As projects go, this is pretty interesting. Word is spreading, plenty of people are following, some are reluctant to get involved while others are firing off ideas. We’ll keep going, slowly introducing more feats (up to a limit of four or five) and try and get lots of people chattering about what we’re attempting.

This is a slow burner; there’s a chance we won’t always be successful, or that it’ll take a while for momentum to build and see our first feat completed. For now, let’s keep thinking and tweeting and seeing what we can make happen.

Here’s this week’s shortlist to choose from – watch out on Twitter for the voting poll which launches soon:

@gemmanoakes

@featsoftweet I’m doing a trek in Borneo to raise money for Barnardo’s. Please help me hit my £3100 target! http://tiny.cc/r0jEA #feat

I am doing the biggest challenge of my life to raise money for children’s charity Barnardo’s. This is an amazing charity, who do so much good in this world. The only way I’m going to meet (and surpass) the target I have set is with the help of you guys!

I need help with raising the money as all my energy is focused on getting fit and mentally ready for this crazy feat, also If everyone donated just £1 we could raise a fortune for such a fantastic charity!

@rungeordierun

@featsoftweet Is there anyone who can mass produce a charity CD featuring 2 songs about my up and coming run across the USA? #feat

In 2011, I’m going to run across the USA – from the West coast to the East, a distance of 3,100 miles – in 100 days. So far, 184 people have been successful since the records began in 1909 – only 7 British people have ran the distance since I was born in 1971.

I’m after the mass production of CDs – around 500. and need help with one or more of the following:

- the printing of artwork onto CDs
- the printing of the insert for the jewel case
- the supply of blank CDs
- the burning of songs onto CD

Two songs have been written and recorded especially by The Exiles for the run. 50 CDs have been produced already and they sold really quickly. All proceeds go to St Benedict’s Hospice and The Children’s Foundation; the CDs sell for a minimum donation of £3. The CDs that sold recently went for any where between £3 and £20. I’m confident that I can sell all CDs and with all proceeds going to the two charities it will be a great fundraiser.

For example, the production of t-shirts for the run have been selling well and were paid for by local business. Over £1300 has been raised from the sale of these t-shirts so far. I see no reason why the same kind of funds can’t be raised via the sale of these CDs.

@scarletshimmer

@FeatsOfTweet I have no car , To fix it would cost more than its worth. I don’t even want a new one just one that works

I used to have a car but it seems to have many problems now that it isn’t safe to drive and now also my MOT is due on it. To fix the problems with it will cost more than the car is worth,also I don’t have the spare cash to fix it or buy another one.

Apart from wanting to generally get around and see family and that, I am a part of a voluntary group called the Joy Of Food which is run by the NHS in Norfolk. I have just finished my courses to become a trainer. This means is we run a class that lasts 3 hours a week, over 4 weeks. We teach people basic cooking skills, how to budget, how use up leftovers and nutrition. Its for people aged 18-30. Its about teaching people who missed out on cooking skills at school, introducing them to new foods and giving them the knowledge and skills to prepare tasty, fresh, healthy meals.

Joy of Food also attends food festivals and similar things and have a stall to do demonstrations and food tastings. In the school holidays, classes were held for people going away to uni to teach them skills to prepare fresh food on budget. All these events are run by volunteers like me.

Unfortunately without a car I cannot get to these classes (we have a lot of cooking equipment that we have to take.) They are desperate for
active trainers in my region and I feel frustrated I cant be involved at the moment.

@spiffykates

@FeatsOfTweet monty python is reuniting at the premiere of their new documentary in NYC 10/15. I would kill to go!!! #feat

All of the Pythons (except for Graham as he is a bit indisposed) will be congregating at the Ziegfeld theatre in Manhattan on October 15th for the premiere to collect an a award have a discussion and all. Despite the disadvantage of being American, I know how huge this is. The Pythons very rarely get together anymore, and on top of that, it is the 40th anniversary of the first broadcast of Monty Python’s Flying Circus in Britain. This soiree is such a big thing that it is invitation only. That causes a bit of a problem as I don’t have an invitation.

I’ve been a fan of Monty Python for well over 10 years. It is sort of a rite of passage: at some point in high school everyone sits down and watches “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” and some episodes of “Flying Circus.” For me it has blossomed into a bit of a detailed DVD collection (read: obsession). I have even had the opportunity to meet Eric Idle and Michael Palin (living near NYC has its advantages). Even if I did not get to meet the Pythons that night, I would totally appreciate the amazing opportunity to be privy to a bit of history.

I know I said I’d kill to get into this event. You’ll have to forgive me as it was about 6am and I was tweeting while still half asleep. I don’t think I could kill anyone… seriously maim maybe… but killing’s a bit much, no?

So the first week of Feats Of Tweet worked out ok – there’s room for more support and more re-tweets, but hey. Plenty of people got involved and after our first vote, we have our first feat.

Feats Of Tweets has 30 days from today to make this feat a reality. Somewhere on Twitter is the right individual, or the right combination of individuals, to make this happen – our job is to find them over the next month. Here’s the first feat we are supporting, as voted for by the Twitter community:

@RachelSMorris

@FeatsOfTweet I want to take my special needs foster son to Oregon for Christmas, to see best friends. help with cheap fares anything. #feat

M is 17 years old and has lived with me for over 9 years. He has global learning difficulties and is on the autistic spectrum. When he came to me he had minimal communication, was malnourished and didn’t know how to play. He can now hold conversations, travel to college independently, is obsessed with vehicles and has a reading age of approximately 6 years. He has no understanding of numbers or money and is unlikely to be able to live independently.

Some years ago my husband left and has had only sporadic contact with M since, depriving him of a good male role model. Some time ago he met some friends of mine from Albany in Oregon, and really bonded with my friend’s husband who is a mechanic. Blayne provided that much needed role model and M adores him. As M reaches 18 and has decisions to make about his future he would really benefit from spending time with Blayne.

Rachel has been in touch to say because of school and college timetables, the flights would need to be outbound after 19th December to return by 2nd January at the latest. Rachel lives in Bognor Regis, which means flights from London shouldn’t be a problem. It’s not massively cheap, however – two return flights from London to Portland cost from £1,300.

I know this is a tall order. It’s our first attempt at this and we’re not a huge community yet. It’s not impossible though. In fact it’s better to assume we’ll manage it regardless, and we just need to work on the fine detail. Some initial thoughts from me:

- there are dozens of airlines involved in indirectly serving the London to Portland route. Do we find all those that have Twitter accounts and bombard them with links to this story? Do we pick one and concentrate our efforts on them? Is there anybody you know personally that works at one of the airlines?

- do we break up the challenge into more manageable chunks? Should we concentrate on sourcing flights to a major US airport first, and then worry about cheaper internal flights later?

- do you have more Air Miles than you know what to do with? Would you be willing to donate them if somebody else paid for the cash element of the tickets?

Remember, there are no rules to say support must be sourced through Twitter; if you know people through flesh-and-blood connections, then by all means get in touch with them.

What do you think? It’s our first feat – can we make it happen for Rachel and her son?

Below are the five feats you can vote for in today’s poll. The voting will start at 12 midday GMT and will be open for 24 hours.

The cause that wins the vote will be supported by Feats Of Tweet over the next 30 days. We’ll tweet about it, ask followers for their support by retweeting or contacting people outside Twitter who could help, think up ideas and hopefully create enough buzz and awareness that ensure we create a Feat of Tweet.

There are only five feats in the shortlist and there were over double that number put forward. It doesn’t necessarily mean I didn’t feel a feat wasn’t worth supporting if it’s not on the list, although I did talk about the kind of requests I felt would and wouldn’t work in my blog post yesterday.

Reading through the proposed feats, you’d have been struck by one in particular – you’ll then read the shortlist below and wonder why the hell I haven’t included it; it’s this one from @Activiated. It relates to the desperate plight of a four year-old boy from California called Aaron who requires a simultaneous heart and kidney transplant. The background to this story is as heartbreaking as Aaron’s current condition.

So why didn’t I include this feat? I can’t say I’m completely happy with my decision not to. The request isn’t for donors, but for donations – Aaron’s family is close to running out of medical insurance, which is capped at $350,000. My feeling is that while there may be no greater feat than this, it isn’t something we could walk away from after 30 days; it needs sustained donations for however long it takes.

Just because this plea doesn’t fit into the framework for Feats Of Tweet, it doesn’t mean it isn’t worth supporting – it absolutely is. If you’re touched by Aaron’s story and want to donate, then do so without hesitation. As I said yesterday, you should support any request you identify with, whether they win the poll or not; Feats Of Tweet is about focusing our goodwill, not confining it.

Other feats that came close to the final five but didn’t quite make it include those from @coseleybaths, @canny_lass, @robcoyle and @samdexter.

I picked the final five for this first shortlist because some are unusual, some are unexpected but all could allow Twitter to shine (I don’t know how Twitter would resolve some of these, but it’s capable of moving in altogether mysterious ways). I asked each to write a few words about their feat – read through and remember to vote for one after midday:

@codoherty

@featsoftweet – help me & @tcfcharity to secure out of this world, money can’t buy prizes for charity ball to help child mental health #feat

The Children’s Foundation works to improve the health and wellbeing of children in North East England. We fund research and manage projects which provide practical solutions to child health issues. We’ve been doing this for nearly twenty years.

This year the Entrepreneur’s Forum has decided to support TCF with their annual charity ball which will take place on Saturday October 10th. The money raised from the ball will go directly towards funding a new project focusing on child mental health where we aim to help children with mental health issues such as anorexia, depression and behavioural problems.

The Entrepreneur’s Forum Ball is a fantastic event attended by North East England’s rich and influential, and a brilliant opportunity for the charity to make significant funds, providing we have money can’t buy prizes and experiences to auction. We need people who may be able to donate a week in their villa somewhere sunny or offer a behind the scenes tour of a TV show, tickets to prestigious events or flights anywhere in the world.

Fundraising is all about contacts and we think our Twitter friends can really help bring something unique and different to our event.

@hitman6498

@FeatsOfTweet This sounds dumb but I want to finish my #bowling league with a 200 or better average and would like to get my first 300 gm

I first started bowling when I was a kid, but nothing real heavy. When I joined the Marine Corps, that’s when bowling became more than just a fad.  I joined a military bowling league but  I was horrible, even got the nickname “Mr 98″ as I was barely able to throw over 100. It really bugged me but I didn’t really know what to do about it.

After I got out of the Marine Corps and went into the civilian sector I made some friends at my job and we joined – you guessed it – a bowling league.  I was the worst bowler on the team although I finally was able to crack that vaunted 100.

I took a part time job at a bowling alley and that is when the competitive juices started to kick in.  I saw and met some awesome bowlers as I worked the counter and they offered to help me to get better.  I would stay after work with some of my new friends and bowl for several hours to work on my game.  I then started investing in more high-end bowling equipment, I joined this very competitive Scratch league and the team that I put together was very easily outmatched.  With my not so impressive average of 170, I was getting beat fairly easily and regularly week in and week out.  There were some teams where the low bowler was 200-210 avg. We finished dead last but the pay for finishing last was more than I had ever won in any of the leagues I had ever been in, so needless to say I went back for a 2nd year.

I would love to attain my two goals of a) 200 avg and b) my first ever 300 game.  Currently I am at 187.75 and I feel like I can actually achieve my first goal.  The second goal can’t be achieved w/o being consistent with my first goal.

I work really hard to get better. I practice as much as I can and the bowling equipment I use is top of the line, so there are no excuses in that aspect.  I no longer want to be the laughing stock of the league.  To do that in this league you have to be a consistent 200 bowler.

@kirrus

@featsoftweet #feat to get a team of people outside zone1 tube stations in London, providing directions 4 tourists

I love helping people, so helping lost tourists find their way would be a fun use of my spare time. I’ve only recently moved to London, so I don’t yet know all the best routes.

To make this feat work, we’d need a team of people, at least one other than me, who armed with maps would go to popular or busy London Underground stations and stand outside, offering directions to anyone who looks lost. Best to go in teams of two – at least you’ve got someone to talk to whilst its quiet, and someone to help whilst it’s manically busy.

@RachelSMorris

@FeatsOfTweet I want to take my special needs foster son to Oregon for Christmas, to see best friends. help with cheap fares anything. #feat

M is 17 years old and has lived with me for over 9 years. He has global learning difficulties and is on the autistic spectrum. When he came to me he had minimal communication, was malnourished and didn’t know how to play. He can now hold conversations, travel to college independently, is obsessed with vehicles and has a reading age of approximately 6 years. He has no understanding of numbers or money and is unlikely to be able to live independently.

Some years ago my husband left and has had only sporadic contact with M since, depriving him of a good male role model. Some time ago he met some friends of mine from Albany in Oregon, and really bonded with my friend’s husband who is a mechanic. Blayne provided that much needed role model and M adores him. As M reaches 18 and has decisions to make about his future he would really benefit from spending time with Blayne.

@sharonodea

@FeatsOfTweet Can you help me find a sport I’ll like enough to do regularly? #feat

On my 18th birthday, someone gave me a notebook, and on each page I wrote one thing I wanted to do before I turned 30. Some trivial, some important.

I’d largely forgotten about this exercise, but as I was moving house a couple of years ago I found the notebook and realised I’d done almost all of the things I’d listed in it. However, three wishes in the book remain unfulfilled. These are:

- Visit Africa
- Visit Australia
- Find a sport I like and do it regularly

Now the first two sound tricky, but if I really wanted to go I could book a plane ticket. No, the latter’s the hard one.

To give you some background, I am entirely blind in my right eye, which means I have pretty bad spacial awareness can’t see anything on my right-hand side. I also have really awful balance, which might be related to my first point, but that could just be me making excuses. Consequently, I am appallingly bad at every sport I’ve ever tried.

I must surely be able to find some from of exercise that I’m not totally, depressingly crap at. But what? I’m willing to try pretty much anything. What can you suggest?

On Thursday @FeatsOfTweet received over a dozen requests for help. Tomorrow, I’ll ask everyone on Twitter to vote on one cause from a shortlist of five. We can’t help everyone, but of course there’s no reason why you can’t help any of the causes we mention – those you’ve read about here or that were tweeted on Thursday. This project is about choosing one specific cause a week, highlighting it, supporting it for 30 days and trying to make it happen through our collective efforts; if others benefit through the preliminary promotion (which is already happening), that’s no bad thing at all!

For this first week I’ll choose the final five to vote myself. This will probably be the case for several weeks, before I begin handing over the decision to a panel of Twitter users. I haven’t decided how this will work yet, but trust me – as soon as I figure out who should be making these decisions that process will begin. Having to choose has cost me sleep and made me feel uncomfortable, even question why I started this project – I don’t want anybody to be disappointed, but inevitably plenty of people will be.

Voting will begin tomorrow at 12pm GMT and continue for 24 hours – keep an eye on both Twitter and the site to find out more. In the meantime, I want to explain a little of my thinking behind the types of feats I’ll be choosing for you to vote on. I think there are certain requests the Twitter community will respond to, and others that will kill this project if pursued, so by shaping these first few weeks I’ll hopefully ensure we make good on our intention to bring about positive change.

So in no particular order, some thoughts on the types of feat I’d like to encourage and those I don’t think are a good fit:

- this project needs feats that can be measured, not open ended requests; this process can only be managed if we know what we’re being asked to do and how we’ll know when we’ve achieved it

- we’re not out to make any one person or website famous on Twitter – Feats Of Tweet will do itself no favours if it becomes a spambot

- we’re not here to do your thinking or live your life for you ; if you want to change an aspect of your life you’re unhappy with, then in the majority of cases there’s only one person preventing you from doing so – you. I appreciate people have situations that make change complicated, but we can’t be expected to resolve every issue or hand out tailored solutions

- that doesn’t mean a feat can’t be a request to help yourself; tomorrow we’ll see a couple of examples of people in very particular situations who simply want encouragement, advice and support to improve their lives

You may disagree with some, none or all of this – if you do think I’ve got this wrong, leave a comment below. This project belongs to everyone, I’m simply the caretaker; Feats Of Tweet will inevitably evolve as a project and your contribution may help that happen.

And of course, by limiting the shortlist to only five will inevitably mean some perfectly worthy requests aren’t included. Let me apologise in advance to anybody disappointed by tomorrow’s decisions; hopefully the exposure you receive by making your request either encourages you or others to make a difference.