Giving by the power of Facebook!
17 December 2009
A grassroots social networking campaign to get Rage Against the Machine’s track ‘Killing in the Name Of’ to number one is raising tens of thousands of pounds for Shelter this Christmas.
A Facebook group was started by Tracy and Jon Morter to encourage people to buy the track and avoid the X Factor monopoly of the number 1 spot. Within days, the group had over half a million members.
Tracy and Jon are asking members to make a Christmas donation to Shelter when they buy the track. To date, they’ve raised a grand total of £42,000 through their Justgiving page, and the figure is rising all the time.
Tracy Morter commented: 'When Jon and I started the group it was just a bit of fun, we had no idea we'd get this much support. Once we realised the impact of the campaign we thought it would be a waste to not make use of the attention to do some good for those in need.
'This year, thanks to the recession, it has been particularly hard on people, keeping a roof over your head has become increasingly hard, people have lost their homes, so it made sense to try and help Shelter.'
Tracy added: 'We are so amazed at how generous people have been. This has been the best bit about this campaign madness, even if Rage don't make it to number 1 it's all been worth it just for this.'
All donations – large and small – make a big difference to our work with homeless and badly housed people. A big thank you to Tracy and Jon for choosing to support Shelter, and to everyone who has donated through the campaign.