Vancouver-based Tweetmyride hopes to raise $1 million for charity through Twitter

A Vancouver-based campaign aims to use Twitter to raise $1 million for charity.

Founded by Leoni Milano and Gavin Romanis, the Tweetmyride Charity Foundation is urging people to donate to 10 charities and to tweet about their contributions.

The four-month campaign launched today (July 30) and runs until November 30.

According to a press release issued by Tweetmyride today, the campaign was inspired by the race between Ashton Kutcher and CNN to gain one million followers.

The Tweetmyride Web site states:

We created tweetmyride charity campaign – which translates to ”˜tweet’ about my ride and ”˜donate’ towards my ride – to raise $1 million for charity. With the help of your tweets on Twitter and the use of other social networking sites we hope to reach our goal by the end of our 4-month campaign.

Along the way, Romanis, who doesn’t have any mountain-bike racing experience, plans to compete in Costa Rica’s four-day La Ruta de los Conquistadores in November.

The campaign will also include a “social ride” in Vancouver at the end of August.

Those who live elsewhere can set up their own such ride to raise money for one of the participating charities in Canada, the U.S., the U.K., Australia, and Costa Rica.

The charities involved in the campaign are charity: water, First United Church, Fred Hollows Foundation, Médecins Sans Frontií¨res, National Breast Cancer Foundation, Oxfam Canada, Starlight Children’s Foundation, Team Fox and the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research, CREAR Association, and World Vision.

People can make donations through the Tweetmyride Web site and get campaign updates via Twitter.

Tweetmyride will hold a launch event tomorrow (July 31) in the penthouse of the Loden Vancouver hotel.

In February, Twitterers organized Twestivals in 202 cities around the world that raised about US$250,000 for charity: water.

You can follow Stephen Hui on Twitter at twitter.com/stephenhui.