Hi all,

Over the past two months, the fundraising team has started testing new messages from WMF staff members, donors, and editors. We're really excited that we've found new messages that perform at the same level as the "founder appeal" from Jimmy Wales. This year, the fundraiser will rely as much as possible on voices of many different members of our community.

Doing in-person interviews and then writing appeals using people's exact words is the key to making these appeals work as well as the Jimmy appeal. Victor Grigas, Aaron Muszalski, and Matthew Roth -- three Storytellers working on the 2011 Fundraiser -- are doing the interviews. They will be attending Wikimania to interview attendees who would like to have their personal appeal run during the fundraising campaign. While on this story gathering mission, they will also be taking photos to be used in fundraising banners.

We would like to feature editors for as much of the fundraiser as possible. But we've found that editor appeals are the hardest to make work. So we're really looking for people who think they can explain in their own words why donating to WMF or a chapter is important. If you'd like to get involved, please get in touch by emailing wikistory@wikimedia.org. We'll be interviewing throughout Wikimania, so please come talk to us about the importance of Wikipedia and tell us your own personal story of how you're connected to the Wikimedia movement.

You don't have to attend Wikimania to get involved. We will be interviewing people from all different areas of the world over the next several months. If you're interested in sharing your story, please send a message to wikistory@wikimedia.org

If you'd like to see a review of our weekly testing and read the new appeals, check out our test updates page: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_2011/Updates

Looking forward to seeing you next week and hearing your stories,

Megan