Friday, February 20, 2009

500 Pledges!

More than 500 people have now gone to www.thelifeyoucansave.com and pledged to donate a share of their income to organizations helping the world's poor. Given that the website has only be up for 3 weeks, and The Life You Can Save has so far only been published in Australia and New Zealand, that's way beyond our expectations. It's obviously been helped by the fantastic media response to the book in Australia, and the sold-out talks I've been giving in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide. Next week I'm off to Perth.

If you are one of those who has pledged already, THANK YOU! If not, please take a look at the website and think about doing so.

The book will be published in the US and Canada on March 2, and I'll be doing a publicity tour starting on that date - traveling to San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, Indianapolis, Washington DC, Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Toronto. Then on to the UK and Sweden. Check www.thelifeyoucansave.com for details. I'll keep you informed on how it goes, and I'm looking forward to many more people learning about the book, and the website, and pledging as well.

Remember to spread the word. As I describe in the book, there is a lot of evidence that the more people see that others are giving, the more likely they are to give. So pledging is just a start, letting others know of the opportunity to pledge is even more important.

Peter Singer

Monday, February 2, 2009

Publication Day!

Hi, this is Peter Singer, welcoming you to The Life You Save, the blog that accompanies the new website, www.thelifeyoucansave.com.

Yesterday was publication day for my new book, The Life You Can Save: Acting Now to End World Poverty. OK, only in Australia, so far. The next edition to appear will be the US and Canadian edition, due out on March 3rd. That will be followed by the UK and then the Swedish editions, in March/April.

And yesterday, we launched the website, so if you haven't seen it yet, go there now. (It's all due to an incredible volunteer who, at least for the moment, wishes to remain anonymous.) Amazingly, we already have more than 40 people who have pledged to meet the standard for giving suggested in the book. Presumably most of them haven't read the book yet, but heard about it - I was busy doing radio and tv interviews all yesterday - and found enough information on the website to know that this was something they wanted to do - or were already doing.

I hope this blog will be a place where you will want to post your thoughts, and exchange ideas with others about both the book and the website. The rest is up to you.

Peter Singer