It is late while I write this, and I suppose that is partially because I want it to reach all the late-night weirdos first. The kind of people who stay awake at odd, fuzzy hours just to share basketball memes on Twitter. The kind of people who have too many ideas spinning through their non-stop brains to sleep even when they know it would be better for them to just call it a night. I think this project would appeal to those kinds of people. Most possibly you.

I am putting together a project for basketball lovers who want to share in a group experience. It is a project for people want to be connected in the best ways the Internet connects people. It is a project for people who want to share their individualism while reiterating on a shared theme.

The idea is fairly simple. I am collecting images — specifically images of basketball courts. These images can be photographs. These images can be original drawings. The only limiting factor is that they must mainly portray a basketball court of some kind. Especially if it’s some random, locally-loved court in your neighborhood. I really want those.

Like the best mass-collaborations in the world, it is an idea that is easy on the contributors. Just go to a favorite basketball court or two, snap or draw a picture (admittedly, drawing takes more time than snapping), and send it to me with a few short lines of information that I will include at the bottom of this post. I will then use all the images I receive to build a collection.

Hopefully a large collection.

Hopefully a diverse collection.

Hopefully it will connect us. We can share our community pride. We can share our love of art. We can share our love of basketball — and not just NBA basketball like we celebrate (and honestly make fun of quite often) on this blog. The kind of basketball people play just for fun. The kind of courts that every so often are the basketball homes to random kids who grow up and really do join the NBA.

I implore anyone who reads this to email me at kal@igohardnow.com (alternatively, our Twitter handle is @igohardnow) and share an image of a basketball court (or two or three) near where you live. And then I implore you to share this link with someone else you know and ask that person to do the same. You don’t have to be a professional artist or photographer. You just have to go out there, take a picture, and share what your stomping grounds are like.

And when you do email me, make sure you also include the following information: