A more realistic approach to financial support?
When I first came across the term ‘crowd funding’ I thought it was an initiative put on by Forest to cover travel costs for disheartened fans. Instead it’s the latest innovative use of the internet to finance projects. The formula is simple: you pitch a project via blogs and videos and state how much cash you need to realise your dreams. Your global audience then cough up a fiver here and there if they like the idea. If you reach your desired amount in the given time you get the cash. If you don’t you lose the lot. In a nutshell it’s digital philanthropy on a timer.
Crowd funding can be used for everything from disaster relief to political campaigns to starting up a company. It all depends upon how good your pitch is and whether the technological democracy deem it worthy. Given the current economic climate, micropayment seems a more reasonable means of raising funds and appears to be part of a growing trend for mass collaboration. Independent banks work on a similar ideal, funding loans through the limited resources of the many rather than the infinite wealth of the few.
Early pioneers of this approach date back to 1997 when fans coughed up $60,000 through internet donations to enable Marillion to do a US tour. The idea spread to the film industry in 2004 when Spanner Films raised a staggering £900,000 over five years to produce their climate change documentary The Age of Stupid. It’s a great concept and one that thankfully hasn’t been hijacked by our government (yet) to fund foreign policy. But give it time. Bombs are expensive.
Crowd funding does come with one or two teething problems. Firstly, it doesn’t offer much security as far as intellectual property is concerned, so don’t be disheartened if a bunch of wealthy idiots tune in purely to steal your ideas. Then again, when was anything digital safe? And I’m yet to meet a writer who hasn’t stolen a storyline from someone pouring their heart out at the bus stop. So don’t be precious, be determined. Or get a patent if it’s that damn good and avoid the problems Kickstarter found in September 2011.The second obvious flaw is that technically, you can kind of cheat the system. If you’ve raised five hundred quid and you need a total of seven hundred in one hour, a friend could donate the remaining two hundred and you would get the rest. Hmmm. I have a cunning plan...
Perhaps to counter this it’s recommended that you offer rewards for donations to help provide people with an incentive to support the project. For some bids this can work easily; film makers, musicians, artists and writers could offer free digital copies of their work – thereby avoiding any kind of added production costs. These incentives can also work alongside a financial hierarchy, whereby a £20 donation could result in a signed hard copy of the book and a £100 donation an original manuscript with coffee cup stains.
This is how you do it.
If you want to see how this works and support a local not-for-profit business, check out the Nottingham Writers’ Studio bid on the WeDidThis website. They’re bidding for £1350 to fund six bursaries for talented writers from BMA backgrounds to help develop their work. For this they’ll get a year’s membership of the studio, mentoring sessions with an established writer, a place on an intensive one-day workshop (previous ones have been by Jon McGregor, Brick, Nick Wood, Nicola Monaghan) as well as the opportunity to see their work performed live in public.
NWS Development Director Robin Vaughn-Williams said, ‘Membership of NWS provides access to a vibrant community of writers at different levels of their careers across the spectrum of genres, from poetry, fiction and scriptwriting to journalism, non-fiction, and copywriting. We provide space for writers to work in away from the pressures of home, plenty of opportunities to meet other writers and share experiences at writing groups and socials, and creative and professional development opportunities through workshops, performance events, talks, and taking part in collaborative projects.’
NWS ran their first bursary scheme in 2011 which was aimed at ‘promising writers facing barriers to accessing creative and professional development opportunities. This has been a success and we would like to repeat it in 2012, with a stronger focus on specific groups that have fewer opportunities to develop their writing,’ Robin enthused.
If you’re feeling inspired by this and haven’t blown all of your wages on heating the house, the following incentives await you.
£5 Entrance into draw for signed copies of books by Nottingham authors
£15 Free pamphlet containing work by each of the six bursary recipients
£100 Free place on a Nottingham Writers' Day (one-day intensive workshop, usually worth £75)
Support the Nottingham Writers' Studio bid at WeDidThis.
Read comments and make your own
Comments