To Be Takei II, The Wrath of Crowdfunding A
Today in Part A
- Examination of internet based equity, debt and rewards based funding paradigm known as Crowdfunding.
- Examination of crowdfunding critics and successful utilization by George Takei; World Bank; YouTube; Google and publicly held Chapel Down.
As Rod Serling would have said: Tonight's offering, submitted for your approval... They were best friends and coworkers in the halcyon days of the mid 80's... when profits were rising, Keating & Milken were flying high and zestful youth was theirs. "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us." - Dickens
The other night, this showed up in my inbox. I have been aware of Dawn's unfortunate journey to a stage IV metastatic colon cancer diagnosis since 2012. I have never been able to reconcile the tragedy when one so young is given a "dead man walking" prognosis. In an effort to meet their medical costs, one must applaud the ingenuity of her husband in utilizing a crowdfunding platform Gofundme.com, and so our fortunate journey for today begins... and now Part A of our feature presentation...
Social Media & Crowdfunding
Since the 2008 crisis, a credit crunch has made funding for small enterprises and most startups difficult to obtain. Crowdfunding is an alternative to traditional sources of investment such as banks, angel investors and venture capital. A one hour synposium regarding this potentially disruptive technology from The Milken Institute.
The Crowdfunding Social Media Impresario
Just the other day, we brought up avant garde social media impresario George Takei (Lt. Sulu) of Star Trek fame, in a missive regarding online communities and social media issues, To Be Takei, In Queensland. This man knows sequels, social media and crowdfunding, so lets roll or engage by George..
George has galactic sized audiences in the Twitterverse (1 million) and on Facebook (7 million) and this year launched his own campaign to raise money for Allegiance, a musical about interned Japanese-Americans.
From 04/18/2014 at Success.com: Takei wanted to create greater awareness of a dark chapter of U.S. history when some 110,000 Japanese-Americans were forcibly interned during World War II. Takei and his family were among those detained.
"I know firsthand that crowdfunding is a remarkable new way to fund your dreams, cultivate an audience or get projects off the ground. And if you're someone who's been sitting on that dream project for 20 years, well, this just might be your chance."
Takei launched a crowdfunding campaign through Indiegogo and solicited donations through his Facebook and Twitter accounts, ultimately raising more than $158,000 to produce the musical. The show was sold out in its 2012-2013 San Diego run. Takei hopes to take it to Broadway this year.
Beginning September 17, 2013, the 77 year old (sure doesn't look or act it) Takei hosted Takei's Take, a web series reviewing consumer technology, produced by AARP. From 01/01/2014, George Takei & Hannah Hart, Takei's Take on Crowdfunding:
The World Bank Crowdfunding
From a 2013 study by InfoDev for The World Bank:
I believe that equity, debt, and rewards-based crowdfunding open new possibilities for funding more entrepreneurs in more places around the world.
Steve Case
Chairman and CEO, Revolution
Co-Founder, America Online
Chairman, The Case Foundation
Publicly Held Crowdfunding
Circa 09/08/2014 Chapel Down became the first publicly held company to utilize equity Crowdfunding; Chapel Down, "the market leader in English wines", has announced an equity crowdfunding initiative to raise £1 million. A growing number of companies have recognized the potential in publicly offering shares via equity crowdfunding as an opportunity to raise needed capital by offering shares to committed consumers.
Google, YouTube enter Crowdfunding
06/29/2014 from SeekingAlpha: YouTube (Google) Rocks the crowdfunding boat. the new "tip jar" feature... works similarly to other crowdfunding services that already exist. The funding feature is not limited to the music industry, and any entrepreneur can publish his or her business model or innovative idea on YouTube and reach a wider audience than crowdfunding sites do.
Crowdfunding Critics
From Forbes 03/17/2013, Crowdfunding is a Ghetto Stockmarket: "It's insane that the world is buying into the joke known as Crowdfunding. Let's be honest with ourselves. Crowdfunding is neither new, nor innovative. Most importantly, it doesn't make sense. Crowfunding is the knock-knock joke that never gets funnier.
06/23/2014 from Slate, Kickstarter, but With Stock: "Equity crowdfunding was supposed to be an economic boon. Instead it's a disaster waiting to happen. Crowdfunding won't significantly improve the supply of investment capital... equity crowdfunding is destined to do little more than separate mom-and-pop investors from their savings.
My muse for this trilogy, Dawn's Medical Bill Fund.
Stay tuned, more to come in Part B, no flippin.
Tomorrow in Part B
- Examination of categories; past market growth; future potential through global market penetration for internet capable devices.
- Examination of legislation; non-accredited vs accredited investor status; breakdown of non-accredited overhead costs.
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