|
Greetings and Salutations! So, what is this all about you may ask? I am a personally committed privacy and open-source software advocate (though more of a deep thinker and moderate tinkerer of OSS, really) looking to raise donations for my identity mechanism Inkblot, while also doing more than just raising funds for a singular and personal project. What does this accomplish? First of all, it will raise not only donations to help fund Inkblot (my primary goal here), but it will also benefit (two-fold) a wonderful and noble environmental cause known as the Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative (Y2Y), a non-profit. You can find them, as well as learn much more about them, here; http://www.y2y.net OK, tell me more... Gladly. With any amount donated by you, 50% of each and every donation done through this campaign will then, in turn, be donated directly to the Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative!* For example, donate $5.00 and, roughly, $2.35 will go to my project at Inkblot and the other, roughly, $2.35 will go directly to Y2Y. The reason I say "roughly" is because the platform that I am running this campaign on (Indiegogo) takes a cut from each and every donation (anywhere between 4% and 9%) that you make through it. Nothing wrong with that of course, as we all need to eat and pay bills (as well as other people for their services), not to mention the fact that without fund-raising platforms such as IndieGoGo I wouldn't even be able to run such a campaign in the first place. Great, but where does the y2y.org domain name fit into all of this? Good question, indeed! I will be donating the domain name y2y.org (which I have owned for almost 8 years now), free-and-clear, to the Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative, no matter the final amount donated by everyone at the end of this campaign. In other words, if this campaign is only able to muster $75.00 (fizzle... ughh!) in donations then half of those donated funds will still go to Y2Y (them) and the other half will go to Inkblot (me), and they (Y2Y) still get the domain name y2y.org (again, for free and with no strings attached whatsoever) in the end, no matter what! If the campaign is an absolute scorching success (Sizzle!!! Yeah!) and raises tens of thousands of dollars (or more!?!), well then... You get the idea! (fingers X crossed) But they already have the domain name y2y.net? Yes, they do, but how many large-scale non-profits such as them do you know of who run under anything but a .org domain name? How many, again? Exactly. It's best for them to outright own and run under the .org version of their name or foundation for anything from marketing purposes to proper non-profit designation and so forth and so on. Y2Y's domain name BC (Before Campaign); http://www.y2y.net Y2Y's domain name AD (After... De... campaign?); http://www.y2y.org Has Y2Y given you their support in running this campaign? No, although I suppose they likely wouldn't mind doing so if asked! As a non-profit, they are just a (big) beneficiary of all of this in the end, and nothing more. As far as I know, they don't know anything about it at all (not yet anyhow), but you can all make it a very pleasant surprise for them (as well as me for Inkblot) nonetheless with as much and with as many donations as you can muster and manage over the course of this campaign. You can donate as much, and as often, as you like! If you just fall in love with Y2Y and their cause you are also more than welcome to just skip this campaign entirely and donate any and all funds directly to Y2Y on their website, if you so please. Thank you for your support, and best to you! Kyle Sandau a.k.a. Inkblot Tell me a little bit more about Inkblot; Certainly! I registered Inkblot.com way back on December 7th, 1998 (yes, that makes it almost 14-years-old, about the exact same age as Google, just a few years younger than Yahoo, and several years before the likes of Facebook stormed onto the scene). I used it for my own personal blog and muse for many years, well before "blogging" became the norm. I was one of the first folks out there on what is now known as the "indie-web". Inkblot is currently registered through 2021, the longest registration term available to it at the moment. In other words, Inkblot isn't going anywhere, folks. Many people (corporations, start-ups, etc.) over the years have hounded me to no end to try and acquire Inkblot.com, the domain name itself. I've been offered mounds of cash, sports cars, equity, and all sorts of other crazy stuff for it. It just happens to be one of the most enigmatic domains out there, ever. After all, an "inkblot" is what you see in it. And who hasn't heard of the Rorschach Inkblot Test? This is the famous personality test developed by the Swiss Freudian psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Hermann Rorschach in the 1920's. It's perfect for an identity mechanism. The following, in it's basic form, is what Inkblot as an identity provider (IdP) is going to represent; 1. You choose your Inkblot identity (Inkblot ID), such as your real name, nick-name, pseudonym, screen name, online persona, etc. You absolutely do not have to use your real name with Inkblot, let us just be crystal clear about that. Consider the "nymwars" officially over here. 2. Once you have secured your identity (in this example it's me; kyle) with Inkblot it (tentatively) will be available to you in the following formats; kyle@inkblot.com https://www.inkblot.com/kyle (Example Page Username: Tester - Password: passwordabc) @kyle #kyle Inkblot Keyword: kyle Yes, you will have email, webfinger, OpenID, completely separate private and public areas, etc., all in one place! Please do understand though that you will not be able to register Trade Marks™, Copyright© names or phrases, Registered® marks, famous names, brand names, etc. unless legally authorized to do so. If you do, and you are not the rightful owner, you will almost certainly lose your rights to that "identity", as well as any fees paid related to it. You may even get sued by the rightful owners, and nobody wants that so just don't do it in the first place and all shall (should) be well. I also own and operate (just to name a few) Inkblot.tv, Inkblot.fm, Inkblot.am, Inkblot.mobi, Inkblot.org, etc. and definitely plan on incorporating them into the Inkblot Identity Mechanism as time goes on. for example, if you were the actor Leonardo DiCaprio you would likely want an identity as follows; LeonardoDiCaprio@inkblot.tv If you were a band like Pearl Jam you would likely want an identity as follows; PearlJam@inkblot.fm If you were a non-profit like, say, Y2Y you would likely want an identity as follows; Y2Y@inkblot.org And so on and so forth... An entire identity ecosystem, if you will. Let us be clear here, Inkblot is not a "Facebook killer", nor will it overtake Google+, nor wipe Twitter off the face of the planet. Inkblot is not going to be just another social network (Google+), nor a closed-wall garden (Facebook) eating up all of your personal and private data and then selling it off to the highest bidder in order to offer you "free" services, nor will it be the land of spammers (Twitter) with as many accounts as their bots can crank out. You will always own your information on Inkblot, and have full control over it's use and portability, and Inkblot will strive to work with and be compatible with any and all services that allows it to be for the good of it's members, such as Facebook, Google+, Twitter and so forth, though focusing primarily on those services within the open-source community such as WordPress, Drupal, Joomala, Unhosted, Diaspora, etc. Inkblot will also strive to not allow advertising or third-party tracking which is tied directly into your identity within the platform itself. Inkblot does not (intend to use) need this type of a slippery slope income driver as it will be a paid service right from the start. There needs to be a healthy balance here concerning identity and privacy, and Inkblot is a pretty good start in the right direction. *Financial and domain name donation to Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative (Y2Y) will occur in one transparent lump-sum at the end of the campaign, with any and all tax benefits associated with said donation(s) directly benefiting Inkblot. *Let it be known, the Inkblot fund-raising/domain name donation campaign is not endorsed by nor associated with the Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative (Y2Y) in any way, shape or form. |