Tweetspeak Party? You Could Be Invited

Maybe you heard the news: the San Francisco Chronicle dismantled its paywall. After all, it’s hard to grow a business behind a wall.

But then, as Jonathan Franzen notes in this controversial interview at Scratch Magazine, “Where’s the pay model?” He means, where’s the pay model for top-quality writers and editors to consistently produce excellent, entertaining, and informative content on the internet.

We are trying to answer that question with an equally challenging proposition: the pay model is right here, if a readership values its favorite content providers.

At Tweetspeak Poetry, we provide a wide range of content and more:

1. Teachers now use our infographics for fun, succinct ways to introduce sonnets, haiku, pantoums (and we are waiting for the first ghazal story to appear)

2. Readers find life-changing inspiration in our book clubs, artist dates, and the occasional poetry dare

3. Poets and word lovers are treated to fast, fun Twitter parties

4. Readers can participate in ongoing education about poets and poems—even attend poetry classrooms led by poets and professors

5. Poets and word lovers get inspiring poetry prompts that sometimes lead to getting published here at Tweetspeak or in Every Day Poems

6. Workers around the world find themselves enriched, enlivened, and entertained with fun celebrations like Poetry at Work Day and Take Your Poet to Work Day

7. And? Besides a host of other great content, we have plans for new, intriguing ways to serve you and promote your creative life and your writing career

To accomplish our goals, we need to stay afloat. It costs a lot more than you might think to run a big ship like Tweetspeak Poetry, and this year is our make-or-break year. We don’t want to put any of our great content behind a wall. And, besides, it’s not a sustainable model anyway.

If you haven’t helped yet, you can help today—just in time for our supporters thank you party.

A party? You know we do them up good.

This is our official announcement:

What: Tweetspeak Supporters Party
Where: Twitter
When: Thursday, November 7, 8 am-9 pm EST
Details: Follow the hashtag #TSPsupportersparty, to catch your thank-you surprises and giveaways all day long. If you are a Tweetspeak supporter at the $15 or above level, just retweet the giveaway items and books you want us to “put you in the hat” for, and you’ll be entered in that particular giveaway.

Giveaway items for supporters at the $15 and up level will include, but are not limited to:

1. A signed copy of our new title Spin: Taking Your Creativity to the Nth Degree.

2. A signed copy of Contingency Plans, Delicate Machinery Suspended, The Novelist, Barbies at Communion, Booked: Literature in the Soul of Me, Sun Shine Down, and Neruda’s Memoirs

3. A $50 gift certificate towards any purchase at The Willingham Enterprise (this could get you a free blog button design or $50 off any larger design project). Want to see some samples? Check out our new Poetry at Work Day website or ClaireBurge.com

4. A bottle of Sineann wine. Says Sineann, “We are a small producer of highly intense wine based in Oregon’s storied Willamette Valley wine country. Our fruit comes from the best vineyards in multiple growing regions. We spare no expense or effort in the pursuit of great wine.” (And we can attest, it is awesome wine.) Note: Cannot be shipped to Massachusetts, New Hampshire, South Dakota, or Utah.

5. A special delivery of salted-caramel brownies, from amazing cook Monica Sharman

6. An Embrace The Life You Have mug, with beautiful photography by Sandra Heska King

7. A free subscription to Jane Friedman and Manjula Martin’s fantastic new publication, Scratch Magazine (pdf/epub version)

8. 6-Pack of Hebert’s Delicious Fun-Flavored Chocolate Bars

9. A 60-minute virtual Organising Session with Get Organised, valued at $350. Includes a time style analysis, personal productivity analysis, overview of how to maximise time style within your current workday, quick overview of some productivity tools that could seriously change your life

10. A $25 gift certificate to Whole Foods

11. Special delivery of gourmet coffee

(All physical giveaway items are to U.S. Locations Only. Some states ineligible for wine delivery.)

Ready to party? Support Tweetspeak today!

Top of post photo by Pink Sherbet, Creative Commons, via Flickr.