Thursday, January 31, 2008

“Tibetan Freedom Movement” Could be the most Popular Cause on Facebook

The Tibetan Freedom Movement is neck-in-neck for the title of the most popular Cause on the social networking website, Facebook, and is poised to win the grand prize of $50,000. For the last month and a half, the Movement has been competing in the Facebook and Case Foundation's online fundraising competition, the Giving Challenge.

"We've already won eight daily challenges, where we had the most donors in one day. We've also been the leading Cause at several points during the competition," said Tenzin Choedon, Program Coordinator with Students for a Free Tibet India. "There has been such a huge outpouring of support that we feel we can win this if people continue to donate."


The Tibetan Freedom Movement was set up by Students for a Free Tibet (SFT) to raise awareness about the Tibetan cause on Facebook. Its membership has grown quickly, especially since the beginning of the Giving Challenge in December. It now has over 3,600 members and has raised nearly $46,000. SFT plans on using the money raised through the Challenge on their Olympics campaign in the upcoming months.

However, the Tibetan Freedom Movement is up against tough competition. The current first place Cause is Love Without Boundaries Foundation, a group that provides assistance to Chinese orphans. In past days, SFT members have discovered a blog where a Chinese person has appealed to their fellow countrymen and women to support Love Without Boundaries, in order to prevent what they call the "Tibetan Independence Movement" from winning.


"This should be a rallying cry for us Tibetans. Do we really want to be defeated by the Chinese?" said Tenzin Choeying, National Coordinator of SFT India. "We were
first place
a couple days ago, we can do it again."

The Giving Challenge winner will be announced on Facebook by February 2nd. Anyone with a Facebook account can donate to the Tibetan Freedom Movement through the '
Causes’ application.


Posted on Phayul.com
[Thursday, January 31, 2008 16:20]

1 comment:

J. said...

Thanks to everyone who donated, we won the second place prize in the Facebook Giving Challenged and set our own best record of the most money raised in a single day!