Chris Waddell wants to climb Kilimanjaro in a wheelchair; George Del Barrio wants to make a film in Cambodia; Jeff Edwards wants to write a book about a sci-fi writer: They want you to fund their dreams.
Web site Kickstarter.com is making it possible for people like this to raise sums ranging from a few hundred to tens of thousands of dollars to fund anything that captures the imagination of Internet users with a little money to spare.
It worked for Emily Richmond, a 24-year-old living in Los Angeles who plans to sail solo around the world for two years.
She raised US$8,142 from 148 people who will receive rewards such as photos from the trip, an origami sailboat or a telephone call when she crosses the equator.
Landon Ray, who runs a marketing software firm called SendPepper.com, gave US$500 after showing his five-year-old daughter Richmond’s video promising to keep donors updated by blog and send rewards such as a coconut mailed from a far-flung port.
“I thought this was a perfect learning experience for my daughter,” Ray said, adding that he also dreamed of sailing the world himself, so it was partly about living vicariously.
Many of the projects are by filmmakers, musicians, artists and writers. Project creators set a time limit and a target. If they don’t reach it, they get nothing.
Jason Bitner’s pitch for US$7,500 to pay for post-production of a documentary about the small Midwestern town of La Porte, Indiana, was so popular it raised US$12,153.
The film is about an archive of portraits by a photographer who died in 1971. Bitner came across boxes of the pictures in the back room of a diner and has published a book. The film features interviews with the subjects 40 or 50 years later.
About a third of his 149 backers were friends and family. Others include residents of La Porte but also people from as far afield as Denmark and Australia.
Jonathan Scott Chinn, who is seeking US$16,500 to make a short comedy-horror film called Always a Bridesmaid said the site was an efficient “creative marketplace.”
“You’re given the opportunity to make your pitch and if it’s really interesting, it will take off,” he said.
Kickstarter cofounder Perry Chen said about US$500,000 had been donated in the four months since it was launched, with more than 60 percent of projects achieving their goal.
Until now the site has charged no fee, but from the middle of this month it will charge 5 percent of funds donated to successful projects.
Chen said so far there had been no scams that he knows of, though plenty of projects simply don’t take off.
“The model works really well to prevent any type of misbehavior because the people who fund these projects; there’s always a core group of the person’s social network,” he said. “Those are bridges people will work very hard not to burn.”
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
DITCH TACTICS: Kenyan officers were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch suspected to have been deliberately dug by Haitian gang members A Kenyan policeman deployed in Haiti has gone missing after violent gangs attacked a group of officers on a rescue mission, a UN-backed multinational security mission said in a statement yesterday. The Kenyan officers on Tuesday were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch “suspected to have been deliberately dug by gangs,” the statement said, adding that “specialized teams have been deployed” to search for the missing officer. Local media outlets in Haiti reported that the officer had been killed and videos of a lifeless man clothed in Kenyan uniform were shared on social media. Gang violence has left
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including
RSS