Make ConTessa More Awesome
Donation protected
Hi there! My name is Stacy, and I'm the founder, organizer, web developer, graphic designer, and whatever other hats I can possibly find to stick on my head - of ConTessa - a free online gaming convention celebrating women who game.
The idea for ConTessa came about in late 2012 when I started craving for a space for myself where I could just be a gamer without having to constantly talk about being a woman who games, or constantly being expected to comment on every piece of artwork or game or political gender discussion that came up. It became so bad that I rarely got asked to actually talk about the actual games and gaming and frequently got asked to talk about anything involving gender politics.
I thought it would be nice to build a convention where women could set aside the gender politics for a few days and just enjoy being gamers. Having participated in a couple of online conventions myself, I thought this would be the best way to keep costs down so the convention could be free, and also to appeal to women all over the world rather than in just one geographical location.
The convention is set to run from June 21st - June 24th and has received an amazing reception. I've been putting my time and energy into building the convention primarily by myself since the start of the year without any knowledge of how one should go about organizing a convention in the first place. With the help of some friends and some good advice, I was able to pick up a variety of sponsors to support the convention by giving away free PDFs of their games and supplements as well as the occasional physical item. I've also used my own experience and gear as a crafter to make buttons, stationery, bookmarks, and the like to offer a "swag bag" (really, a padded envelope) filled with goodies.
The only thing our online convention lacks, now, is a vendor hall and I thoroughly intend to have something for that by next year.
So what are you funding?
This campaign is specifically to reimburse me for all of the money I've spent putting ConTessa together. I did everything in my power to keep the costs low-to-nothing for the convention so that I could keep the barrier for entry at 'free'. The convention's sponsors have done a fantastic job of making that possible while still giving away free stuff by giving us all of the free stuff, and my own experience as a web developer meant that I didn't have to hire anybody to build the custom code necessary for the ConTessa website, but I still went the extra mile and paid for some things (including the time it took to build all of this) out of my own pocket.
For instance, while I've done all of the graphic design for the site, I did commission the artwork so that we could have outstanding - and fun - mascots and props for said graphic design. I'm also putting together 20 "swag bags" (swag padded envelopes) containing pinback buttons, bookmarks, send-a-dungeon greeting cards, and other gaming goodies to 20 lucky winners of contests and random drawings. Then, of course, there are the costs associated with the domain name and hosting the website.
I was willing to just eat those costs as my gift to the fantastic women that I game with and who are setting up all of these great events, but then the world surprised me and people started asking me how they could contribute cash to offset my own expenses. After doing a bit of searching, GoFundMe seemed to be a good way to go about giving people a space to do that end.
To all of the people who have said this, and all the people donating ... thank you, from the bottom of my heart. Working on this convention for the last six months has been a labor of love on my part and I never expected anyone to pay me for that labor of love, or even reimburse my expenses. So many people have done so much to renew my faith in humanity (I know, tired phrase, but I can't think of anything better) that I'm constantly overwhelmed.
Thank you, thank you, thank you...
And because I can't just take money without wanting to give cool crap away, I'm putting in some swag bags and buttons as rewards.
At $5, I'll send you a random ConTessa character button, some of which are shown below. At $20, I'll send you the whole set, along with a handful of the non-character buttons.
At $50, I'll send you one of the ConTessa grab bags, and you won't even have to win a contest or drawing to get it! The contents of the bag are still in process, but we've got a post on our website detailing what's going into it as we're creating it.
One part of the bag are these send-a-dungeon greeting cards that feature a faint dot grid on the cover and inside the card with a ConTessa-themed compass rose. You can draw a dungeon on the card, then send it off to a friend for some instant fun!
If this campaign exceeds expectations, I want to put the money into adding more things to the swag bag or creating more awesome for ConTessa, so the stuff that goes in the swag bag may very well be added to before all of this is finished.
I want to thank you again for taking the time to read this, and if you choose to donate, for donating. ConTessa is already set to be an awesome event, and you're just adding more awesome on top of the already huge pile of awesome.
Thank you!
Stacy
The idea for ConTessa came about in late 2012 when I started craving for a space for myself where I could just be a gamer without having to constantly talk about being a woman who games, or constantly being expected to comment on every piece of artwork or game or political gender discussion that came up. It became so bad that I rarely got asked to actually talk about the actual games and gaming and frequently got asked to talk about anything involving gender politics.
I thought it would be nice to build a convention where women could set aside the gender politics for a few days and just enjoy being gamers. Having participated in a couple of online conventions myself, I thought this would be the best way to keep costs down so the convention could be free, and also to appeal to women all over the world rather than in just one geographical location.
The convention is set to run from June 21st - June 24th and has received an amazing reception. I've been putting my time and energy into building the convention primarily by myself since the start of the year without any knowledge of how one should go about organizing a convention in the first place. With the help of some friends and some good advice, I was able to pick up a variety of sponsors to support the convention by giving away free PDFs of their games and supplements as well as the occasional physical item. I've also used my own experience and gear as a crafter to make buttons, stationery, bookmarks, and the like to offer a "swag bag" (really, a padded envelope) filled with goodies.
The only thing our online convention lacks, now, is a vendor hall and I thoroughly intend to have something for that by next year.
So what are you funding?
This campaign is specifically to reimburse me for all of the money I've spent putting ConTessa together. I did everything in my power to keep the costs low-to-nothing for the convention so that I could keep the barrier for entry at 'free'. The convention's sponsors have done a fantastic job of making that possible while still giving away free stuff by giving us all of the free stuff, and my own experience as a web developer meant that I didn't have to hire anybody to build the custom code necessary for the ConTessa website, but I still went the extra mile and paid for some things (including the time it took to build all of this) out of my own pocket.
For instance, while I've done all of the graphic design for the site, I did commission the artwork so that we could have outstanding - and fun - mascots and props for said graphic design. I'm also putting together 20 "swag bags" (swag padded envelopes) containing pinback buttons, bookmarks, send-a-dungeon greeting cards, and other gaming goodies to 20 lucky winners of contests and random drawings. Then, of course, there are the costs associated with the domain name and hosting the website.
I was willing to just eat those costs as my gift to the fantastic women that I game with and who are setting up all of these great events, but then the world surprised me and people started asking me how they could contribute cash to offset my own expenses. After doing a bit of searching, GoFundMe seemed to be a good way to go about giving people a space to do that end.
To all of the people who have said this, and all the people donating ... thank you, from the bottom of my heart. Working on this convention for the last six months has been a labor of love on my part and I never expected anyone to pay me for that labor of love, or even reimburse my expenses. So many people have done so much to renew my faith in humanity (I know, tired phrase, but I can't think of anything better) that I'm constantly overwhelmed.
Thank you, thank you, thank you...
And because I can't just take money without wanting to give cool crap away, I'm putting in some swag bags and buttons as rewards.
At $5, I'll send you a random ConTessa character button, some of which are shown below. At $20, I'll send you the whole set, along with a handful of the non-character buttons.
At $50, I'll send you one of the ConTessa grab bags, and you won't even have to win a contest or drawing to get it! The contents of the bag are still in process, but we've got a post on our website detailing what's going into it as we're creating it.
One part of the bag are these send-a-dungeon greeting cards that feature a faint dot grid on the cover and inside the card with a ConTessa-themed compass rose. You can draw a dungeon on the card, then send it off to a friend for some instant fun!
If this campaign exceeds expectations, I want to put the money into adding more things to the swag bag or creating more awesome for ConTessa, so the stuff that goes in the swag bag may very well be added to before all of this is finished.
I want to thank you again for taking the time to read this, and if you choose to donate, for donating. ConTessa is already set to be an awesome event, and you're just adding more awesome on top of the already huge pile of awesome.
Thank you!
Stacy
Organizer
Stacy Dellorfano
Organizer
Escondido, CA