MODULE 4 - ARTICLE SAMPLE- by Joel Alvarez. Congrats on your work!

DID YOU KNOW?: TOMB RAIDER is a media franchise that began as a videogame series and includes comic books, novels and films, centering around the adventures of the British archeologist Lara Croft. Since 1996, the series has sold over 60 million units worldwide.

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What would you do if the thing you love most is in danger? Discover the story behind two friends (and millions of people) as they embark on a journey to raise money in order to save a beloved project.

There is no ‘I’ in team. That’s the very first thing Gillian and I learnt when we decided to start this amazing project: we were not doing it just for ourselves, but also for the millions of people out there who were expecting the same thing as we did.

Just imagine you woke up one day and your favourite thing in the world was gone. You name it: your favourite film, your loveliest family photo, the park you go every weekend for a walk or that book you read over and over again… Gone. What would you do? Wouldn’t you do everything in your power to save it?

When we woke up that morning of May 2013 and found out that Rise of the Tomb Raider, the next installment of our favourite videogame series got cancelled by the developer arguing “lack of funds”, we decided it was time we did something about it. We started collecting signatures and launched a petition to bring the series back to life in Change.org (the most famous petition website in the world), but after getting together more than 45,000 signatures from all over the world and seeing no response, we decided to take things to the next level. You know what they say: money doesn’t grow on trees…

After weeks of thinking, Gillian came up with a brilliant idea. Knowing that thousands of die-hard Tomb Raider fans would go above and beyond to continue the breathtaking, unfinished tale of the much-loved archeologist, we launched another campaign on a crowdfunding website named Kickstarter. This time was not about ordinary people collecting signatures – it was about ordinary people donating money for a beloved cause from all over the world. In less than six weeks, we raised almost half a million dollars and the once cancelled project restarted its production. It was the most unusual way we have ever raised money, but it was a satisfying experience and I think we would definitely do it again if it was necessary. In Lara Croft’s own words: “A famous explorer once said that the extraordinary is in what we do, not who we are. I’d finally set out to make my mark, to find adventure… But instead, adventure found me.”