crowdfunding example

God, kickstarter needs to start filtering which projects get approval for funding. It makes me so pissed off that shit like this gets funded and yet there are other, better projects out there that need money but never see any of it.
 
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Angel Park said:
God, kickstarter needs to start filtering which projects get approval for funding. It makes me so pissed off that shit like this gets funded and yet there are other, better projects out there that need money but never see any of it.
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I'd like to ask you a serious question.

Well, three...

Do you truly believe someone or some group of people at Kickstarter should
look at every project and then decide which ones are allowed to ask for funding?
What if a project YOU wanted to place on the site for funding was determined
by that person or group to be not acceptable? Would you be willing to be on
the panel who decides who can even ask for funding?
 
trueindie said:
Could someone out there please explain to me how in the world this thing got funded, and how it follows the crowdfunding strategies? thanks.
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I'll just go out on a limb and suggest that this nibblet of news might have had something to do with it:

The Updates on the KS Page said:
NPR, The Onion, Forbes and Indiewire have all reported on our Kickstarter campaign.
Click to expand...

How much is that kind of promotional mention worth, ya reckon? :abduct:

Also, Josh Fadem has been plugging it. I'm sure others have as well.

Their KS success certainly did not happen in a vacuum. :bag:
 
directorik said:
I'd like to ask you a serious question.

Well, three...

Do you truly believe someone or some group of people at Kickstarter should
look at every project and then decide which ones are allowed to ask for funding?
What if a project YOU wanted to place on the site for funding was determined
by that person or group to be not acceptable? Would you be willing to be on
the panel who decides who can even ask for funding?
Click to expand...

Well, no. When I said "kickstarter should start filtering their projects" it was really said out of shock. From what's been provided about the project, (what it's about, etc.) It doesn't seem like something that would have been able to gain enough interest and support to raise 70,000. But that's just my opinion. For all I know this film could be an oscar winner. I'm just surprised, is all.
 
trueindie said:
Could someone out there please explain to me how in the world this thing got funded, and how it follows the crowdfunding strategies? thanks.
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The director had a film in Sundance.
The director built a fan base in his home town.
The director got some good write-ups on on-line "magazines".
The director used his home town fan base well.
The cast worked hard to bring in donations.

Despite ones personal opinion on the movie itself, this guy hit the
market well, did a lot of press, built a fan base and had a project
other people believed in.
 
Good to know. Makes a little more sense.

thanks for the info.

(This was edited as a lot more stuff was posted since I wrote it )
 
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Angel Park said:
Well, no. When I said "kickstarter should start filtering their projects" it was really said out of shock.
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I understand. Thanks.

I, personally, am thrilled to see that a filmmaker in Kansas City with
no "Hollywood" connections was able to rally that many people to his
cause. Including 2 people who kicked in five large each. I'm not
shocked at all. I have never heard of this until just now, did a little
research and quickly discovered a filmmaker who worked very hard
to make his project happen. To me this is a great thing. This guy worked
his marketing butt off! I say good for him!

This kind of thing makes me really, really happy. Thanks trueindie for
bringing it to our attention.
 
directorik is right, the guy built an audience with an extensive network and was able to generate the necessary funding.

Also, it is important to understand how kickstarter actually works. Between their fee and the Amazon processing fee, they take around 9% of the funds. Notice that in many projects that there is a large donation at the beginning or end of the project. This is sometimes the project owner's contribution to verify that they get all of the money they were looking for.

Hypothetically, this director could have had 50k and felt that if we could pull an additional 25k it would be valuable. 91% of 75k is greater that 50k. It is also not always the project owner themselves, but an investor who agrees to cover the gap. Notice that the upper level limits show they kicked in x amount or more. Viewers do not get to see individual contributions. I could contribute 15k at the $5 price bucket and it would show as $5 or more.

This isn't really all that different than a pledge-a-thon for college radio stations or similar. They always seem to come up with the last chunk of money right at the end. Pretty standard fund raising stuff.

Also, kickstarter used to be more discriminatory with projects and it was felt as a negative. Projects that were very similar would be approved / rejected seemingly at random.

Kickstarter should invest in better tools for screening / filtering / searching for users, not for submissions.
 
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Angel Park said:
God, kickstarter needs to start filtering which projects get approval for funding. It makes me so pissed off that shit like this gets funded and yet there are other, better projects out there that need money but never see any of it.
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Although your reaction may have sounded a bit harsh, don't feel too bad about it. My girlfriend watched the KS video and wondered the same thing. In almost the same words. lol

He's had enough pull to be able to raise that, and looks like his entire city must've heard about it.

That's the importance of finding your hook, regardless of how the project may or may not look.
 
Speaking of "hitting it big" on Kickstarter...

A.V.Club: Amanda Palmer raises $1 million on Kickstarter, celebrates with concert, webstream

The Verge: Amanda Palmer Kickstarter finishes with record-breaking $1 million

SPIN: Hear Amanda Palmer's Kickstarter-Assisted 'Want It Back'

Guess she's not a filmmaker, not per se, but I guess it's turned some heads lately. The cut from the album at the third link sounds pretty good. =)

Oh, she's married to Neil Gaiman, of all people. That pushes her coolness factor up there quite a bit for me. :yes:
 
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directorik said:
The director had a film in Sundance.
The director built a fan base in his home town.
The director got some good write-ups on on-line "magazines".
The director used his home town fan base well.
The cast worked hard to bring in donations.

Despite ones personal opinion on the movie itself, this guy hit the
market well, did a lot of press, built a fan base and had a project
other people believed in.
Click to expand...


Pretty much the kind of conditions you MUST have if you're going to raise more than a couple grand. I have friends right now trying to raise 10K without a lot of those factors and they will fail, miserably. You can raise 2K or 3K off friends, family, and a few random strangers, but if you're going for more than that you better have some very big factors in your favor.

I only raised 50% of the budget of Kohlman Files on Kickstarter... because I knew there was no way I'd raise the full budget. I didn't have the right factors in place to raise that kind money.
 
From what I read on the Internet, Kickstarter offers a platform for artists and filmmakers to engage their fan base to seek funding for their projects. They have a fan base and they bring their fan base to Kickstarter.

The rest of us need to build our own.,
 
From what I read on the Internet, Kickstarter offers a platform for artists and filmmakers to engage their fan base to seek funding for their projects. They have a fan base and they bring their fan base to Kickstarter.

The rest of us need to build our own.,
 
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