It is with much relief that I present the fruits of our labor:

The Unofficial Vine: A Collection of User Selected Works from Newsvine.com

This project has been more than a month in the making, and it is finally complete.

What started as a simple 'napkin idea' developed into something not overly large, but with large future potential and a decent showing for a first go. I firmly believe that 'we're on to something here', and am proud to have kicked it off with all of you.

A 15 page preview of the book is here.

PRICING:

Each book has 10% of the base price added on to it which will then be given to donation in full. There are two paper types - Standard and Premium. Premium paper, which is 100-pound text silk-finish paper that has "improved opacity over our standard paper and stellar image quality."

This 8X10 book is 136 pages, with over 85 full color pictures in easy to read text and contains some of the best authors who use Newsvine.

$46.14 Softcover w/ premium paper

$67.04 Hardcover / Image Wrap w premium paper

Again, this is with the donation added to it, so the Hardcover Image Warp w/ premium paper has a base price (which I cannot control) of $60.95. Add to that $6.09 for donation and the total is $67.04. I know times are tight with people right now, but I do feel this is for a good cause. With that, I've placed an order for TWO Hardcover / Image Wrap w/ premium paper books. Obviously, the softcover will be less expensive, but the donation will be smaller.

Blurb has a base price per book (based on size and material), that I have no control over. I can't tweak or adjust the prices that Blurb has set print a book. All books are printed on demand, so there is no sitting inventory; when you place an order, they print it and only then will they print it.

Every month, when profits exceed $25 a check will be fut and sent directly to The American Red Cross. If in a month profits do not exceed $25, like Newsvine, they "roll-over" until the sum equals or exceeds $25.

To place an order, go here

I have but one more thing to ask of everyone and that is please help me promote this book by mentioning it to people you know physically or on the blogosphere, or at the very least let me know of places and people who might be interested and I'll do it. I would like to see this book listed as a 'best seller' on Blurb because there would be a larger donation made to charity.

OTHER STUFF:

Now that the hard part is out of the way, let us focus on the next year and the articles that we Newsviners will be putting out. If you have not done so, take this time to join or group "Unofficial Vine Vol II" and clip any well written original and non-meta articles you find to it thought this upcoming year so that when it comes time to do this again next year the wait will not be as long and the book will have more substance. As a reminder there is also a Flickr group, "Unofficial Vine", I've created to start an image pool for next years book, that any of you are welcome to join and contribute any photos you may have taken for use. Be sure to read the rules of both groups before joining them.

I want to thank everyone who participated and despite the work that was needed to get it together, it was more than worth it when I think about someone at some point will get some kind of help that they might not otherwise get.

To bring yourself up to speed on this project from start to finish you can read and see it in the previous 4 phases

• Phase I - The Idea
• Phase II - The Vote
• Phase III - The Results and Permissions
• Phase IV - The Compile and Updated Adjustments

I had planned on announcing the completion tomorrow morning,but I forgot - I'm supposed to start going in earlier than usual this week, so I won't have time.

I have announced this on:

twitter
Iliketotallyloveit
rejaw
tumblr
facebook
email
digg
newsvine
flickr
vox