March 21, 2014 @ 11:58 am By Charles Luzar  |  

We reported on the GoBe last week as the campaign was crossing $300,000 on Indiegogo. The campaign seeks to fund a new activity tracker that promises some really slick functionality, including the ability to read calories burned during exercise based on glucose levels in our cells…. Read More

March 21, 2014 @ 11:15 am By Charles Luzar  |  

Soylent has had to delay shipping until mid-April thanks to supply chain difficulties. It all comes down to the process of securing multiple tons of rice protein for Soylent’s forthcoming meal replacement drink. Rob Rhinehart and his team have gone to great lengths to perfect… Read More

March 20, 2014 @ 5:01 pm By Charles Luzar  |  

TechCrunch Disrupt is taking place at the Manhattan Center in New York City on May 5-7, and Kickstarter CEO Yancey Strickler will be among the many thought leaders gracing the stage in 2014. John Biggs of TechCrunch alludes to the discussion skewing toward Crowdfunding 2.0, so… Read More

March 20, 2014 @ 3:36 pm By Charles Luzar  |  

A decision-making platform with roots in the Occupy Movement is being crowdfunded on Crowdtilt right now, and it just closed out a great first week of funding. The campaign raised over $34,000 and has a good head start toward a $100,000 goal. So what is… Read More

March 20, 2014 @ 1:16 pm By Charles Luzar  |  

“I screwed up. I take full responsibility, and it is all my fault.” Not the most inspiring pitch for an Indiegogo campaign for Norilana Books. The company is behind on royalty payments to authors, and the story behind it is really quite sad. From the campaign… Read More

March 20, 2014 @ 10:08 am By Charles Luzar  |  

Steve Swink is an Arizona-based game developer and the man behind Scale, a video game that raised over $100,000 on Kickstarter in a round that closed late in 2013. The game looks incredible, by the way. It elicits thoughts of Portal with a bit of… Read More

March 19, 2014 @ 11:27 am By Charles Luzar  |  

Below is the trailer for Startupland, a documentary series we reported on last year that will follow the stories of startup founders as they work to build their businesses. All of the participating startups were embedded in the now defunct Fortify Ventures Accelerator Program. The first… Read More

March 19, 2014 @ 10:51 am By Charles Luzar  |  

Bancbox Invest is getting into the investor accreditation game with the launch of a new accreditation service. This is in addition to Bancbox’s existing slate of features, including escrow and investment solutions. The goal: to be “a one-stop shop for Private Placement and Equity/Debt based Crowdfunding… Read More

March 17, 2014 @ 11:43 am By Charles Luzar  |  

Design to Matter has placed their name on two dubious crowdfunding campaigns. We reported on both in the Summer of 2013 and pointed out that the scenario raised some ethical questions about crowdfunding. Their first campaign, a Kickstarter for the Instacube, is actually said to… Read More

March 17, 2014 @ 10:19 am By Charles Luzar  |  

According to Lending Memo’s Simon Cunningham, Lending Club is planning to crack down on third party tools making use of screen scrapers. More specifically, Cunningham points to tools that automatically invest on behalf of the user by faking that user’s actions. Note that screen scraping… Read More

March 17, 2014 @ 9:53 am By Charles Luzar  |  

A family healthcare facility in Montana was recently vandalized and suffered extreme losses including extensive damage to medical records and property. That facility is now seeking donations via Indiegogo, and the campaign is fully-funded with almost a month left to go. All Families Healthcare provided… Read More

March 14, 2014 @ 12:27 pm By Charles Luzar  |  

Can crowdfunding consistently deliver the money medical devices and drugs need to make it a key part of healthcare investing? That question will take center stage at this year’s MidAmerica Healthcare Venture Forum. Representatives from Crowdfund Insider and Med City News will lead a series of four 20-minute… Read More

March 14, 2014 @ 11:54 am By Charles Luzar  |  

In a blog post published yesterday, PayPal Chief Risk Officer Tomer Barel announced a set of changes regarding how PayPal will approach crowdfunding as a payment provider. Consider this excerpt, emphasis ours… Together with the crowdfunding sites, we identify if campaigns are strictly fundraising or… Read More

March 14, 2014 @ 11:03 am By Charles Luzar  |  

It’s Veronica Mars day. Related: A Fan History of Veronica Mars [Kickstarter] Director Rob Thomas joined CNBC on Wednesday to take a look back at the campaign. Consider that when the film launched on Kickstarter, the largest Kickstarter campaign ever had raised just short of… Read More

March 13, 2014 @ 11:53 am By Charles Luzar  |  

If you happen to have used the Internet in the past year or two, chances are you’ve stumbled upon a page created and hosted by LaunchRock. It’s a service that allowed anyone with an idea to quickly and easily set up a landing page and… Read More

March 13, 2014 @ 11:16 am By Charles Luzar  |  

Jamie Siminoff is the definition of “serial entrepreneur.” He has six startups to his name including a successfully funded (and eventually refunded) Kickstarter campaign. He launched a crowdfunding platform called Christie Street that is currently dormant, but before it went dormant he also crowdfunded a second product… Read More

March 13, 2014 @ 10:39 am By Charles Luzar  |  

In this past week’s episode of Inside Crowdfunding, Alon and I sat down with Richard Bliss of the Funding The Dream podcast. What ensued was almost an hour of fascinating input from Richard on rewards-based crowdfunding strategy, platforms, campaigns and the hustle it takes to… Read More

March 13, 2014 @ 10:18 am By Charles Luzar  |  

Australian employment website CareerOne has announced their intention to launch a crowdfunding platform sometime this year, but they won’t go it alone. CareerOne CEO Karen Lawson told Business Insider Australia that the platform is looking to team with an existing rewards-based crowdfunding site. Her comments allude… Read More

March 12, 2014 @ 12:50 pm By Charles Luzar  |  

Wow. $40,000,000+ in crowdfunding cash from 400,000+ backers for Star Citizen. To put that in perspective, the 2010 census placed the population of Wyoming – the smallest state by population – at somewhere around 560,000 people. At what point should Star Citizen get a couple of Senators and… Read More

March 12, 2014 @ 12:22 pm By Charles Luzar  |  

If you want a case study in how a Kickstarter can go horribly wrong, look no further than the campaign for SOAP, a touchscreen home automation router. The campaign is fully funded despite bleeding almost $4,000 since we caught wind of scam allegations surrounding the campaign… Read More