I’ve been quiet online for a while now, and it’s been because I’ve both had lots on after work hours, but also because I’ve been spending my time trying to get a microsite out in time for it to make a difference.

Check out http://www.g8reboot.net to have a look.

Like most people in the UK, I sent in my text messages to the Live8 concert, hoping to get a ticket. I really, really wanted to go, but unfortunately I didn’t get one. In fact, only two people I know did get tickets, so I don’t feel that bad after all I know that a SQL random select statement isn’t unfair, so that’s life, and that’s cool.

Anyways, it got me to thinking – “the concerts are about raising public awareness for the G8 summit in Gleneagles, so that we can collectively put pressure on our leaders to do the right thing – trade justice, dropping the debt and more & better aid -
so what can I as an individual do instead of going to the concerts. We’re all in this together, right?” And then I remembered the May 1st Reboot that the creative community has been doing for a few years now, put the two ideas together, and thought that it would be cool to do something similiar online.

If we can spread the message, then we can create more awareness. And that is good.

I know that there are a lot of people who run websites, particularly in the tech / web / creative community, and in turn each of those websites has an audience – so if we can get to each websites audience, then we can really create more awareness. It’s not unrealistic, and it gives people an opportunity to do something in spite of not being able to go to the concerts, or Scotland for that matter. So I ran the idea past a few close friends, and started working on it the next opportunity I got. Along the way, Damien and Ryan offered to get involved, so we made a small team which made things a lot easier. Several late nights and a weekend or two later, we’ve managed to put something together that is enough to get the ball rolling.

What’s left, is for us collectively to spread the word.

So, respectfully, I’m asking people who read this around the world, to spread the word. Help us to get this out.

Tell people you see and work with, email your friends, email people on your blogroll, tell people on messenger, add a line to the bottom of your RSS feed, add a button on your site, add a Make Poverty History banner on your site if you can, post the message to your sites on the day, tell your local newspaper, get involved.

Making Poverty History is not something that we can just assume our leaders will do, neither is it something that we can assume our neighbour or parents will do for us. And while it is a massive task, and one which will probably underscore this century, all of us can do something small to help, so that collectively it makes a bigger difference.

So, respectfully, I’m asking people who read this to help us spread the word. Lend us your screens.