I am a big fan of fast growing crowd funding platform Kickstarter, arguably one of the most disruptive and innovative platforms to emerge for the creative community.
Less a technology site, more a socio-cultural movement, Kickstarter is changing how we make things, how we turn dreams into reality and make ideas come to life. While a lot of people focus on Union Square Ventures” Fred Wilson’sbig name portfolio of Twitter, Zynga and Foursquare, I would argue, Kickstarter is the one that transforms the very idea of commerce.
On his blog, Author/publisher Craig Mod tells the story of how folks pledged $ 24,000 for Art Space Tokyo, a book he co-wrote with Ashley Rawlings, on Kickstarter. I think this quote sums up everything that is awesome about Kickstarter and why it works.
With Kickstarter, people are preordering your idea. Sure, they’re buying something tangible — a CD, a movie, a book, etc — but more than that, they’re pledging money because they believe in you, the creator. If you take the time to extrapolate beyond the obvious low-hanging goals, you can use this money to push the idea — the project — somewhere farther reaching than initially envisaged. And all without giving up any ownership of the idea. This — micro-seed capital without relinquishment of ownership — is where the latent potential of Kickstarter funding lies.
