One of the internet’s truly magical capabilities is its ability for everyday people to discover and get in on the ground floor of some remarkable projects.
The movement is called crowdsourcing or crowdfunding. It allows people to post projects on the internet and ask for the public’s funding.
The Pebble smartwatch and the three-wheel Elio smartcar are prime examples of crowdsourced projects that have created multimillion dollar companies ($20 million plus) using your money and mine.
Crowdsourcing can finance whatever you have the courage to dream up, from artisanal freeze-dried ice cream to erecting a statue in Detroit to honor “RoboCop.”
The Kickstarter site, one of the two best known crowdsourcing sites — the other being Indiegogo — lists hundreds of projects in areas as diverse as art, journalism and dance to films and video, technology and theater.
As I write this column, Kickstarter’s project of the day is asking for funds to support Evel Spirit, aimed at duplicating the motorcycle stunt that almost killed Evel Knievel in 1974. Ten dollars gives you access to view the jump live on the Internet; $2,000 gets you V.I.P. access to the Idaho launch site to watch the stunt in person. Check the website for yourself.
My own crowdsourcing investments include watches, mobile batteries, earphones, a tech-savvy jacket and several car accessories. I’ve even supported the release of unseen films by Orson Welles and Dennis Hopper. My latest investment: Superbook, a “laptop” using an Android smartphone for its processor and display. I missed the initial $85 investment round (rats!) and had to settle for the $99 level. Hint: For crowdsourcing projects, you gotta move fast.
So what else is out there? I picked these at random as I browsed through my crowdsourcing sites:
• Shots/On/Stone (Kickstarter): An exact copy of the Apollo 11 final flight manual used by mission control. (Kickstarter, $99)
• Monkii Bars 2: a portable gym that folds up into a briefcase or travel bag. (Kickstarter, $98)
And I found SuperMeat (Indiegogo), a project to grow real edible meat using animal cells without killing animals. Scoff if you like, but over 2,700 backers don’t think the idea is crazy.
A cautionary note: you’re gambling that these projects are real and that you can trust the presentations you see on the Web. So, caveat emptor. Even if you don’t invest, even if you only spend about $10 just to get a project’s T-shirt, it’s great fun to surf these sites and see what people can dream up.
Contact Skip Ferderber at sferderber@gmail.com.
