Listen Campaign
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The Listen Campaign [1], launched in November 2007, is an annual global multimedia campaign for disadvantaged children. Each year it involves 60 top creative artists and stars from film, music and the arts in producing rich media content. Already involved are – Film Stars: Natalie Portman, Samuel L Jackson, Ashley Judd, Ben Kingsley, Goldie Hawn, Kurt Russell, Jessica Lange and Brooke Shields, Novelists: Marina Lewycka, Tim Lott, Wole Soyinka, Ishmael Beah, Patricia Melo and Guo Xiaolu [2], Music Directors: Dave Stewart and Don Was
The campaign has three main purposes. Each year it aims to:
a) raise awareness of the needs and rights of the world's most disadvantaged children amongst an audience of 500 million people;
b) raise about $100 million for 200 pre-selected children's charity projects; and
c) continue building a community of people who are interested and want to help disadvantaged children.
The bulk of the fund-raising activity will take place during an annual global fund-raising broadcast which in the first year will be transmitted by 60 broadcaster partners in late 2008. The donations raised will go to The Listen Charity, a UK-registered charity which will then fund selected children’s charity projects around the world.
Each year The Listen Charity pre-declares to the public the projects it wishes to fund before it asks the public for any donations. It then reports back to each donor five times in two years on the effect their money has had on the lives of children helped by the projects. All of the money donated by the public goes to the charity, with none going to fund the media campaign, and 90 per cent of the money that leaves the public’s pockets gets to the projects in the field with only 10 per cent being absorbed by credit and debit card commissions, banking charges and the costs of selecting, vetting, monitoring and auditing the projects and of reporting back to each and every donor. This unique methodology has been designed to meet the wishes of the public, as expressed when they were asked what they would most want to see before they donated money to an initiative of this type.
The Listen Campaign has been developed and is being produced by Tribute [3], which has produced nine of the world’s largest global broadcasts including the historic Nelson Mandela 70th Birthday Tribute (demanding his release from prison), and The Wall Live in Berlin. The campaign is funded by commercial sources, including sponsorships, ticket sales and rights sales, allowing all the public’s donations to go to The Listen Charity.
