Press

February 14, 2001

Over 5,000 Acres of Threatened Rainforest and Wilderness Has Been Preserved Through FREE Click-to-Donate Web Site

Ann Arbor, MI (February 14, 2001) - EcologyFund.com (http://www.EcologyFund.com), today celebrates its one-year anniversary. The innovative site launched on February 14, 2000-sending a Valentine to the Earth. Since then, the site traffic has increased enormously; over one million individual donations are made every month. Users of EcologyFund have preserved over 5,000 acres of rainforest and wilderness land. EcologyFund sponsors, partners and users have made EcologyFund the leading click-to-donate land preservation site-saving more wilderness land in more places than any other Web site. In addition, added services and the recent server upgrade and redesign, make EcologyFund a hub of eco-information, and a quick and easy way to make a daily contribution to preserving our planet.

Thank You Sponsors
Visitors to EcologyFund raise funds for land trusts by clicking on a "donate" button to see ad banners from site sponsors. The sponsors pay a per-view fee each month to the individual non-profit land preservation groups. One hundred percent of the sponsors' payments go to EcologyFund's non-profit partners. Each visitor currently can save 180 square feet of rainforest and wilderness land a day, at no cost, by clicking the seven primary donate buttons. So far, this clicking has preserved 5,000 acres of land. Without the generous dedication of the EcologyFund sponsors over the past year, this land would not have been preserved. We are proud to acknowledge the contributions of all of the companies who have sponsored EcologyFund in the past year: Novica (charter), CharityMall (charter), iPrint (charter), WholePeople (charter), CoolSavings (charter), FinePrint, EnviroNetwork, Flower.com, Lucy, NaturePhotosOnline, RedJellyFish, WebReleaf, Working Assets, Yacumama Rainforest Lodge, Zeal.com, Caf� Canopy, Hollow Top, Regis, University of Leeds, and Wine Accents. The Environment News Service is an official partner of EcologyFund.com.

Thank You EcologyFund Users
The community of EcologyFund users has steadily grown since our launch a year ago. They have helped to build the site with their suggestions, support, and daily clicks. And they have also spread the word. EcologyFund has never launched a large advertising campaign. The site has grown through the word-of-mouth efforts of its users. From just a few hundred users in our first month, to the over 100,000 monthly users today, the buzz generated from our clickers has been the key to success for EcologyFund. In October we launched a new service, Group Registration, which allows an individual to have their daily clicks also count towards a group tally. Anyone can form a group, and the response has been wonderful. Many people have rallied their friends and family into a group, while others donate in the name of their favorite musician, athlete or cause. This new initiative by EcologyFund users has increased daily clicks by 4500%. Thank you to all EcologyFund clickers. A special thanks to the Honor Roll clickers who have donated over � acre each, and to the top 10 Groups who have donated between 1,335,075 and 87,470 square feet of wilderness each. They are GVdD-team, Seti@ Netherlands, KWSN, Spreadheads, John Denver Remembrance, Michelle Kwan Fans, Kimock Friends, Runquist, Florida Environmentalists, and Nova Scotia Nature Trust.

Thank You Non-Profit Partners
The mission of EcologyFund is to find new ways to harness the power of the Internet to help the environment. We are grateful that so many non-profit land and wildlife preservation groups have paired their missions with ours. We provide the site, the users make daily clicks, the sponsors make the payments, but it is the non-profit partners that do the real work. They must apply that money to their mission. They actually plant the trees, buy the land, save our wilderness. Without their trust and partnership, and their commitment to our environment, there would be no land to save. EcologyFund gratefully acknowledges the efforts of our non-profit partners: the Rainforest Trust and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds based in the U.K., the Wilderness Land Trust, The Wildlands Project, The Cascades Conservation Partnership, The American Chestnut Foundation, The Michoacan Reforestation Fund, and the Kentucky Natural Lands Trust based in the U.S., Pronatura of Mexico, the Nature Conservancy of Canada, and Fondo per la Terra of Italy. Their projects in the US, Canada, Mexico, Africa, Amazon Basin, Patagonia and Scotland are making significant and vital contributions to our global environment.

For more detailed information on EcologyFund click-to-donate opportunities, partners, sponsors, and projects, or to make a free daily contribution, please visit http://www.EcologyFund.com.

EcologyFund.com founder Tim Kunin is available for interviews: [email protected] or 781-461-6161.