I mentioned last month that there would be prizes on offer for those who supported Daily Grail with a 'voluntary subscription'. Well, this month we begin to honour that promise (I'll draw some new prizes each month), with the first of our prizes being very sexy indeed: a limited edition artwork by the lead singer of Tool, Maynard James Keenan, personally signed and with certificate (and seal) of authenticity, direct from the inner sanctum of the Tool Temple (thanks Blair!). It certainly would look kick-ass in a frame up on my wall, but I'm sacrificing for the good of TDG and putting it up for one of you lucky folk to win (click the image for a larger view):

Also, I'll throw in a few books as runner-up prizes, just so y'all have a good chance of picking something up. If you want to be in the running for this month's prizes, you have to have become a 'voluntary subscriber' to TDG before the prize draw on October 31 - see below on how to do so. Remember that higher donation amounts give you more chances to win: subscriptions up to $19 get 1 entry, $20 to $49 gets 2 entries, and $50 and up gets 3.

All voluntary subscriptions not only get you in the draw, but also allow me to improve the site, so it's win-win for everyone. Note too that I'm currently working on a site redesign, which will have more functions and improvements, some of which may be only available to voluntary subscribers. So plonk down a few dollars on a worthwhile investment.

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Voluntary subscriptions can be donated via the PayPal button underneath (**accepts credit card details** as well as PayPal account transfers):

For cheques/money orders via the post (only for amounts over $50 please, due to the expenses involved), or just plain old crispy dollar bills of any amount:

Greg Taylor
P.O. Box 28
Petrie, QLD, 4502
AUSTRALIA

I'll announce the winners of the October Prize Draw in early November.

Swiss adventurer —and Icarus impersonator— Yves Rossi has accomplished his goal of crossing the English channel, using his strapped-on jet wing that he designed and fabricated.

According to CNN, He began the Friday flight just before 1207 GMT; by 12:15 GMT, Rossy was above British soil and looped over onlookers before opening his parachute, with his wings still strapped to his back.

"It was perfect. Blue sky, sunny, no clouds, perfect conditions," Rossy said. "We prepared everything and it was great."

The travesy was not without incidents, however. Yves' jet wing ran out of fuel just before the end, and he had to use a parachute to safely reach ground.

You can watch the video of this amazing feat here.

Also, National Geographic will run a special program called "Flight of the Jet Man" that will start at 8 pm ET/PT. Just in case you were not planning on watching certain debate that may *or* may not air at the same hour ;-)

Hey, this website is 10 years old. That's pretty damn good going for an almost-updated-daily website with no operating budget and a complete lack of editorial qualifications. I guess we must do something right. Most of the credit for that "right" has to go to the amazing admins that we've had over the years, who've worked their butts off collecting news, in order to help out the community - big props to all of them*, a big thanks from me on behalf of both myself, and all TDG readers (I'd list their names, but I'm doped up to the eyeballs and I'd forget someone and be eternally ashamed of myself).

Thanks also to all you readers out there that hang out, discuss the topics, spread the word, send thanks, news tips, comments, advice, and offer me membership in the Illuminati (yes, I still get about ten a year). The site has always been about community, and all you guys are therefore an intrinsic part of the Grail gestalt.

I'd say more, but I'm not very well. Maybe I'll celebrate when my eyeballs stop hurting. But anyway, happy birthday to us!

(* Hey, did anyone else notice that our very own Cernig now has a gig on one of the biggest political blogs on the planet, Crooks and Liars...and yes, I'll claim him now that he's famous)

**This story stickied for the next few days - regular updates continue beneath**

This coming Monday is the Daily Grail's 10th birthday*! As mentioned previously, we're 'celebrating' this feat by asking for voluntary subscriptions to the site, in order to help the site grow and continue on for years to come. With more than 10,000 readers per day, that should be a simple matter of asking everyone to chip in just a dollar or two (not bad value you'd have to say, for 10 years of TDG). Unfortunately, the apathy monster generally has a pretty firm grip on everyone out there - but *you* might just be that free-spirited exception, willing to support independent news and commentary! So, one more time, this is how you can help out:

You can donate using Paypal, credit card, or via selected debit cards, using the PayPal donation button beneath:

Alternately, for cheques/money orders via the post (only for amounts over $50 please, due to the expenses involved), or simply great wads of cash bundled in envelopes (really, really big envelopes):

Greg Taylor
P.O. Box 28
Petrie, QLD, 4502
AUSTRALIA

As mentioned previously, there will be prizes distributed to lucky 'subscribers' - so throw in a few dollars and give yourself a chance. Trust me, you'll be kicking yourself when your neighbour proudly shows off his newly won special TDG merchandise...

For those number-crunchers out there - of the 232 voluntary subscribers so far, European and UK readers are currently the majority contributors over the USA (barely), with Scandinavian countries in particular making up a huge proportion, given the percent of readers we have from there versus the US. We definitely need to post more Viking stories here on TDG...

Sincere thanks to all those who have contributed thus far - hopefully you'll enjoy watching TDG evolve and grow over the coming years, on the back of your wonderful support.

* For those expecting fireworks and celebrations for our birthday, please note that currently I'm barely able to stay upright due to a severe dose of flu. Sorry!

A quick update on our 'Voluntary Subscription' drive here on TDG. A month in, we have had 145 donations made - thanks so much to all that have offered some support, it makes such a huge difference to my ability to push the site forward.

However - and I don't mean to sound ungrateful, or demanding - 145 people (in a month) is *less than 1%* of our daily audience. I would like to think that the hours and expense that gets poured into TDG over the course of a year is perhaps worth, say, the price of a coffee? If it's not a valuable resource for 99% of readers, what is the point of the site continuing?

So come on, skip that coffee tomorrow and instead help ensure the future of The Daily Grail. Even if you do think the site's a worthless pile of crap, you still might get lucky and win a very nifty prize (details below)! Here's the PayPal donation button, you know you want to click it (you don't need a PayPal account, you can use your credit card as well):

For cheques/money orders via the post (only for amounts over $50 please, due to the expenses involved):

Greg Taylor
P.O. Box 28
Petrie, QLD, 4502
AUSTRALIA

Now: the upside of having just 145 donations so far is that - at the moment - the chances of those 'voluntary subscribers' winning a prize is about 1 in 15 (and getting better as more prize commitments come in). There are signed books from the likes of Jacques Vallee and Graham Hancock on offer, as well as a *very* nice piece of signed occult memorabilia from the Tool camp (thanks Blair!). More besides, but I'll keep that for the next update - let's see if we can get up to 200 voluntary subscribers by then! Remember too, the more you donate, the more entries you get in the draw.

Once again, a huge thanks to all those who have contributed to the our funding drive. You're all stars.

Many thanks to all those who have provided a contribution to our Daily Grail Donation Drive - it is appreciated very much! The prize pool (for those who have offered a 'voluntary subscription') is growing, with various authors/personalities kicking in some goods (e.g. this week Jacques Vallee and Graham Hancock offered a few autographed books each). At the moment, with number of contributors, versus the size of the prize pool, you're a good chance of picking up something - so it may well be worth your while.

A number of people have asked about providing a snail mail address, as they prefer sending a cheque to using PayPal, so here it is:

Please note: as I mentioned previously, cashing international cheques costs me around $10 each, takes 15 minutes to do each, and takes 30 days to clear. So, while I appreciate the thought very much, it just does not make sense to send a cheque in non-Australian dollars for a small amount - PayPal is best suited to that.

Greg Taylor
P.O. Box 28
Petrie, QLD, 4502
AUSTRALIA

Also: for those who queried me about donating via bank transfer, I have now received information from my bank about the SWIFT code needed to do so. Please contact me personally if you wish to do this.

And, just to persevere, here's the PayPal donation button again:

Again, many thanks and appreciation to all those who have given a little bit back to TDG!

Firstly, a huge thanks to those who have responded to my call for donations/voluntary subscriptions here on TDG a couple of weeks ago. Around 80 people have contributed varying amounts thus far, some small, some large, but all appreciated so much (although the one individual who sent a rather stunning donation will be receiving a gift in the mail from me - they deserve it)! I don't respond to each person individually, (a lot of people wish to remain anonymous, so I respect that), but if you want to say 'hi' then drop me a line - would love to thank you personally.

For those who have said they would like to send a cheque: I will provide an address next week. *Please note though*: for me to change international cheques (not in Australian dollars) costs around $10 per cheque, takes around 15 minutes of waiting around at the bank to do each one, and then takes an additional 30 days for the funds to clear. So, unless the amount is of a decent size or in Australian dollars, I would much rather you redirect your voluntary subscription to a worthy charity!

If you would like to help out via PayPal, here's the donation button once more:

Now, here's the good part!! I'm putting together a prize pool of multiple items - signed books by top authors etc. All 'voluntary subscribers' will go in the running for a chance to win one of these special items! Donations up to $19 get 1 entry, $20 to $49 gets 2 entries, and $50 and up gets 3.

Once again, thanks to all those who have been so kind as to help support The Daily Grail. It all goes back into making the site even better, so all readers (and obviously, myself) owe you a huge debt of gratitude.

In two months time (September 1), the Daily Grail will be ten years old. For some time, I've been seeing this date as a moment to ask myself whether it's worth continuing on with TDG. That's not to say that I don't enjoy it, or that I don't have big plans - simply that the requirements of living a happy family life (I've been married and had three children since starting TDG) have meant that I need to start justifying the time and expense I sink into the site.

The upshot of all this is that TDG needs to stop being a hobby, and more the thing that I do professionally. I have a number of ideas on how to achieve this (website improvements, advertising and marketing, diversification projects), but to do so the Daily Grail first needs some working capital, to help fund these future developments.

I have always been averse to people paying a subscription for TDG - I sincerely believe in information being a free resource. As such, with TDG's tenth birthday approaching, what I am doing is simply asking for a retroactive, completely voluntary subscription, for the ten years of information TDG has provided thus far. This donation/voluntary subscription drive will run for the next two months, till September 1st. To begin with, below is a Donation button for both Paypal and credit card/bank account transactions. I'll post details for snail-mail cheques in the coming days, and will occasionally post reminders until TDG's birthday. The donation amount is completely your choice - what has TDG been worth to you?

Access remains exactly the same here on TDG, whether you donate or not. If you can't spare anything, there are other ways to help - such as by spreading word about the site to others. When one reader becomes two, our advertising revenue (theoretically) doubles. So that's how easy it is to give back a little to the Daily Grail.

My appreciation and thanks for all assistance provided!

A quick apology for the lack of updates (other than news briefs) this week. Have been under the hammer with a bunch of other tasks, and can't quite seem to get the time to sit down at the keyboard for too long. I have a number of very interesting articles to post on as well...so hang in there!

On a brighter note, I sent out royalty payments to all the authors involved in Darklore Volume 1 this week. Really great to be able to help support good researchers and writers in the Daily Grail genres, so huge kudos to all you guys that bought a copy and threw your support behind the project. Darklore 2 is approaching completion right now, and I'm also about to publish a few other great books - exciting (if draining) times!

At a bit of a crossroads at the moment, wondering where to go with TDG. Server costs have just jumped appreciably, and my free time is growing more and more limited. Somehow, I need to make the website become a (paying) job for me, to justify the necessary time and expense involved in running the site. The dream would be to work full-time on it, and have the time to host regular interviews and features (perhaps even in video form) - in other words, regular frontline content. Being able to devote serious time to the site would also result in a far more professional presentation

The strange fact is that if every person who visited TDG regularly paid $1 for a year of access to daily news (compare that to $30 for a yearly magazine subscription for 6 mags), I would earn that full-time wage. However, the intarwebs just don't seem to work like that. So I'm at a loss on how to achieve my aim. I may make July 'voluntary subscription' (donation) month, for those who are willing to pay a small amount - just to help pay the bills. Obviously, we have other projects working towards that goal (e.g. Darklore), and I'm hopeful that they will one day make us self-sufficient. But apart from that, I'm open to suggestions from readers on how to make TDG a bit more of a worthwhile investment of my time. (Selling my body will *not* be a money spinner, unless I get paid by the kilo).