Andrew Detwiler / The public record
Memory is the thing I care about most, and there are diseases that take it. So my studio puts a fixed share of everything it earns toward the people working on cures, and we are doing the whole thing in public, starting from nothing.
This page is day one. Almost everything below is unfinished, and it is dated so you can watch it either fill in or not.
01 / Why
Several people in my family have had it. Most of them are gone now.
The last time I saw my uncle, he remembered my name. He was crying, and he told me he wanted to go home.
That hasn't left me. I don't want anyone else to go through it.
One more thing, because I keep finding out how many people do not know it. The Alzheimer's Association puts it plainly: "Alzheimer's is not just memory loss. Alzheimer's kills." I am not going to say it softer than they do.
02 / The commitment
Turtlevania Games gives twenty percent of what it earns to memory disease research. It comes off the top, before anyone in the studio gets paid, including me.
Off the top is the part that matters, so here is what it means. When a game earns money, the twenty percent comes out first. Whatever is left is what gets split between the company and the people who built it. Nobody sits down afterward and decides what counted as profit.
This started August 3, 2026 as my own pledge, out of my share and nobody else's, because a company with more than one owner in it was not mine to promise. On August 8, 2026 I asked my business partner whether the whole studio should do it instead. He said do it. So it is not my mission now, it is the studio's, and we are writing it into our operating agreement so it is not just something we said.
I also give twenty percent of everything else I earn in public: the platform I license, the work I build for other people, the book. Not my day job. I cannot afford to do that, and I would rather tell you exactly where the line is than let you assume there is not one.
The studio is small right now and most of what it makes goes back into building it, so this will be a small number for a while. I would rather tell you that than dress it up.
The studio's twenty percent is calculated from project-level proceeds: net after platform and payment fees, taxes, refunds, recoupment and direct project costs.
03 / The public record
$0 actually directed to research so far
Nothing has moved yet. When it does, every dollar appears here with the date, the amount, who received it, why I picked them, and which of the two it came out of. If this stays empty, you will be able to see that it stayed empty.
$25,000 earmarked for memory disease research
I want to be exact about what that word means, because a lot of people are not. This is my own money and it is sitting in my savings account. It has not been donated. It is in an account I control, which means I could technically move it. I am telling you it is marked, and this page is where you would find out if that ever changed.
It has not gone anywhere yet because I have not decided where it should go, and I would rather be slow about that than fast.
Two different pockets pay into this list. The studio gives twenty percent of what it earns, off the top. I give twenty percent of what I earn on my own, outside it. Every row says which, because a dollar arriving somewhere is only half of where it came from.
04 / Open work
All of it is free, and all of it is meant to be taken and built on by anyone. That is the point of writing the formats down.
An open format for keeping a record of who a person is, for families and caregivers dealing with memory loss. Plain files anyone can read, on any device. Free, and free to build on.
A small offline screen that shows today's date, what is happening today, and who visited yesterday. Around a hundred and twenty dollars in parts, and the build guide will be free.
Working out which research organizations actually move toward cures, and the right way to move money to them. The reasoning gets published alongside the first pick, not just the result.
05 / The boundaries
This is not medicine. Nothing I build treats, slows, or prevents any disease, and I am never going to say otherwise. What I build are care aids: ways for a family to hold on to who someone is. The people working on cures are researchers, and my job is to fund them and to build things families can actually use.
I am not asking you for money. There is no foundation yet and no charity to give to, so there is nothing to donate to and no link to do it. The only money moving here is mine, going out. If that changes, it changes on this page first.
06 / Andrew Detwiler
Andrew Detwiler
Trust takes time and I have not earned yours yet. So I am not going to ask for it. Here is my name, here is my LinkedIn, and above this is my own money, marked before I have anything to show for it.
I have a long way to go with this. I would rather do it in the open and get there with you than wait and show up later with a finished story.
That photo is a few years old. I will put up a current one soon.
07 / Taking part
This is the one I need most. I have $25,000 marked and I have not picked a recipient. If you know a research organization that genuinely moves toward cures, tell me about it. I am going to read the evidence myself and publish my reasoning next to whatever I pick, so a suggestion is a starting point rather than a vote. I would still rather start from what people who know this field would point me at than from a search engine. Send it to hello@andrewdetwiler.com.
Come tear the format apart before I tell anyone it is any good. This is worth more to me right now than money is, and I mean that literally.
Take any of this when it lands and make something better. Or point your own work at something you care about and tell people what you are doing with it.
Client work
I build websites and apps for a living. One builder, twenty years of experience, and tooling that moves fast. Sites from $900 and custom apps from $7,500.
Twenty percent of everything I earn from that work goes straight into this.
Not profit, and not what is left over. Twenty percent of what I am paid.
08 / Follow along
The whole thing goes in public as it happens, including the parts that do not work.
The artwork on this page is by Oscar Stashwick.