Donate £10 to Lumos and have dinner with JKR

[fromorbit]

JKR has made a very generous offer on Twitter:

J.K. Rowling
https://x.com/jk_rowling/status/1929113511004664078

I mean this, by the way. Donate £10 to lumos, I'll draw three names out of a hat and we'll have dinner. It could be KFC, but the wonderful JamesChiavarini has just suggested his restaurant, so it might be there instead (travel and accommodation on me if you're not in London).

Offer stands! Applications close at midnight on Monday. A £10 donation means your name will go into the draw.

https://wearelumos.org/how-you-can-help/donate/

If your name’s chosen and you’re outside London (or the UK) I’ll pay for travel and accommodation.

Once donations have been verified with Lumos I’ll select three donors’ names at random (can’t promise a literal hat, but who knows).

I’ll match the total sum donated to Lumos between first offer and midnight Monday.

And once my three fellow diners have been chosen, we’ll have a vote on whether we’re having KFC or going to Il Portico.

Additional offer from John Boyne:

John Boyne

£10 donated to Lumos. Whoever has the good fortune to win the raffle and have dinner with you, I'll donate £1,000 to the charity of his or her choosing.

This was inspired by JKR's ongoing twitter spat with Jolyon:

I've never sought to auction dinner with myself at a Michelin-starred restaurant with ‘a selection of wines from [my] own cellar’ as you have, Jolyon, but if anyone wants to bung Lumos £10, I'll draw a name out of a hat and we'll split a KFC bargain bucket.

Don't be so patronising please.

I've been here for very many years and always been puzzled by the massive fangirling of JKR. She is in my opinion a very average writer who managed to hit it big with clever marketing.

I don't think she is quite the saint or genius people make her out to be.

Why don’t you tell her how you feel and i’m positive she’ll see it from your perspective and pull the plug on the whole thing. 🙄

Gah - so I had the email earlier, clicked the link to again say yes, definitely still include me in the prize draw but like an idiot deleted the email. Then tried to enter my info on lumos when site crashed …

I now cannot find the blinking email in my deleted items or anywhere but can’t be sure my consent got through …

Any suggestions? I know I won’t win but still absolutely want to be in that hat!!!

You're entitled to your opinion absolutely and I don't think JKR will mind in the least. I have to say for a 'mediocre' writer she's doing pretty good.

Is there something bothering you in particular about this free raffle? I can't see who or what would be the loser here. It's fun and a little exciting and Lumos benefits from extra funds.

@tellmewhenthespaceshiplandscoz - you might be able to fish the deleted email out of a bin - sometimes they only really delete after 30 days or something.

The links in the email are not currently working. I'm guessing there is huge demand. But the competition is free to enter anyway (because of the law) so you don't need to be 'linked' to your donation. If you can get onto the form, you'll be able to fill out your details.

chimp because I am neither her publicist nor her lawyer.

Anyway we are derailing this thread so I will sit back and see what happens next.

Good luck to all those desperate to share take away fried chicken or a slap up Michelin meal with the Great One

Oh the fucking irony. I think you’re the one being patronising by accusing us of “fangirling” and then acting all superior about her being average. You don’t like her? Fine. Don’t enter the competition to have a chance of dinner with her. But then you wouldn’t have been able to come on here and sneer if you just ignored it would you.

A very fair point @DialSquare . I will bow out now and observe. Good luck with the raffle!

I certainly don't think she's a saint, nor would I say she qualifies as a genius and I haven't read any of her books so I can't comment on her writing skills. However I would like to personally thank her for giving me the strength and bravery to stand up for women's rights at a time when it was very dangerous to do so.

Now that it's a free prize draw and not linked to donating there is no reason donations cant be gift aided.

Why should she shelve the idea? Loads of people would love to win dinner with her. If you're not one of them, don't enter.

Lumos is one of her own charities. She's estimated to have donated around a quarter of a billion to charitable causes, as well as paying all her taxes and not using any tax avoidance schemes.

Criticise her for not agreeing that trans people are more important than female people if you must. But suggesting that she doesn't donate enough to charity is rather idiotic.

JKR said right, from the start that she would match donations made by midnight on Monday - see in the opening post on this thread

I’ll match the total sum donated to Lumos between first offer and midnight Monday.

She’s now saying that if those donations are withdrawn she’ll still match the original amount.

I got the email and was shocked that people might pull out of this but still want to be in the draw.

I’ll try again Not2 thanks

Me too

It doesn’t really matter what you think - clearly book sales amounting to millions of £££££s show that most people think differently to you. No need to be so petty, your jealousy is peeping through,

By ‘we are’ you mean ‘I am’.

As I understand it, her original offer was to match all donations made within the first 48 hours.

She is now offering to do this AND double-match any withdrawn donations.

Either way, the charity gets a lot of benefit from the event.

I don’t enjoy her writing, but others do. She’s immensely successful and much of her early popularity was word of mouth as Harry Potter got children reading in a way they hadn’t for decades.
Add to that she’s generous to a fault and has endured years of people carping at her and lately threatening her with grace, tolerance and courage. No wonder she’s admired.

I donated but have no interest in the meal bit. So I don’t want a refund (how petty would that be?).

Hello @borntobequiet ! Hope all well

I can’t access it. I tried earlier and it wouldn’t finish submitting and now I’ve got this.

Yes, still overloaded. I will try really late tonight or early tomorrow morning, in the hope that it is indeed just masses of fans trying to access the site and not a DDoS.

When did people get the emails and who from? I donated last week and haven't received the email.
So I don't think I'm entered now?

It’s still down. Poor sods!