Yesterday, I woke up to an email that someone had sent us $5,000. I reread the Stripe email several times and blinked to make sure I wasn't still asleep.

I quickly messaged Laurel about our new HTML angel...

We had just orchestrated HTML Day, a day where people meet up and write HTML in cities all around the world. (This year, 20 cities spanning 4 continents participated.) These freewrites take place in parks, cafes, even boats. It's all about returning to the source of what made the web beautiful to begin with and writing HTML together in real life. Maybe our new angel had seen the potential of our project. Maybe they realized how much unpaid work we had done over the last five years: organizing events, teaching people HTML, recording an entire podcast, keeping things light, all in the hopes of making the web a calmer and more human place to browse.

HTML Day took place on Saturday, July 13th, 2024 in Sydney, New York City, Rotterdam, San Francisco, Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal, Stockholm, Hamburg, London, Saskatoon, Buenos Aires, Dublin, Seoul, Shanghai, Austin, Portland (Maine), Atlanta, Lee / Lenox (Massachusetts), Honolulu, and Seattle.

The day passed as usual, and Laurel and I texted about how we could thank our angel and how we could put this new found energy into the movement. A special edition HTML Energy shirt, a gift basket of only green items, and, of course, a special certificate of appreciation all came to mind.

In the evening, a message arrived...

HELP HELP PLEASE DECLINE MY PAYMENT...

Alas, it had all been a mistake :(

Our angel was just a smaller angel who had clicked through the donate page a little too fast. Maybe if Stripe had more HTML Energy this wouldn't have happened.

We promptly refunded our tiny angel and thanked them for their energy, though it saddened us that this was all a mistake.

But this experience did make us wonder...

Maybe a big angel did exist after all. It seemed so possible early that day. We had heard stories of projects being funded by a single bitcoin or a generous CEO. It really felt like our day had come.

So the question still lingers with us...

Is there an HTML Energy angel out there?

Send HTML Energy $5000
Send HTML Energy $100
Send HTML Energy $25

Thanks to our angels:

shub
Andrew

you?


Energy creates energy,
Elliott & Laurel
stewards of html energy
http://html.energy







❇️ Written in pure, raw HTML. Can you feel the energy?

⛲ Want to see? View the source!