Each year a group of people put on a gaming marathon known as the Mario Marathon to raise money for Child's Play Charity. A charity dedicated to improving the lives of children in hospitals with things such as toys, books and games. This charity is also supported by such organizations as The Humble Bundle and many others.
Basically how this works is that they have a check list of goals spread throughout a variety of Mario games that are unlocked by donation goals. The more donations they receive, the more gets unlocked and 100% of the proceeds go directly to Child's Play Charity. They continue to play until they have completed all the unlocked goals and it typically takes them about 5 days of straight gaming. Last year they raised well over $100,000! All of this is streamed on their website http://www.mariomarathon.com/ with a view of the players, a view of the game as they play it and graphics displaying information about their progress. They allow the users to submit fan art, join the conversation on irc and twitter and even win prizes through a variety of contests hold periodically throughout the marathon.
For those of you that like stats there is also and independent site called Mario Marathon Statistics run by @directionalpad that gives information about things such as hourly donations, tweets, viewers, etc. as well as providing some neat info about the quantity of an item that can be bought with the current donation total.
Feel free to join us in supporting a good cause by donating or just by mentioning them on your social network(s) of choice.
http://www.mariomarathon.com/
https://twitter.com/MarioMarathon
http://www.facebook.com/mariomarathon
Donate through Tortuga Cove: http://tortuga-cove.com/78-site-news/90 ... or-charity
