Make Money Doing Nothing - Run a Crowd Funding Site
In Theory.
Crowd funding has become popular, and with good reason. There are a lot of good ideas and not always enough capital to make them come to life. The idea that you can go onto a website and receive a few hundred tiny donations from strangers that add up to enough to fund those dreams seems almost too good to be true. Soon you'll be saddled atop a gorgeous pony with flowing hair, saddle bags bursting with money, and a legion behind you as you lead the charge over a sun swept hill to success.
In Practice.
Unfortunately, this isn't how it ends up. The best ideas don't become the most popular ones, and there's quite an ugly underbelly to it all that I would ask people to consider before getting tangled up in it, potentially wasting your time.
As of late, many sites other than "the big two" have cropped up. It's no surprise; taking a percentage of all raised money for doing effectively nothing but being the guy who holds the money seems like a pretty cushy job. I also understand that sounds incredibly passive aggressive; implying that these services do absolutely nothing, well, those be fightin' words.
Think of why these sites exist. In order to fulfill their purpose, I would have to believe that we all more or less agree that a crowd funding site must accomplish the following in order for its existence to have any merit:
Provide a service that allows a developer who is starting from nothing to raise money from interested persons who come across what they're developing.
If we can't agree that that's the purpose for crowd funding sites to exist, then one would have to ask what the purpose is. So for the sake of rationality, we're going to assume that the above is the goal of these sites. However very little of the above is offered as part of these crowd funding services. Allow me to break down why this is so.
"Provide a service"
Giving you a page, a video, and a donate button is indeed providing a service. The question is, what part of this cannot be done by anyone with basic knowledge of building a web page? I think any reasonable person would agree that this alone is not enough to justify these sites to exist, because their purpose would then be made redundant or superfluous by PayPal donation buttons and the fact that anyone can embed a video on a web page with a code snippet.
"allows a developer who is starting from nothing"
I've never personally seen a Kickstarter reach its funding goal "from scratch"; which as it happens, goes against the name of the site itself. Kickstarter. For people who need a kick start. To make new and interesting and unknown ideas become known, not well-known ideas from well-known people. Right? So one must first ask themselves, "Why are all the most successful crowd funding projects started by people who are celebrities or already have a significant presence in the community, or who simply already have a good chunk of money and have spent it on advertising for their Kickstarter page which then asks for more money?" The answer would be a two-parter if I mentioned it here, so I'll cover it in the last bit.
"raise money from interested persons who come across what they're developing"
As of yet, no crowd funding site exists that allows people to find things they might be interested in without already knowing what they're looking for. Rather, they alltell you what to be interested in by suggesting only projects that have been pre-picked to win based on the celebrity status of the group who has started the project. This is because only projects that have already been funded well past their goals appear on the front page, while projects that are at 0% and could theoretically become 100% funded if only they could be seen get forced to the bottom of the pile, ensuring they never will be found. Well that's fun!
Besides, don't these sites always basically tell you that you're on your own, that you're going to get most of your funding from people you already know? Isn't that like admitting that they're basically doing nothing for you and in return expecting for you to let them ride your coattails wherever it takes you? So why do they take a cut?
-They don't help unseen projects get seen.
-They intentionally place new/unfunded projects at the bottom of the pile.
-The only time your project will appear on the front page is if it's mostly funded, completely funded, way overfunded, or otherwise needs no help whatsoever.
There's nothing wrong with running a business, but I do have something against people being disingenuous b-holes (earmuff the kids) about their real intentions. And although it may seem conspiratorial, it appears to me that what the crowd funding business really entails is this, the ugly underbelly we discussed earlier:
Step 1. Start a crowd funding site. Invite people to accept donations for their projects on your site. Charge a fee to be applied to the final amount. Everyone loves you because they think you care about start-ups.
Step 2. Secretly suffer through the "nobodies" who start tiny projects asking for very little money; use those paltry fees to pay the bandwidth bill while the site gains popularity.
Step 3. Cry with happiness and ride the gravy train to funky town when famous people start using your site to launch million dollar projects that are guaranteed to succeed, giving you a consistent flow of mad crazy dosh. Slap every million dollar/celebrity project on the front page to make 100% sure they succeed, at the detriment of everyone who is trying to start a small project and is stuck in a cobwebbed corner of a disused room. Like if Santa Claus insisted you send him a list of your hopes and dreams for Christmas, then he used it as toilet paper right in front of you as your mouth opens in terror.
Not Just Problems, but Solutions
Because I don't believe in leaving any rant on a low note, I want to get a bit more serious (I'll stop using goofy similes now) and way more happy and make some honest suggestions for new crowd funding sites who haven't yet been touched by corruption.
Suggestion 1: Rotate Between Unfunded Projects
The front page of a crowd funding site shouldn't be where you stick every popular and already-funded project. It should be where you earn your cut and provide a service to those who are having trouble getting their chance. Constantly rotate between 10 or so projects in each category at a time; place an emphasis on rotating between projects that are less than 75% funded, and an enormous emphasis on rotating projects that are 0% funded and probably just haven't been seen yet. Nothing that is more than 99% funded should ever appear on the front page for any reason; they've reached their goal, now give other people a chance.
Suggestion 2: Make Unfunded Projects Easily Searchable
A lot of places don't allow you to sort by what percentage of the project is funded in a specific category. Letting people easily find all 0% funded projects will automatically mean they're finding new things they weren't looking for but might still be interested in, and that you're not just forcing what's popular down their throats.
Suggestion 3: Every New Project Deserves Face Time
In the event that someone doesn't show up in the rotation at the right time, everyone should at least get a few hours of front page exposure when they first create their project in a little "New Projects" blurb.
In conclusion, I want to see these crowd funding sites succeed without throwing small projects under the bus and functioning like celebrity showcases. I believe it's possible for a crowd funding site to get what they need while also providing an actual service to people who need it, but I guess we'll never know if none of them try it!
