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    Created in 2008, Phoenix Rising is the largest and oldest forum dedicated to furthering the understanding of, and finding treatments for, complex chronic illnesses such as chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), fibromyalgia, long COVID, postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS), mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS), and allied diseases.

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Win $5,000 for Phoenix Rising and PANDORA in One-Time Facebook Vote!

View the Post on the Blog

by Sasha


Backwards, forwards.. just so long as you vote!
Image by Dean Terry/Flickr

After pushing so hard for so many of our organizations in these online voting contests, it’s refreshing to ask you to vote for us this time! Both Phoenix Rising and PANDORA are in the Bogs (lovely name) Footwear contest in which the top two charities will each win $2,500 (£1,700, €1,900), and we can all vote for both.

Phoenix Rising, of course, provides the ME/CFS community with reliable information, advocacy, support for other charities and a busy forum; PANDORA Org advocates and educates about neuro-immune diseases including ME/CFS, fibromyalgia, Lyme and Gulf War Illness, targeting local and national US government agencies to influence policy and improve patients’ lives.

Both deserve our mouse-clicks and each of us can vote for both charities so we don’t have to choose between them. Although the contest is for US and Canadian charities, it appears that votes are being accepted from anywhere in the world.


How to vote

1. Log in to your Facebook account.
2. Go here to vote for Phoenix Rising.
3. Click the 'Like' button on the top right.
4. Click on ‘Vote’ and you will be asked to let Photo Contest access your public profile, friend list and likes. You can't vote without clicking 'OK' but you can click 'Skip' in the next pop-up to prevent Photo Contest posting to your friends on your behalf. Once you’ve voted for PANDORA Org, you can remove Photo Contest from your Facebook apps (see below).
5. Go here to vote for PANDORA Org.
6. If you wish to remove Photo Contest from your Facebook apps, go to your Facebook homepage (from any Facebook page, click on 'home' on the top right). Click on 'App Centre' in the lefthand sidebar and in the new sidebar that appears, click on 'Your apps'. Move your pointer over 'Photo Contest' and click on the 'x' that appears in the top right of that box to delete the app.

Done! Thank you. And you know the next bit by now: please tell your friends and family to vote too! The closing date of Wednesday, 24 July is very close.


Copy my signature

Help spread the word on the forums by copying my signature: here’s how.


The state of play

At the time of writing, PANDORA is already in third place and Phoenix Rising, who only entered a few hours ago, is already 14th in a field of 36. The current leaders only have 400 and 300 votes respectively; when our community turn out in force we can gather thousands of votes and we have a spectacular record of wins. In fact, we’ve won over $400,000 (£270,000, €310,000) in such contests already. We can certainly achieve this and get much-needed funds for our organisations who do so much for us.

Let’s win this one – let’s get voting!


Remember that Phoenix Rising costs money to run and needs your donations to support it. Please hit the button below and donate!


Phoenix Rising is a registered 501 c.(3) non profit. We support ME/CFS and NEID patients through rigorous reporting, reliable information, effective advocacy and the provision of online services which empower patients and help them to cope with their isolation.

There are many ways you can help Phoenix Rising to continue its work. If you feel able to offer your time and talent, we could really use some more authors, proof-readers, fundraisers, technicians etc. and we'd love to expand our Board of Directors. So, if you think you can help then please contact Mark through the Forum.

And don't forget: you can always support our efforts at no cost to yourself as you shop online! To find out more, visit Phoenix Rising’s Donate page by clicking the button below.


View the Post on the Blog
 
They shared this article when it came out from their Faccebook page. This is great but, they should send out reminders with the link for voting. PR reaches about a thousand more people than I do.

If request for voting in this contest is to be sent out, perhaps it would be good to wait until helen41 hears from MEFM Society of BC if they will take part too - so that people can hopefully vote for all 4 organizations :)
 
The articles get posted to Facebook automatically. I don't know what else we might do on the Facebook page, I know next to nothing about Facebook. That's another big gap we need to fill: social media correspondent, to do something more active with our Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Google+ sites. They're very under-developed; they need somebody who understands social media to do something with them.

If request for voting in this contest is to be sent out, perhaps it would be good to wait until helen41 hears from MEFM Society of BC if they will take part too - so that people can hopefully vote for all 4 organizations :)
That's tricky, I've been preparing a mailing about the contest this evening and my finger is hovering over the Send button right now. We need to get going quickly or PR will miss out. I'm going to send a full newsletter next Monday, and lead on the contest then again (with 2 days to go) - I can mention anybody else who's joined the contest then, so I think I'll send this mailing out anyway unless somebody shouts at me to stop in the next few minutes.

Am I right in thinking that only the top two organisations win any money in this contest?
 
I think you should just go ahead. The top voted canadian group only has 22 votes right now, from what I can tell. Plus, I does strike me that if we win all 4 prizes, the optics might look like we are pretty greedy ;)
 
Well, our votes have perked up a bit overnight since Maria very kindly posted about the contest on her MEandYou Facebook page - thanks, Maria! :thumbsup:

Here's how things are now:

1. Puppies: 590
2. Military families (out of nowhere): 507
3. PANDORA: 412
4. Windsong School: 395
5. Dobermans: 379
6. Search & Rescue: 184
7. Phoenix Rising: 175

So, the good news is we got more votes but the bad news is that a new charity came out of nowhere and pushed our position down one.

Spread the word! Vote! :)
 
Am I right in thinking that only the top two organisations win any money in this contest?

That's what appeared to be the case originally but now Bogs have put out new info and have confirmed that they'll be giving prizes to the top two US and the top two Canadian winners:

https://www.facebook.com/bogsfootwear/posts/10151795425444365

All this late-breaking info is because Bogs have provided a dead link to their official rules which apparently remains well dead despite people asking them to fix it. o_O
 
Current situation:

1. Puppies: 590
2. Military families: 625
3. Windsong School: 470
4. PANDORA: 463
5. Dobermans: 399
6. Phoenix Rising: 218
[...]
8. National ME/FM Action Network:132
[...]
25. MEFM Society of BC: 35
 
This morning:

1. Puppies: 756
2. Military families: 629
3. Windsong School: 472
4. PANDORA: 481
5. Dobermans: 407
6. Phoenix Rising: 236
[...]
8. National ME/FM Action Network:146
[...]
24. MEFM Society of BC: 48

This is very, very winnable - only a few hundred votes in it and voting numbers are generally low in this contest - the leaders have gained only a handful of votes overnight.

I've put a new message out (I hope, haven't really got the hang of it) on Co-cure which I hope will come out later today so let's see if that perks things up.

Meanwhile, please do vote, including for our two new charities in this contest - they're not in direct competition, all four will win $2,500 if they're in the top four.

And tell your friends and family to vote! :)