie did send out at least two emails about it, I'd say about a week and a half ago.  It's really nice that we've been able to make some new connections between permies and other permaculture groups.  

I've talked to a number of publishing houses that have authors and books that are right up our alley.  Unfortunately, most of the time, their ability to cross-promote ebooks is limited by contracts so after a few conversations we realize it won't work.  But it's a start.

Thanks everyone for your kind words and support, it really means a lot!!!

     $116,280!

Jennifer Pomykaj wrote:Finally see a mention about the kickstarter in Justin Rhodes email I got this morning at 6:11. It’s a blurb at the bottom, but maybe it will generate  some attention. I’ve been wondering why I haven’t seen more support for Paul and his book from some of the people I follow in this space. Where’s Marjory Wildcraft? You had a book from Lynn Gillespie, where is her email blurb?

Last year, Jennifer spent more than a hundred hours contacting all sorts of folks in an effort to get work out about the kickstarter.  In the end, two organizations (out of about 200) actually did something and the results were weak.  Lesson learned.  

Each year we spend months trying to figure out how to be smart about doing a kickstarter.  Being smart could mean a million dollars, infecting ten times more brains with permaculture stuff and super fueling our other projects for the year.  

---

One of the reasons I started permies is that I saw that each regional leader would not tell their audience about other regional leaders stuff.  And that was making it so that cool projects would fail due to a lack of people finding out about them.  I thought it would be good to create a place that would gladly announce all the events and, hopefully, fill all the events.  Move permaculture forward.  

Years pass and ....   I am glad to promote kickstarters of other people even if they will not promote mine.  I am glad to promote an online summit even if I am not invited to be a speaker.  And, I am glad to promote the events and PDCs of others even if they will never mention my events or even mention permies.

Of course, if they do mention my stuff and it works, then I become grateful.  And I think my gratitude can be pretty awesome.

I thought I was on Justin's email, but I guess I am not.   When I contacted Justin about the permaculture chickens movie, he did not hesitate - he instantly provided me with everything I would need and then said he would tell his peeps about my kickstarter.   I am grateful :)

nataly marchuk wrote:Hi there!
I know it is all exciting and a bit stressful for you'll, but I want to shed some good news and pose a question:
After receiving the update that I am at $25 level  (I know, I know that was part mistake, but nevertheless) I went to Kickstarter to check and realized that I have two accounts there. I suspected it for some time but never was thorough enough to do something about it. This campaign motivated me to address this issue: I backed at least one (may be more) Paul's project from my gmail account and 4 campaigns from yahoo account. Moreover, I have 2 accounts on permies as well with yahoo one from 2015. So after that email (Fix your pledge!) I was able to figure things out and actually tie my $65 pledge to the Kickstarter yahoo account that supported most of the Paul Wheaton campaigns
My question is even though I know it is my mess, I truly want to visit one of the events at Wheaton Labs and may be considering my two accounts combined I would have a chance?
Thank you so much for doing all amazing things that you do!
Best wishes,
Nataly

The lovely thing is that you are being lovely about it.  It seems that most people that travel this path try to get things sorted out with a lot of anger and awful.

I know that there is a process here on permies to merge two accounts.  I have never learned how to do it, but I think nicole has done it.  As part of it, one email address is your "primary" and you can have one or more "secondary" email addresses.  And all your candy gets moved to one account with all those email addresses while the other account is locked.

When the time comes for figuring out who goes to which event, we will send out the official kickstarter "survey" which will ask, for each event, "wanna go?"  That will go through the official kickstarter stuff.  With whatever account and email address you are using for that.  And then when we select the people that will be going, we will contact them through the email address on their kickstarter account.

Does that help?

I sent out a dailyish just now:

21 stretch goals complete! Garden Master Course tickets are next!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/paulwheaton/skip-0?ref=b92d0e

This is Paul the Happy!  We are now down to hours left and I am so excited to be getting such a powerful river of generosity and kind words.  Both from backers and from the good people offering stretch goal stuff.  Thanks everybody!  Whenever you hear about a negative thing in the world, please remember this moment.  So many good people doing such good things.

On to the joy factory!

At the beginning of the kickstarter, a $65 backer would get:

- a draft copy of the new book Rocket Mass Heaters: Analysis and Design
- 4 gift codes for the Round Wood Timber Framing documentary
- 4 gift codes for the Permaculture Thorns draft eBook
- 11 podcast review of Botany in a Day by Thomas J Elpel
- Full movie "Rocket Ovens"
- "Building a Better World in Your Backyard" audiobook
- 6 physical SKIP books (or mix and match eBooks)
- your most creative name in the SKIP book

And now, because of hitting 21 stretch goals, those people also get:

 - Sepp Holzer's movie "Desert or Paradise" ($10 value)
 - David Pagan Butler's movie "Make a Natural Swimming Pool" ($15 value)
 - Ben Peterson's "Wood Gasifier Builder’s Bible" as an eBook ($29 value)
 - Mike Oehler's "$50 and Up Underground House Book" as an eBook ($10 value)
 - All 117 hours of the video from Permaculture Voices 1, 2 and 3 ($99 value)
 - Tony Wrench's eBook "A Simple Roundhouse Manual" ($20 value)
 - Leigh Tate's eBook "5 acres and a Dream - the Book" ($10 value)
 - Green Planet Films movie "Abundance on Dry Land" ($10 value)  
 - Michael Judd's webinar "Water Harvesting and Soil Building" ($45 value)
 - Living Woods Magazine - all 55 issues ($35 value)
 - Robert Kourik's eBook "Roots Demystified" ($12 value)
 - Best of Mother Earth News 2018 - 196 pages ($10 value)    
 - World Domination Gardening 3-movie set ($28 value)
 - 20 backers get their likeness worked into the illustrations (infinite value)
 - Lynn Gillespie's eBook "High Performance Gardening" ($29 value)
 - Erica Wisner's Greenhouse Rocket Mass Heater plans ($20 value)
 - Justin Rhodes' movie "Permaculture Chickens" ($29 value)
 - Kate Downham's ebook "A Year in an Off-grid Kitchen" ($10 value)

And, in addition to that, several of the $65 and up people will get event tickets:

 - 6 tickets to the 2021 SKIP event ($1250 value)
 - 6 tickets to the 2021 Permaculture Technology Jamboree ($1650 value)
 - 6 tickets to the 2021 Rocket Mass Heater Jamboree ($1650 value)

And the next stretch goal is that six people will get tickets to Helen Atthowe's Garden Master Certification Course.  It will be a lot like the Master Gardener course she used to teach, but with a heavy emphasis on organic techniques, permaculture techniques and Fukuoka's techniques.

  https://wheaton-labs.com/garden-master/

Nicole has made some wacky memes for the kickstarter!  Check it out!

   https://permies.com/p/1251958

link to the kickstarter:

  https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/paulwheaton/skip-0?ref=b92d0e

Questions?  Comments?  Deep thoughts?  Racy thoughts?  Shameless begging for ice cream?  The kickstarter party thread is pretty active:

  https://permies.com/t/skip-book



Thanks again for making the world beautiful.

I just need to say thanks to all the people posting encouraging words in this thread, and sending encouraging words via email and kickstarter PM stuff.  And, most of all, putting actualy coin into the kickstarter.   A dollar in the kickstarter weighs a hundred times more than somebody being nasty on the internet.

A huge welcome to all the Justin Rhodes fans who have recently backed the kickstarter!  Welcome to the party bus!!!

     $117,008!

I just got an email claiming I'm at a lower level than my pledge. I signed into Kickstarter to double-check, and my pledge is set to the correct level ($65 + shipping) and the pledge label is correct for that level, so I'm a bit frustrated and very sure I didn't accidentally just change the dollar amount and not the pledge. Why am I getting emails saying I'm at a $25 level?

Sorry Kallista, that "$25 level" update was a botched email so you can disregard it.  Sorry for the confusion.  

I will be attending this course:

Jennifer Pomykaj wrote:Finally see a mention about the kickstarter in Justin Rhodes email I got this morning at 6:11. It’s a blurb at the bottom, but maybe it will generate  some attention. I’ve been wondering why I haven’t seen more support for Paul and his book from some of the people I follow in this space. Where’s Marjory Wildcraft? You had a book from Lynn Gillespie, where is her email blurb?

I attended the whole ‘Building Your Permaculture Property Summit’ that Takota Coen and Rob Avis put on last weekend. Permies has been advertising this summit in the Permies daily-ish so I was sorely disappointed they mentioned Permies as a sponsor but didn’t say a thing about Paul’s Kickstarter :(

I originally selected the $25 USD reward level. That was accompanied by a $15 shipping cost. I only really wanted the one book. I still have 9 of the previous books sitting in the shipping box just outside my bedroom door.
The local city library was not interested in a donation.

But about half way through all the stretch goal it got interesting enough to increase my contribution to $65 USD which increased my shipping to $30.
I experienced the issue that occurred on the last kickstarter, I thought I had gone through the right path this time by selecting “manage pledge”.
When I followed the post link about checking my pledge it showed me at the level that I had selected $65.

My question was did I get the email about checking on my pledge because of the shipping expense?
Or was I just part of the Oops?

     $118,838!

Rebecca Blake wrote:I was sorely disappointed they mentioned Permies as a sponsor but didn’t say a thing about Paul’s Kickstarter :(

Perhaps they were so busy with their own stuff they didn't take the time to learn about this kickstarter.

Josh Boschma wrote:I originally selected the $25 USD reward level. That was accompanied by a $15 shipping cost. I only really wanted the one book. I still have 9 of the previous books sitting in the shipping box just outside my bedroom door.
The local city library was not interested in a donation.

But about half way through all the stretch goal it got interesting enough to increase my contribution to $65 USD which increased my shipping to $30.
I experienced the issue that occurred on the last kickstarter, I thought I had gone through the right path this time by selecting “manage pledge”.
When I followed the post link about checking my pledge it showed me at the level that I had selected $65.

My question was did I get the email about checking on my pledge because of the shipping expense?
Or was I just part of the Oops?

The information I have access to at this time is pretty limited, so it took me a while to find the info.  

You are currently set up with backer level "6 Physical Books plus Glory!" - which is the $65 level. And I see there is a lot of extra coin in there for shipping.  

Mike has a couple of options to get your shipping costs down - have you seen that stuff?  I think it is on the kickstarter FAQ.

Jennifer Pomykaj wrote:And I have to say that Nicole, you’re an awesome artist and I love your drawings!

Paul Fookes wrote:

Nicole Alderman wrote: I feel really, really bad for Mike. Through this whole kickstarter, he has been fantastic about finding spelling, accuracy, and grammar errors. He's proofread every single one of my graphics, and caught so many errors. I know he tries really hard for everything to be just right. And I think that makes it even worse that this error happened to him. I guess it goes to show that even Mike is human!

Wow , There are a million kids going to die of malaria, starvation, and neglect today.  The fact that a box did not get ticked is not a biggy in the world scheme.  But onward and upward with SKIP.  really looking forward to 4th of May to find a big bag of goodies.  Thanks one and all for your hard work and stretch goals.  Love your art work Nicole.  Would like one of your sketches as a stretch.  Just putting it out there?

Thank you both!  I just wanted to make sure credit went where credit is due--the people who made the cover and video are Bernal Brothers Studio. You can see Andrés Bernal posting here. He and his brother have been working really hard at drawing the cover and inside pictures, that they probably haven't had more time to post here in the thread. I'm thankful for both of them, because I certainly don't have enough time to do all they're doing! It takes a ton of time to make so many little people and details that are in the cover, and they're doing a great job!

All I've done is take their artwork and move (and sometimes alter it slightly) to match the stretch goal and reward images on kickstarter, and make all those banners and images. So, I'm very much doing the "graphics" stuff, while they're doing the drawing!

You can see some of their sketches here .

     $119,093!

WOW

How does it feel to be making $100/hr XD

I kinda feel like a duck.


Looking calm above the surface but paddling like hell behind the scenes

T Simpson wrote:How does it feel to be making $100/hr XD

I used to make $300 per hour.

Now ....  At the end of the year I will crunch the numbers and it will turn out that I made 80 cents an hour.

so close to 120 ....

And only 47 hours left!

I just changed the announcement at the top to say "Just 1 day left"!

Just $222 to go to the $120k stretch goal.
(one of those fun numbers for you Nicole!)

paul wheaton wrote:

Rebecca Blake wrote:I was sorely disappointed they mentioned Permies as a sponsor but didn’t say a thing about Paul’s Kickstarter :(

Perhaps they were so busy with their own stuff they didn't take the time to learn about this kickstarter.

Seems like they were awfully busy, so that’s probably correct.

I applaud your greater understanding than my own.

Mike Haasl wrote:Sam, I messed up.  That update should have only gone to the $25 people but I missed a checkbox and it went to everybody.  Which totally confused the situation that I was trying to unconfuse.  Not my best day.

You are at the right level, please ignore that update

Thank you so much for clarifying. I appreciate it!
Sam

I have to say, this has been a fun month.  I've enjoyed checking in on the kickstarter to see how many "others" there are out there with shared passions and interests. I've loved watching the kickstarter grow and grow. I feel part of something. It is very cool.
Thank you Permies for putting all this amazing information together for truly such an incredible deal.
Time for another STRETCH....

Wow, 22 great stretch goals going out...so far!

     $120,194!

Today I was asked:

How does the mix and match work at $65?
If I request one physical book, then how many of the e-downloads/stretch goals would I receive?

Thank you so much! Love what you’re all doing! Love permies

To answer this, I'm gonna start with the blurb from the kickstarter:

Once the kickstarter is over, everybody will get a kickstarter "survey" so I can get all sorts of details from you about your preferences. People that supported the kickstarter at $25 or more will be asked how many physical books they want. The remaining number that they paid for will be converted 3-to-1 from physical books to eBook gift codes.

For example, at the $65 level, folks can choose between 6 physical books or 18 ebook gift codes. Or a mix! The survey question will ask how many physical books you want. Maybe you will put in "4." So the remaining 2 books are converted, 3-to-1, to 6 eBook gift codes. I will send you 4 physical books and 6 eBook gift codes.

Some people have asked "how do the shipping fees work?" Unfortunately we do not have the ability to scale shipping fees based on the number of physical books selected at a particular reward level. Each reward level has a set shipping fee associated with it according to location. If you are getting only ebook gift codes, then you can select "US Virgin Islands" as your shipping location and the shipping charge will be $0 and you will receive 0 physical books.  It's not perfect, but it's the best we can do within the system.

And if you are actually in the US Virgin Islands and want physical copies... congratulations, you get free shipping!  

Does this answer the question?  

As many of you know, the next stretch goal is "Gracie's Backyard", a beautiful film documenting the daily life of a highly-diverse, small-scale commercial permaculture farm in Sweden.  Here's the movie trailer:

Nicole Alderman wrote:And only 47 hours left!

I just changed the announcement at the top to say "Just 1 day left"!

I changed it to show hours.

Thank you Paul.

I understand that if I backed at $65 then wanted 1 physical book, I would have 15 e-book codes. Can I choose which 15 books? And choosing a physical copy doesn’t remove any stretch goal goodies?

Thank you very much for taking the time to illuminate me on this.

paul wheaton wrote:Today I was asked:

How does the mix and match work at $65?
If I request one physical book, then how many of the e-downloads/stretch goals would I receive?

Thank you so much! Love what you’re all doing! Love permies

To answer this, I'm gonna start with the blurb from the kickstarter:

Once the kickstarter is over, everybody will get a kickstarter "survey" so I can get all sorts of details from you about your preferences. People that supported the kickstarter at $25 or more will be asked how many physical books they want. The remaining number that they paid for will be converted 3-to-1 from physical books to eBook gift codes.

For example, at the $65 level, folks can choose between 6 physical books or 18 ebook gift codes. Or a mix! The survey question will ask how many physical books you want. Maybe you will put in "4." So the remaining 2 books are converted, 3-to-1, to 6 eBook gift codes. I will send you 4 physical books and 6 eBook gift codes.

Some people have asked "how do the shipping fees work?" Unfortunately we do not have the ability to scale shipping fees based on the number of physical books selected at a particular reward level. Each reward level has a set shipping fee associated with it according to location. If you are getting only ebook gift codes, then you can select "US Virgin Islands" as your shipping location and the shipping charge will be $0 and you will receive 0 physical books.  It's not perfect, but it's the best we can do within the system.

And if you are actually in the US Virgin Islands and want physical copies... congratulations, you get free shipping!  

Does this answer the question?  

I've been trying to find a way to express the awesome diversity in kickstarter rewards, and so I made this. I'm still not sure if I like the style--I'd love input!

Nicole,
I love it! We've been on this journey/discovery/education for a little over 10 years. It started with a garden and some chickens and Guineas.  I feel like that graphic highlights all of the topics I've been learning about. So much cheaper than what I have put in so far.  Between books, Mother Earth News fairs, supporting local like-minded folks, plus my time in finding all the info (before I found permies.com), and everything else $65 seems incredibly cheap.  And I love the different formats too. I know some function better in my life (technology and I dont always get along) so I would think others probably feel the same way about different formats.
Long story short, I like that the graphic highlights the different areas in which the kickstarter will help "you" grow knowledge.

I did that when I changed from $5 to $65. I am still getting messages that I am not at the level I think I am. I even got one that said I  was still at $25 even though I  never was at $25. I followed those instructions,  though, and double checked and it looked like it was supposed to according to the instructions.  I have never used Kickstarter before and I am getting worried.