Child's Play... my thoughts (please share yours)

[djpretzel]

Since I have built my entire life around having my cake and eating it too, why not do both?

Contribute to both Child's play (which from a cold hearted marketing standpoint would be a great boon for OCR's credibility and exposure) and some reliable medical charity.

Philosophically, when it comes to a choice of either/or, tell those people to fuck themselves and do both.... Then fuck their moms.

Yes, this occurred to me when I left for work, but I didn't have time to post... I'm thinking this is a good idea (doing both, not the fucking), and mulling over ways to implement it.

[Shadow Wolf]

First off, I want to say that I think Child's Play is an absolutely AMAZING charity... for certain people. I think it's wonderful for the terminally ill, for whom nothing can be done. But as a nurse, I fully endorse pushing money towards research and treatment. I would anyways, but since I've started training for pediatrics I say we saves teh childrens. In Norfolk, Virginia, there's a nonprofit children's hospital called Children's Hospital of the King's Daughters. I desperately hope to work there some day soon, but until then, the children there could greatly benefit from their people being able to conduct more research. Now, to business.

Medical research is a scam anyway. Most organizations don't actually want to find a cure for whatever it is they're dedicated to, because then they go out of business.

Because I don't have the time or the money to hunt you down and fucking kill you, I will chock this statement up to an absolutely astonishing amount of ignorance. Medical research costs billions of dollars. BILLIONS. Most of the profit that is ever made is simply in the saving of a person's life. Medical advances are slow in coming because the VAST majority of organizations that are performing the research are nonprofit organizations, dependent on the donations of people who care to continue their research. Provided they get the money they need, which is rare, it's never as simple as finding a cure. You peel away on layer of mystery to find another 20 years of new questions underneath. Furthermore, saying medical research would go out of business completely ignores the fact that, for instance, IF we ever find a cure for breast cancer, we still have brain, chest, lung, bone, and roughly 70 other unique types of CANCER alone to address for the next several hundred years before we move on to anything else. In summation, you have proven yourself to be a complete fucking idiot. Have a nice night.

Kind of a bullshit policy but whatever.

No hospital ever allows outside objects of this type on a unit. Simply put, in hospitals, we have to control as many variables as possible to reduce spread of disease. For example, if someone were to donate a used NES cartridge. What if that person had the flu, coughed on their hand, then picked that cartridge up and handed it to someone in the hospital. That cartridge is carrying a flu virus, intentionally or not. You risk the nurses and doctors being infected, and worse, there are potentially kids on the unit in such an immunosuppressed state that a bout of flu would kill them. It sounds extreme, but that's precisely how most nosocomial infections (infections started in the hospital) get started. I'm not even allowed to bring my own disposable gloves on the unit where I'm training. So it's not a bullshit policy, but it is a regrettable one. Especially with things like stuffed animals this holds true. They hold diseases like you wouldn't believe. Now, I know a new game can get sneezed on as easily as an old one, but once again, it's just controlling as many variables as possible.

[Kenobio]

The one thing that is kinda cool about Child's Play is that everyone else is donating to the medical stuff. This is giving them something a little different, that otherwise their families wouldn't be able to do.

Very good point.

Obviously donating to research facilities and so forth is probably better for hospitals and their patients in the long run, but for the little kids out there who'd like to play a little Mario Galaxy while cooped up in a depressing hospital I think it's a worthy cause for us. Don't get me wrong--I think it'd be great for OCR to donate to the aforementioned disease research facilities (and I'm sure some of us do already)--but considering what Child's Play is targeting (as gamers, something most of us can easily relate to) I also think it's the perfect charity for this sort of community.

tl;dr -- Other charities are more worthwhile but are also more significantly represented. Child's Play is a good cause, and also better suited for OCR considering the demographic. Those who prefer donating to other charities can still do that, but OCR support for Child's Play would seem logical and beneficial.

[Triad Orion]

Yeah, DarkeSword actually said what was on my mind pretty well. Hospitals can be boring places if you're stuck there for extended periods of time. I think the idea of donating money to help kids get entertainment while being treated is a great idea. I mean, in my experience when I see kids playing games, it makes them happy, even when they're sick. I think that's what they were really going for with this.

But yeah, if you have misgivings about donating solely to Child's Play, DJP, I think having OCR associated with two different charities would be really wise too.

[Arek the Absolute]

That would be a good idea, but DJ P would have to research which one of the many charities he wishes to have shown along with Child's Play.

...of course, if DJ Pretzel wanted, we could make our own little charity. I mean, we ARE a huge site that gets insane hits everyday and is known around the world, so I don't see why it would be hard to create one and have the word spread around. Too bad this most likely will ever happen

[Steben]

Echoing Darkesword and others, I'd like to point out that Child's Play doesn't really take money away from charities that support medical research. I'd imagine a lot of people who support Child's Play are giving money that would otherwise not go to any charity at all.

The point being, even if Child's Play didn't do anything positive for these kids, it's not like it's taking a lot of money away from charities that could really help them. But the fact is, Child's Play does do a lot to help make a kid's stay in a hospital slightly less like Hell.

Check out the letters page for examples on how the charity makes a positive impact, if there's any question remaining.

http://www.childsplaycharity.org/photosletters.php

EDIT

...of course, if DJ Pretzel wanted, we could make our own little charity. I mean, we ARE a huge site that gets insane hits everyday and is known around the world, so I don't see why it would be hard to create one and have the word spread around. Too bad this most likely will ever happen

That'd require a lot of volunteer work from DJP and others in order to get such a project off the ground. Jerry Holkins and Mike Krahulik didn't do this on a whim - they have loads of volunteers (and maybe paid staff too?) who head up the effort. Furthermore, OCR may be big, but we don't control the fanbase that PA does. Starting our own charity wouldn't be cost-effective, arguably.

[Mustin]

Dude.

Make a kid happy.

Buy them a game.

You can also send cash.

I can't believe people are debating on this. Makes me sick.

[Mustin]

Just contact Kristin. http://www.childsplaycharity.org/contact.php

Ask her how you can help. I'm sure she's heard of OCR and would be willing to brainstorm something. This charity is 100% non-profit. No one is getting paid for the work.

If you wanna give, do it. If don't want to give, then don't! But debating on whether or not you should? It just seems so wrong and ...heartless.

[djpretzel]

Dude.

Make a kid happy.

Buy them a game.

You can also send cash.

I can't believe people are debating on this. Makes me sick.

Your moral outrage is duly noted... now how much of those album donations are you funneling their way, again?

We weren't questioning whether giving sick kids stuff was worthwhile, we were questioning whether, if OCR is going to endorse something like that, it should be Child's Play, or something with a research/direct benefit focus, as opposed to the "emotional well-being" angle that - while important - isn't as life or death as getting medical care, or food, or shelter in the first place.

Come on, if you'd read the thread, that much would be clear... intelligent adults should be able to question which form of charity would be most beneficial without holier-than-thou finger-pointing and soapboxing, no?

[yangfeili]

Because I don't have the time or the money to hunt you down and fucking kill you, I will chock this statement up to an absolutely astonishing amount of ignorance. Medical research costs billions of dollars. BILLIONS. Most of the profit that is ever made is simply in the saving of a person's life. Medical advances are slow in coming because the VAST majority of organizations that are performing the research are nonprofit organizations, dependent on the donations of people who care to continue their research. Provided they get the money they need, which is rare, it's never as simple as finding a cure. You peel away on layer of mystery to find another 20 years of new questions underneath. Furthermore, saying medical research would go out of business completely ignores the fact that, for instance, IF we ever find a cure for breast cancer, we still have brain, chest, lung, bone, and roughly 70 other unique types of CANCER alone to address for the next several hundred years before we move on to anything else. In summation, you have proven yourself to be a complete fucking idiot. Have a nice night.

You might want to take a look into some of the criticisms of the American Cancer Society before you dismiss my half-serious/half-facetious hyperbole.

link

This sort of thing is fairly well-documented among sociological circles, these self-perpetuating organizations that have a tendency to set goals which are unobtainable either by nature or by intentional design/self-sabotage. Child's Play strikes me as a pleasant alternative.

[Dave Harris]

Heh actually I agree, I think donating to medical research and whatnot would probably be a better idea than to a games fund for kids. But I suppose eitherway, donating is better than not donating. Besides, it makes more sense to advertise a charity that is relevant to the site itself. It'd probably be a bit odd to advertise a medical research charity on a videogame music site... I dunno!

I reckon you should consider it anyway. It'd only be encouraging people to donate who otherwise probably wouldn't.

[Kenobio]

Official Mascot of Child's Play Charity

Donate your money to me, friends, or I'll fucking cut you.

[Dhsu]

Your moral outrage is duly noted... now how much of those album donations are you funneling their way, again?

We weren't questioning whether giving sick kids stuff was worthwhile, we were questioning whether, if OCR is going to endorse something like that, it should be Child's Play, or something with a research/direct benefit focus, as opposed to the "emotional well-being" angle that - while important - isn't as life or death as getting medical care, or food, or shelter in the first place.

Come on, if you'd read the thread, that much would be clear... intelligent adults should be able to question which form of charity would be most beneficial without holier-than-thou finger-pointing and soapboxing, no?

Wow, Mustin, you got FACED.

[Devyn]

Shariq was suggesting OCR do something for Child's Play (http://www.childsplaycharity.org/), as it seems www.vgmusic.com have with their addition of a banner to their homepage.

I don't want to start a huge argument or come off as an evil, uncaring bastard, but here's my concern:

I think the idea of the gaming community giving back to society is great, but when given the choice to give a Nintendo DS to a sick child, versus pay for medical care for sick children who can't afford it, or donate to research that could have prevented that child from being sick in the first place, my heart and mind go out to the latter causes.

Am I a bastard for thinking this? Am I a grinchy, bad man that doesn't want sick kids to play Phoenix Wright? I hope no one believes that of me... I just feel that if the gaming community is going to contribute - and there's huge potential for doing so - I'm not convinced that buying more games and game systems is the best approach.

I'd like to do something different... ideally, it'd be trackable, so we could see how much progress we were making... and have OCR promote one or more charities that actually pay for medical care or medical research, because in my opinion, those are more important causes.

I totally get and appreciate what PA are doing with CP, and since there's tons of charities out there, perhaps from a marketing perspective, it's more persuasive to gamers if the charity itself is donating games.

I'm interested in hearing everyone's thoughts. If there's a service that proxies and tracks donations to combinations of charities on a per group basis, I'd love to do something like that for OCR, and coincide it with Child's Play. If everyone thinks my concerns about CP are dumb, that's cool, we'll do a banner and promote it instead. I'm totally open on this, I just see all those $$$ going to Nintendo DSs and think that, while it's great for gaming, there might be more direct ways to help...

I have to agree with you. Maybe you should consider a different charity, and have a banner and link to the charity. OCR members can donate, and you could have a board/system that keeps track of who donates and how much each forum member donates.

Yet, we shouldn't donate just on the premise that vgmusic does it. That's just competition. If we do it, we should do it because we want to help people, and I don't mind donating money for that cause.

[Mustin]

Your moral outrage is duly noted... now how much of those album donations are you funneling their way, again?

We weren't questioning whether giving sick kids stuff was worthwhile, we were questioning whether, if OCR is going to endorse something like that, it should be Child's Play, or something with a research/direct benefit focus, as opposed to the "emotional well-being" angle that - while important - isn't as life or death as getting medical care, or food, or shelter in the first place.

Come on, if you'd read the thread, that much would be clear... intelligent adults should be able to question which form of charity would be most beneficial without holier-than-thou finger-pointing and soapboxing, no?

Dale and I are going to be giving quite a bit, actually. We didn't ask anyone if it would be a good idea - we just did it 'cause that's how we are.

I think this should have been handled with the core OCR types in private (dave, andy, larry, etc.) and not made public. Then you could have come about with a firm decision (or nothing at all) and we wouldn't have had comments like

Medical research is a scam anyway. Most organizations don't actually want to find a cure for whatever it is they're dedicated to, because then they go out of business.

which are completely assinine.

Even with the public debate it could have been approached from several angles. I just felt this one was singling out Child's Play at questioning it. You could have said, "Hey, let's do something good this year. Should we donate to a charity, donate to research, or feed the homeless? Thoughts?"

My first post wasn't so directed at you, David, as it was some of the whiners. The second post was more directed at you with "contact Kristin."

[djpretzel]

My first post wasn't so directed at you, David, as it was some of the whiners. The second post was more directed at you with "contact Kristin."

Cool, makes sense. I'm thinking of doing something where we emphasize CP along with a couple other charities with excellent reputations, which as you suggest, might have been more appropriate to go ahead and do, rather than discuss, but even when people make goofy comments, the discussion can still be beneficial.

[DragonFireKai]

The way I see it, while you don't wield as much power over the frothing masses as Gabe and Tycho, you still have a considerable amount of influence over a relatively large number of people, DJP. Given these conditions, you really need to consider what your priorities are. Before you start talking about ditching Child's Play for a medical charity, you need to at least come up with a set of diseases you might consider fighting, there are a lot, and at times it seems overwhelming. And in the end, by choosing a narrow set medical charity, you've essentially swapped a minor benefit to a wide group of kids for a major benefit to a much smaller group of kids. Your donations might have made a breakthrough in the fight against Cystic Fibrosis, but now there are kids with ALS who don't even get a game to pass the time before they die. Such are the choices one must make.

But here's what I want to know. Why do you need to make a choice right now? You seem like you haven't figured out what charity you would like to go with from a medical standpoint, and even once you make a decision, there are still issues to tackle on the logistics of paypaling the donations and setting up the banners, and that'll take a little more time. But in the interim, it sounds like Darkesword already has an idea for how to set up the CP donations. Why not do both? There's room on the page, especially below the Firefox with Google Toolbar! ad on the siderbar. If I was in your position, I'd slap the CP link right there, right now, and think about what medical charity I'd want to add. Get the donations flowing to a charity now, rather than waiting for the ideal charity, in the end, the donations that could have been made today won't detract alot from the donations that will be made when whatever additional charity pops up. You could even compile a list of medical charities you like, then have the community vote on which one they're more likely to donate to, and throw the winner up there to replace the CP link. Or you could leave the CP link up there alongside it, as I said, there's plenty of room for another good cause.

*sigh* I go to all that work, just to have you come up with the exact same idea while I was typing...

[Mustin]

Cool, makes sense. I'm thinking of doing something where we emphasize CP along with a couple other charities with excellent reputations, which as you suggest, might have been more appropriate to go ahead and do, rather than discuss, but even when people make goofy comments, the discussion can still be beneficial.

bet that, son

[The wingless]

I love it when you and mommy fight. It means I get more presents

[djpretzel]

Done.

Honestly, researching and selecting three charities in addition to CP didn't take too much time at all - I looked for independently accredited, reputable charities intelligently fighting global problems on a global basis. I personally prefer this type of thing; one of my concerns about CP is that it seems to be focusing on Western, English-speaking countries, and also I didn't see where it was independently accredited by the BBB or American Philanthropic Association, both of which are excellent things for a charity to have. At any rate, no more hatin' on CP - some people think it's a great idea, and if it gets people to donate that wouldn't have otherwise, that's fantastic.

[Harmony]

Very cool. I was hoping to have, as you initially suggested, some sort of tracking system to give us a sense of our collective contribution. If nothing else, it may have given the community a little extra incentive to try and reach any donation goals that were established. But not tracking donations has its pros as well.

[Citris]

(Getting ready for work, so I haven't read the whole thread or researched this organization.)

This sounds like a more focused Toys for Tots. It would be a good place to funnel used games. So you're not just putting money into games that could go into research. The money has already been spent, the games are just going to a worthier cause than getting 2% of their original dollar value from EB and collecting dust on the shelves.

[Shadowe]

Actually because it's going to a place where there are lots of people with no real immune system everything has to be new.

One thing occurs though. The amount of money CP generates would probably be basically nothing to a diabetes research program but when converted to toys it's impact is considerably greater.

Think about it. 500,000 isn't that much for doctors without borders. It's maybe one X-ray machine. But convert that to xboxes, DS-lites, books, and whatever else you wind up with a much more significant impact on a lot more people's lives.

[DarkeSword]

(Getting ready for work, so I haven't read the whole thread or researched this organization.)

This sounds like a more focused Toys for Tots. It would be a good place to funnel used games. So you're not just putting money into games that could go into research. The money has already been spent, the games are just going to a worthier cause than getting 2% of their original dollar value from EB and collecting dust on the shelves.

Went over this already, but they don't take your used crap. You buy brand new things for them.

[djpretzel]

Went over this already, but they don't take your used crap. You buy brand new things for them.

I would also imagine that, even with a brand new DS, they can't pass it from one child to another...