Commerce and Patronage Find a Home in Kickstarter
Kickstarter began as a funding platform intended to help elevate ideas and finance change. From graphic novels to space-mapping tools, we have all seen some of its inventive ideas reach the limelight. But in 2013, Kickstarter will enjoy its 4th birthday and $100 million in pledges, which begs the question, Has Kickstarter begun to make the changes it originally envisioned? Although some of the funding categories still have room to grow, from an arts and culture perspective the answer is a resounding “YES!”
Here are some arts and culture Kickstarter-earned achievements from 2012:
- Reaching the New York Times Bestseller list
- Two films have been nominated for Oscars in the past two years: Sun Come Up and Incident in New Baghdad. A third, Barber of Birmingham, launched a project after being Oscar-nominated. Three documentary features and two documentary shorts are currently shortlisted for Oscar nominations in 2013: The Waiting Room, Detropia, Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry, Inocente, and Kings Point.
- 10 per cent of Sundance Film Festival films
- “#2 publisher of graphic novels”
- Billboard Top 10 debut
- Funded full-length opera
- 63 Kickstarter films opened in theaters
Kickstarter has clearly started to make a visible impact to the kinds of arts and projects we are exposed to through mass media. Have you checked out Kickstarter lately? Do you have a story or an idea you would like to share?