Kickstarter Visits Creative Mornings

On June 28th, I was able to attend Creative Mornings, a monthly breakfast lecture for creative people. There are currently chapters in New York City, Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles, London and Zurich. The event is half lecture and half group discussion. Yancey Strickler, cofounder of Kickstarter, was this month’s speaker.

Strickler gave the audience an insider’s look into the history of Kickstarter and how it has evolved into what it is today. Since day one, Kickstarter has focused on supporting and increasing involvement within the art community. Projects posted on Kickstarter are encouraged to offer non-monetary incentives for people who pledge money. Instead of offering traditional donation incentives like ‘20% off’, Kickstarter employs a fresh approach in showing gratitude for contributions made. For example, a $50 donation could be met with an upcoming movie featuring a character with a donator’s namesake or you could receive a one of a kind pice of art work. This makes the person pledging money a part of the project rather than just a donor.

One story that he shared in particular really stood out to us. A story that stood out to us involved two men, David and Eric, that had an idea to launch a video game based off of people’s doodles. They set a Kickstarter goal of $20,000 and crossed their fingers. Unfortunately, they didn’t reach their goal in time. A little while later, the duo was e-mailed by a fund manager at X.Million Venture offering to invest $200,000 to help turn it into a full featured game. The point Strickler was trying to make was that Kickstarter isn’t just a place to fund projects anymore. It’s also become a place to scour for talent.

You can watch the full talk above.