Lets make this right - Operation Green Triangle #OGTyoyo

General Yo-Yo
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Re: Vs Newton (Thanks Heath for being so corrupt it inspired me to do this)
Operation Green Triangle -

It is a shame to see what looked like such a powerful cause and cancer charity drive fall flat on its face due to greed and admitted theft. There is an old aphorism that states: “ The road to heck is paved with good intentions.” The actions of one man has risked the generosity of a great and loving global community. Money was promised to a cause I am very emotional about. Cancer has in some way affected 40% of the global population. Nearly 1 in 2 people have either had cancer, had a close call with cancer, lost a loved one to cancer, or are actively seeking treatment for cancer and the money promised to the American Cancer Society was stolen

I refuse to stand by and do nothing.

Today, with the assistance and council of a few key members in the yo-yo community, I am announcing Operation Green Triangle - #OGTyoyo for short
The Green Triangle is a core trick in the development of a modern yoyoer. It is difficult to learn, satisfying to master, and has three points.

What I am asking, is for community participation:
Pick an item in your collection. Post it up to ebay with 100% of the auction going to a Cancer Charity, and use the tag #OGTyoyo in the title.

Using eBay Giving Works, you can set an auction to donate 100% of that auction to a specific registered charity of your choice. eBay waves the listing and selling fees and the money goes directly from the buyer to the charity. There is no middle man. Once the funds are transferred, the seller receives shipping instructions for the buyer. This setup is 100% transparent and ensures that all promised auctions funds… 100% of them go directly to the charity. No middle man. No product to anyone but the buyer, no money to anyone but the charity. Period end.

Like the trick, Operation Green Triangle may be hard. It may be hard to give up a cherished item, but once completed it can be very satisfying.

The three points of the Green Triangle represent the three charities I want to focus on. You can technically donate to any charity, but the American Cancer Society (ACS), the Cancer Research Institute (CRI) and CureSearch for Children’s Cancer are my personal three tiers of charity donations. Here is why.

Support - The American Cancer Society is a massive organization that provides services on a breadth of areas but primarily focuses on patient support. Helping patients and families with therapy and support is a drastically needed service and the American Cancer Society does a phenomenal job.

Research - The Cancer Research Institute is dedicated to finding novel ways to harness the our own immunities and boosting the healing power of our own bodies to fight and cure cancer. This is important in finding ways to prevent cancer in the first place, and provide treatments to patients who cannot receive chemotherapy or aggressive therapy treatments.

Children – CureSearch for Children’s Cancer funds and supports children’s cancer research and provide information and resources to all those affected by children’s cancer.

From now until the November 1st, eBay auctions using the tag #OGTyoyo will be captured in a widget on YoYoSkills. Successful sales will be tracked. When you create your auction post a link to it on this thread. I’ll keep an updated list of what was donated and who donated it. The total amount raised will be presented at the end. I will be auctioning off some items from my personal collections for this charity drive. My auctions will be set to automatically transfer 100% of the sale going to one of my chosen charities. My hope is that you will do the same. I refuse to allow the yo-yo communities generosity to be poisoned with failed and sabotaged “good intentions”. I am taking action, and I hope you all will do the same.

Thank you to Jason Week, Paul Escolar, LJ (vega), Caribou Chris, Zammy, Jrod, Louis Alleyand all the others who provided input and feedback

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This will go up on yoyoskills tonight along with some auctions.

THe bullet points that everyone needs to take away are:

  • 100% of the auction money goes directly to the charity
  • No middle man
  • No product to anyone but the buyer
  • No money to anyone but the charity
  • Period end
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This is nice to get something up and running for charity, but it also seems like you’re simply running off of of the emotions (anger/sadness) of the forum members/community.

If this does end up happening, publicly link it to anything showing that,

“Look what we set up because someone else failed to donate for us properly”

just comes off as a reactive (as opposed to a genuinely proactive charity setup) result of someone else’s actions.

Don’t get me wrong here–I’m not saying, “Chris, you’re terrible and just trying to make this/something big because everyone is listening”, I’m just saying that it always rubs me the wrong way when someone uses an event to gain traction on something.

Heck, I’ll even donate.

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Honestly, it is reactive, but only kind of. Here is why.
I supported the Works. I wanted to do something similar but Heath had it going and by all accounts it was working fine until about 12 months ago. Heck, until about two weeks ago, when Louis emailed me I thought Heath had successfully donated 4k.

Now there is a need that was promised and not fulfilled. Last night I spoke to Vega and a few others and we all thought it was time to do this the right way.

Instead of trusting heath again to come through again, I would rather take an action to raise the money. He he comes through great, but I am not holding my breath.

So yes, it is reactive, but only because I thought (and trusted) a similar drive was already being handled correctly.

*edit for clarification

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I understand what you’re saying, but I have the opposite reaction. When I experience a set back, it motivates me to try harder to achieve the goal.

Donating to cancer prevention is emotional. If emotion wasn’t involved, individual donations wouldn’t make any sense. Without those individual donations, in the long run, we wouldn’t see progress on a wide variety of problems.

I don’t care why people donate. I just care that they do, and that they feel good about it.

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Wow Thatch, seriously? Chris, a hardworking man with honest intentions, took time out of his life with help from some great people to set up a charity benefit THE CORRECT WAY, and it rubs you the wrong way? Many charity benefits are “reactive.” Something happens, such as this VsNewton scandal, that triggers people that want to make a difference to come together for a common cause. It is very typical for people to want to donate after something has occurred in their life to compel them to do so. I agree with one part of your statement: proactive charity setups are a great thing. However, what better time than now to right a wrong, band together as a community, and donate money to a cause that not only deserves it, but has been ROBBED of funds it was supposed to receive? There is no place for nonchalance on a thread like this. I end my response to you there, Thatch, and hope that from here on out only constructive posts appear here.

Chris, what you’re doing is admirable. Thank you so much for setting this up and providing a safe and legitimate way for the yo-yo community to donate to a great cause. The circumstances over the last week or two have caused many of us to feel many different emotions. I, for one, feel angry and upset , but I also feel relieved, encouraged, and inspired by what you’re doing, Chris. I don’t want to leave anyone else out (JROD, Vega, and many others). I don’t know you all by name, but anyone involved in setting this up and/or donating, thank you all. Thank you all for re-affirming my belief that the yo-yo community is a community of people with big hearts who do great things. I, for one, will be taking a look at my collection tonight.

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In the next hour I’ll post some yoyos on eBay to get the ball rolling on this.

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I’ll post better pictures when I get some sunlight, but here’s a few modest items to get things going.

This is the first yoyo I ever modified on a lathe: http://www.ebay.com/itm/130777650156?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1555.l2649

This is the first pair of modern loopers I owned and that I learned to loop with:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/130777651578?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1555.l2649

This is the first production run CODE2 I received from One Drop and it has traveled with me to 6 different countries – it is quite special to me and despite my dog walking shenanigans, it still plays as totally smooth: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=130777656529

Again, just a very small gesture to get things rolling. Great idea, Chris!

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A Higby 07’ 888. I’m a big 888 fan so this seemed appropriate.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=300788761131

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I am okay with Thatch sharing his skepticism and opinion. Thatch is a good guy and i value his opinion. In fact, if more skepticism was shown 2 years ago this would all be a non issue.
It is reactive. The same way that disaster reliefs are reactive. Heath left a black eye on the yoyo community and i wont let it stand. Lets build the reaction into a movement and make something great! Like a phoenix out of a fire.

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Subscribing!

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Pretty radical.

I don’t care about the reasons and politics behind saving lives. Just saving lives is awesome.

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Oh, and sticky would be good.

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I think it’ll get enough posting to keep it on the front page. Sticky isn’t necessary.

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Here’s one more.

This Freehand Zero is mint, silicone recessed, and has the sticker lips removed. This is from my personal collection of some of the best playing FHZs I ever modified. This one really is stellar and would make a great collectors piece. 100% of the proceeds going to the American Cancer Society.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=130777672090

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What about money donations?

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This has nothing to do with scepticism of the charity, though I’m glad you value my opinion and comments.

This wasn’t necessarily/primarily focused on your effort, Chris.

I was simply voicing my [constant] disappointment with the way things tend to be in the case of reactionary movements and groups. Someone/group will take an idea that’s hot off the tail of an event, failure, or disaster (etc) and use that to fuel something else.

My message to you, which I suppose I didn’t quite communicate well enough, was to make sure that you don’t come across as this:

“Hi [group of people]. Heath really screwed us by taking our money, and we’re all quite angry about it at the moment. I’m going to fix it.”

This [,to me,] comes off as, “I found a place that I can get some positive attention by pointing out the negative press of another”. You really have to look at it from the point of view of someone outside our yoyo community I suppose.

I applaud you for starting this. As I said before I will donate in some form too. Just make sure that you come across as a good effort and not one that is riding the coattails of a failure or trying to show how poor someone else did something.

Keep doing what you’re doing, I know you’re doing it for a good reason.

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I’ll try to find something I can donate.

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Yes!

We’re figuring out how to best incorporate these. It seems to me that the best way is to make your donation directly to the organization and then post a screenshot of it so that it can be added to the tally. Details about this soon.