Celebrity Auction on Twitter Gives New Twist to Online Fund Raising

If you follow certain celebrities on Twitter, you may have noticed recent tweets mentioning TwitChange, a Twitter-based effort to raise money for aHomeInHaiti.org, an Atlanta group that is working to build permanent homes for orphans in Haiti.

An example:

RT @EvaLongoria: Our friend @tpolamalu (Troy Polamalu) of the Pittsburgh Steelers is w/ us @ http://TwitChange.com + 2 tickets to a home game + signed jersey

So what is it?

TwitChange purports to be the “first ever celebrity tweet auction,” using Twitter to direct visitors to TwitChange.com. Once they arrive at the site, visitors are encouraged to bid on the chance to have celebrities follow them for 90 days and to have the celebrity mention them to their other Twitter followers.

Here are some of the bids coming in so far:

– Dana White, Ultimate Fighting Championship president: $15,600
– Zachary Levi, actor on NBC’s “Chuck”: $14,900
– Alyssa Milano, actress: $3,550
– Kim Kardashian, reality television star: $2,550
– Joe Jonas, entertainer: $2,025
– Ryan Seacrest, host of Fox’s “American Idol”: $1,525

“It’s so easy for celebrities to do,” says Shaun King, founder of Atlanta-based aHomeInHaiti.org and the one who hatched the TwitChange idea. “It’s for a good cause. It’s really hard for celebrities to say no.”

So far, about 150 celebrities, mostly athletes and entertainers, are participating and telling their Twitter followers to bid. The celebrities can add items to the auction to get more bids. TwitChange.com, since its launch two weeks ago, has been viewed 22 million times.

aHomeInHaiti.org is rebuilding the Miriam Center, which houses and educates children with disabilities in Haiti. The charity hopes to raise $1-million. To date, Mr. King says the TwitChange auction has drawn winning bids totaling about $130,000.

The online auction, which garnered free support from eBay and online-auction agency Kompolt, began September 15 and ends September 25.

Fans who don’t want to bid on the celebrities but are interested in supporting the cause are invited to make donations at the charity’s Web site. Mr. King says donors have given from $6,000 to $8,000 through the site since the auction started.

“I hope that other organizations and causes can see what we’re doing and copy it,” Mr. King says. “We don’t really care about having this duplicated. We’d like more people to see the value of social media and technology and to see it as their friend, contextualize it, and do it on their own.”