This is the first of a new series of Heroes in Action articles, which will recognize the efforts of people in the Crash Course community who have gone beyond the call of duty and contributed to promoting the messages of the Crash Course in unique or special ways.
Michael Höhne is a businessman living in southern Germany, near Munich. He's a recognized expert on a part of the software industry known as Customer Relationship Management Systems, or CRM. While Michael has had a very successful career, he's not a person of extraordinary wealth. (more...)
When Michael recently discovered the Crash Course, he was so affected by the importance of the message that he felt a civic obligation to get involved. He started by promoting the Crash Course on his own web site (where he usually blogs about the software industry). Then Michael learned of our goal of finding a producer to underwrite the cost of producing a shortened version of the Crash Course as a television documentary. He felt this was a critically important idea, and wanted to get personally involved in making it happen, despite not being able to personally afford to fund such a project himself.
Michael put out a challenge to others in his professional community, offering to match any donation they might make to the Crash Course effort. Shortly thereafter, Michael sent Chris Martenson a cash donation of 10,000 Euro (about $13,000 USD) from his own savings, along with several excellent suggestions for how we might coordinate a group of donors to underwrite a TV documentary version of the Crash Course.
Aside from his extraordinary generosity, Michael immediately impressed Chris by registering as a user on the site using his own real name and uploading a real photo of himself for his profile. While we respect everyone's right to use screen names and avatars if they choose to do so, we feel that the topics discussed at PeakProsperity.com are serious issues confronting society, and we always appreciate when people participate using their true identity, rather than an anonymous screen name.
Michael posted a forum message describing his reasons for donating, hoping that his action might inspire others to follow suit. Unfortunately, there was a lot of traffic on the forums that week, and Michael's Post saw relatively few views.
Michael's main belief is that serious times call for serious measures and that society's path forward requires people to change their actions in meaningful ways. So he stepped up and made a donation that was very large compared to his means. Many regulars on this site don't realize this, but Chris paid nearly $2,000 to have the DVD mastering work done and then bought his own DVDs at cost just like everybody else. Chris gives his own time and money generously to this cause and, like Michael, he is not an especially wealthy person.
This is the level of dedication it will take to spread the messages contained in the Crash Course because, frankly, the status quo is not (yet) interested in hearing this message of change. Real change takes vision and sacrifice, and it takes heroes - those who are willing to give more than most because they know that if they don't, nobody will. That's why I thought it fitting to feature Michael in this first installation of a new series of Heroes in Action articles on the blog.
Many who are reading this have already given their time, money and dedication to helping to spread this message and we thank each and every one of you as well.
We certainly understand that not everyone can afford to be as generous as Michael has been, but we do hope his extraordinary generosity will motivate others to consider making a donation this holiday season. We're working as hard as we can to continue to bring you top quality content on PeakProsperity.com, and the site is just barely breaking even on subscription revenue.
Chris Martenson hasn't made a penny from the website this year, and we really need more support from the community in order for these efforts to continue. If you're able to afford to help our cause, please consider following Michael's example by making a donation in whatever amount you feel comfortable with.
Erik Townsend
Business Manager (on a purely voluntary basis)
PeakProsperity.com
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://peakprosperity.com/heroes-in-action-michael-hohne-2/