John: We're, we're posted to the public, we're-it's live!! Something, looks like there's something pink over there, but I think it's just lighting, just bad lighting. By the way, I apologize for the stain, up there-It's the 2012 project for awesome, the 6th annual project for awesome! I'm gonna lower it just so you don't see the stain.

OK I've gotta start my treadmill desk, there's a lot going on right now, and I've gotta refresh the Vlogbrothers page to make sure it's working....and it's not working. Schmoog! Double schmoog!

(typing)

It says that I am, I am going, but that I have 0 viewers, which is a depressingly low number of viewers. Ohhhhh please work, please work, it said you were gonna broadcast on the Vlogbrothers YouTube channel but why aren't you? Ohhhhhhhhh.

There's 4 viewers now, 4 viewers is significantly improved from none, it makes me think that maybe...no! Still not...how are these 4 people watching me? Uggghhh Google+ hangouts on air you're supposed to be so easy...... Come on, please come, please appear magically. You can do it. No, it's still not there. Ohh, I'm gonna have to call my brother, he's the expert in the field.

(sigh) OK, let's see if my brother answers.

(typing)

Sorry, I'm trying to figure out what's going on. If anyone's watching this, which I don't think anyone is. Ohh, and Hank isn't even awake yet. Awwwwhhhhhhaaaahh awwwwhhhhhhaaaahh.

It should just automatically broadcast it to the YouTube channel, but it isn't. Stan?! Can you try to figure this out?

Uggghhh! I'm so frustrated, there are 58 viewers, which is awesome, except none of them seem to be on YouTube, which is where we need to have them, so...

Stan: What's the problem?

Where are they showing up? Oh people are watching me right now? 

Stan: Yep, yep, yep.

Oh, I should stop cursing.

Stan: So, I will, uh -

Where am I? I don't see myself

Stan: Go into the Vlogbrothers video manager... 

If I go in,

Stan: ...live events

yeah, in the video manager?

Stan: Yeah

And then I click live events? It should stream automatically to...

Stan: To the head of the Vlogbrothers page.

Yeah, but whatever, we'll just go directly-OK, 

Stan: I'm gonna go try and figure out the description

Aww great, thank you. OK, yeah, there's a- like a- wggabhh. oh but now I hear myself in the past. So - oh god, oh it's like there's like a 5 second lag, ah, that was crazy.

Hi! Helloooo everybody! OK! I don't look very good, I've got a weird cut off here; but I have to choose between - whoa, see, I'm on the treadmill desk, so I apologize. Aw now you can see the stain though, we gotta do a happy medium. 

Gotta get that stain fixed up there. I want you guys to think I have a fancy, professional office. Alright, so, that is the link, to the do-and I don't know why it's not broadcasting on Vlogbrothers, but it doesn't matter! 

Ok, so uh, we're gonna very shortly start, uh, comment spamming our first video. My project for awesome video is up, uh, my 2012 - I am gonna, I am, you know what, forget it, I'm just gonna show you the stain because it's a better angle for me. I mean, I'm more concerned about myself than the office.

The 2012 project for awesome is upon us. Uh, I'm gonna bring you up to date on what's going on so far before we go to our first video, um, but yes, it's all very exciting.

I don't know, I'm very excited. Oh wait, ummm, yeah, so if you, if you uhhh, if you hit refresh shortly, there should be a description available. But I actually don't know how to edit that description and no one else seems to, so we're trying to figure that out, because that's gonna be important to the success of the project for awesome, because there's no other way you can know which videos to go to, like what the links are.

So basically what we do is we spend the next, um, 48 hours or so, uh, commenting, liking, favoriting videos, uh, that are about charity because this is all about the project, the 2012 project for awesome, like all previous projects for awesome, is all about charity. I'm speeding up my treadmill desk so I can get some energy flowing.

Um, and uh, yep so that's what we're gonna be doing, we're gonna be going to various YouTube videos, favoriting them, sharing them, on twitter and Tumblr. By the way, if you're on twitter today, please use the hashtag #P4A. Letter P, number 4, letter A. Um, but there is also a fundraising component to this year's project for awesome, and hopefully it will be the biggest project for awesome yet. 

For those of you who aren't aware, all of the money that is donated to the foundation, what we call the Foundation to Decrease Worldsuck, goes to charity, there is no overhead at the Foundation to Decrease Worldsuck, no one is paid, the board of directors, um, is all volunteers and you know, it's like, me, and The Fine Bros., and valerie2776, um, so they're all nerdfighters and they're all volunteers, um, uh, all the people who pack and ship stuff related to the project for awesome this year are volunteers, so everybody, there is no, there is no overhead, the only costs are like, the actual cost of printing the hot, hot  calendar featuring charlieissocoollike dressed as an elf.

I would argue that the calendar has the hottest picture of charlieissocoollike dressed as an elf that I have ever seen. Which is really saying something. But it also includes pictures of me, humiliating pictures of myself and my brother Hank, uh, Wheezy Waiter, Tyler Oakley, Shane Dawson, so many great people agreed to participate in this, we're very grateful to them. So, um, you can get that at the Indiegogo, um, which is at, ah, indiegogo.com/p4a2012, hopefully there will be a link soon, uh, and you can get many other great perks which I will be describing throughout the day. 

Umm, but yes, so, to bring you up to date on our financial situation currently. We have currently raised $73,396 toward our $100,000 goal, uh, at the Indiegogo, which is pretty impressive, because the project for awesome is technically only 13 minutes old. Um, we did have stuff up all day yesterday that you could get, so yes, umm. 

Let's see here, is there an update to the link yet? No, still no description available, and I'm a little concerned that it's impossible to update the description. Uh, by the way, I apologize for drinking diet Dr. Pepper, they're not a sponsor, I just, I just love it

OK. So, um, if you go to indiegogo.com/p4a2012 you can see the Indiegogo, I'll also tweet the link right now, um. The Indiegogo campaign is at, and then with the hashtag #p4a, because we always use the hashtag #p4a. Um, and, right.

OK, so, umm. Lots and lots of people are trying to, uh trying to make the link work, and hopefully one of them will succeed at some point. It's quite complicated. Google hangouts on air, a beautiful tool, but a complicated one.

So right, we've raised, what did I just say, $73,396 through - $73,580 now because it's been a minute - um, towards our $100,000 goal. Of course we would like to dramatically exceed that $100,000 goal, but because, uh, we also started out with quite a bit of money in the Foundation to Decrease Worldsuck coffers, if you go over to projectforawesome.com, where you can submit, uh, your project for awesome videos, or project for awesome videos that you loved, um, and you can also vitally vote on project for awesome videos, um, that you liked.

So you can go there right now and you can see tons and tons of project for awesome videos that have already been uploaded, um, and you can watch them and you can vote for your favorites. This is a really cool tool, and then the people, the, the videos that get the most votes, the charities that those videos are supporting will get a percentage of the Foundation to Decrease Worldsuck's, uh, money that we raise over the course of the next two days.             

So, if you go there right now you can see the total money raised is $98,894, so we are very close to $100,000 total. Total number of comments already is 21,872 which is particularly impressive - that's YouTube comments by the way - which is particularly impressive when you consider - oh wait no, that's every comment submitted to this site. Oh no, no no no, sorry that is YouTube, yeah - so that's total YouTube comments, um. 21,872, I'm really bad at math, but I think that means - I have to move the decimal place twice - that means that I, I already owe $218.72 to, uh, the Foundation to Decrease Worldsuck.

Every time you comment on YouTube on a project for awesome video, it is worth one penny, that I have to pay to charity. I hate pennies, so, it's good for me. Um, y'know, yeah, I do hate charit - I mean, I do, I do, I do hate pennies very much. I almost said I hate charity, but in fact, I don't, or I wouldn't be doing this.

Um, let me see if the links have updated yet. Do Do Doodle Do Do- Ohh, they have! Alright, so you can see right there if you just hit refresh right now, at least the Indiegogo page link is updated, the other two, uh, links that we're hoping to have haven't updated, projectforawesome.com, but yes, look at that, you can see the Indiegogo page, and yes, I am on my treadmill desk, by the way, that's why I look funny, but y'know, that's what I do, I walk on my treadmill desk, that's who I am. Um, how do you think I, how do you think I keep this incredibly fit, svelte, v-shaped, torso of mine. Um, right, so you can go to that very Indiegogo page, p4a 2012.

Before we do our first video, I just want to briefly thank some people, and then also introduce you to that Indiegogo page where you should go now and donate. OK. First, I have to thank Sam Rudge, um, who does a ton, a ton of work for nerdfighteria behind the scenes, designing websites, and forums, and doing, uh, all kinds of amazing stuff, uh, a lot, every time you see a new, every time Hank has a new crazy idea and you see it come to fruition, a lot of that has to do with Sam. 

I also wanna thank - hold on, my wife is IMing me and that could be important. Um, "I'm on the p4a livestream now, but you can call if you wanna talk, with a lot of people". - OK, um, I also wanna thank, I do wanna thank my wife she donated a, she was very nice to donate a lot of uh, a lot of her time to do one of the perks, um, and um, yeah, so Sam, Sam is amazing, this would not, projectforawesome.com wouldn't exist without him.

It also wouldn't exist without Karen Kavett, uh, who has been a nerdfighter since 2007, and whose amazing design work, um, you've seen over and over again in nerdfighteria, uh, for many years, but projectforawesome.com is, is hers, um, in terms of the design and it's beautiful, the layout is great, we're so grateful to her, um, and, uh, I also wanna thank everyone who works in this office here with me; Stan, uh, and Danica, and Meredith, and Mark, who added a lot of the fancy graphics to my project for awesome video, which you can find at the Vlogbrothers channel, about save the children, and um, also, I, I hope that video somehow gets, umm, gets pushed to projectforawesome.com 'cause I didn't do that before I started this livestream.

Also, um, I wanna thank everybody at effyeahnerdfighters. If you guys have never been to effyeahnerdfighters.com, um, they are, they are the group, um, that Esther was a part of, um, and that really, every time something great happens in nerdfighteria, they have a hand in it. So they are working their butts of today to make the project for awesome as successful as it can be. 

And I wanna thank everybody who donated, um, perks to the project for awesome and I wanna thank everybody who's donated to the actual project for awesome so far, uh, including people like best-selling author Ray, who just made an extraordinarily generous donation to the Foundation to Decrease Worldsuck, and uh, yeah, all the people who have donated, it's really, really awesome.

So I'm just gonna run through the perks for you. Uh this, the perks are a little bit different, like a lot of times, in Kickstarters or Indiegogos, if you get, um, y'know, like an expensive perk, you also get all the cheap perks? We didn't do it that way, um, because we wanted to, um, take more money from you for charity. That's the reason I'm looking for. By the way, 2000 people here, hellooo. Oh gosh I almost fell.

OK, um. Um, OK. Soooo, yeah. First a $10, if you donate $10 or more you can get the awesome list of awesome, which means that you will be listed in the awesome list of awesome, which will be on the project for awesome Tumblr, as well as my Tumblr and Hank's Tumblr and the effyeahnerdfighters Tumblr, and you will, you will have done something awesome for the world. Plus you will be e-mailed a story written by me and one written by Maureen Johnson.

My story is, um, about a children's hospital, and it's not very good, because I wrote it in 2001, but um, it is the first story, it's extremely personal to me, because it's more autobiographical than most of the stuff that I share, and it's the first story that I ever wrote on the long path to writing The Fault in Our Stars. And then Maureen Johnson's story is, it's like a re-imagining of early American history, it's completely insane, so two very different stories. 

$15, so Holly Black and Cassandra Clare, both best-selling authors, have generously decided to work together to create a story, um, for you, and everyone who donates at that level will get that, everyone who chooses that perk will get that story. One person who chooses that perk will get the opportunity to have their name in the new, uh, in the next and final, um, Cassie Clare boo- Cassie Clare book, not final book that you're writing - City of Bones book, you know what I mean, um, people who've read the series know what I mean. City of Heavenly Fire, I think it's called, so excited! Anyway, off-topic. Uh, you will get to choose, your name will be in the book, and you will get to choose if you get kissed or get killed, but you will not get to choose who you kiss or, uh, how you get killed. That's like my favorite perk ever.

For $20 you get an e-book, you can choose a perk that will get you an e-book by me. My e-book, um, is uh, it's basically, it's called Double On-Call and Other Stories, Double On-Call is the story that everyone will get who donates $10, um, but Double On-Call and Other Stories includes a total of three stories uh, the first 6000, um, one of which is the first 6000 words of a book I abandoned called The Sequel that's set primarily in a children's hospital, one of which is Double On-Call, this story about a chaplain who's stuck inside a children's hospital for 48 hours straight because the person who's supposed to be on-call after him cancels, and um, it's very, yeah, that was, that was really like my first attempt to write The Fault in Our Stars, and I was reading it yesterday and I'm still kinda proud of it, I might read it during the project for awesome livestream if we raise enough money over the next 48 hours.

Um, and then the other story's also about a hospital chaplain, and um yeah, and his interactions with a patient. Um, so that is all, I wrote all that stuff shortly after I was a chaplain, and it's all very autobiographical, and it was the first time of me trying to fit together some pieces that ended up becoming The Fault in Our Stars, And you will recognize a few phrases, a few sentences that ended up in the book, although the vast majority of it didn't, um, but there's also an afterword in which I talk about the role of these stories in creating The Fault in Our Stars and what I think about them y'know, like 10 or 12 years after I finished them. So that is available for $20. It's about 20,000 words total, which is about, I'm really bad at math, but that's like, that's like 80 pages, 80 solid pages of reading.

Aww, the Wheezy Waiter Christmas card is sold out! Schmerg! You would have gotten Wheezy Waiter's Christmas card, but that's already sold out. At $28 you can get a MysteryGuitarMan flash drive that's shaped like MysteryGuitarMan and signed by MysteryGuitarMan.

$30, you can get the Men of YouTube calendar. I don't wanna brag, um, but I am in this calendar and I, uh, look terrible. I am wearing a toga, you can see part of my chest, it's incredibly humiliating. Please, as many as possible, take that, so I can at least know that it went to charity. However I will say, George Watsky, Mr. February, ugh, gahbushkaberg , Tyler Oakley, he's July, he looks awesome, um, Shane Dawson's in it, uh, there's so, uh, Charlie, Charlie McDonnell is in it as, as an elf, uh, oh, it's just magical. Wheezy Waiter shirtless, I don't know, I don't know what else I can do to talk you into getting it.          

$35, um, Annoying Orange, the most popular show in my household right now. Um, uh, Dane from the Annoying Orange who created the show and is the voice of the Annoying Orange, um, is offering signed posters, which is so, so cool.

Um, (the guild thing is sold out) $50, Hank Green, Anglerfish art. You know, Hank Green is the leading draw-er of anglerfish- es? Fish? I'm not gonna venture it. Um, but, uh, yeah. So Hank will make you original anglerfish art that is signed and numbered. And, uh, yes. There are 150 of those available, only 37 gone.

For $100, I will sign and personalize this book that I wrote called The Fault in Our Stars for you. But only first names, please, because my hand... and also, you cannot pick some crazy Sharpie color. You've gotta pick a normal Sharpie color: green, blue, r- anything in the variety pack or silver.

$150 is the Yeti level. Um, there were 50 of these yesterday, but they were all gone, and so, I talked to Sarah, and she very generously agreed to do more. For those of you who don't know, before Sarah was a fancy-pants curator of contemporary art, she was an artist. Well, she still is an artist I guess. And, uh, she's very good. And she was an art major in college and everything. So she will draw you an original drawing. Um, that's signed by her, and you can pick one of five options, a Yeti, a Mountain Goat, Bubbles the Nerdfighting Puppy, a quotation by and artist of the Yeti's choosing, or wild card. So... yes. There are 47 of those left.

And finally, for $1000, you can get your own Vlogbrothers video, in which you suggest- or don't suggest, it's up to you- a topic of the Vlogbrothers video. We make the video for you, it's unlisted, you can choose whether to share it with the world or whether to just make it your own, you can do whatever you want with it, so yes 5 of those have already been claimed, so thank you to those people who donated so much money that was very nice of you. Sense i started talking we raised 3,000 dollars so maybe i should just keep talking forever. Oh God, it's very hard to talk and walk I may have to sit down soon, but in amazing news we have gone over $100,000 in the first 26 minutes of the Project for Awesome. If every 26 minutes is like this we will raise kajillions of dollar... (21:00)