April 3, 2014 @ 10:37 am By Charles Luzar  |  

A brief history lesson: in the late 1800’s as the Statue of Liberty was being constructed in France, a group in the US was trying to find a way to fund and construct a pedestal for the new monument. That pedestal was essentially crowdfunded via… Read More

April 2, 2014 @ 4:20 pm By Charles Luzar  |  

A telling quote coming from Hartford Business recently that supports our postulation that intrastate crowdfunding is creating interstate competition… “To be honest, I don’t understand what crowdfunding really is,” said State Sen. Gary LeBeau, an East Hartford Democrat who co-chairs the Commerce Committee. “I just… Read More

April 2, 2014 @ 2:58 pm By Charles Luzar  |  

Lending Club has been forced to seek the ability to originate loans on a state-by-state basis, and that map of states just filled in a bit. Lending Club has announced that the peer lending platform has received the green light to operate in the State of Mississippi. “We’re… Read More

April 2, 2014 @ 2:50 pm By Charles Luzar  |  

Kickstarter already has a pretty robust statistics page, but as you may know they also release a yearly statistics report that usually garners quite a bit of attention. In an effort to build upon this response, the Brooklyn-based startup has published their first quarterly report…. Read More

April 2, 2014 @ 11:36 am By Charles Luzar  |  

Those that are fans of The Walking Dead TV show on AMC may not necessarily be aware of the popular graphic novel series the show is based on. That series was the inspiration for a recent board game project launched on Kickstarter, but the campaign was… Read More

April 2, 2014 @ 10:46 am By Charles Luzar  |  

Alibaba.com is a giant in China, and the company has now launched a crowdfunding play for entertainment-related projects. It’s called Yu Le Bao, or “Entertainment Treasure,” and it allows anyone to invest in entertainment projects like films and games in amounts as little as 100… Read More

April 2, 2014 @ 9:56 am By Charles Luzar  |  

The crowdfunding campaign for Play-i’s interactive robots Bo and Yana was a success by any measure, having raised over $1.4 million. Of course, the easy part is raising money. As far too many crowdfunders have learned the hard way, the hard part is actually delivering… Read More

April 1, 2014 @ 4:51 pm By Charles Luzar  |  

Put simply, the significance of automatically calculating calories consumed and burned cannot be overstated. Currently, calorie databases such as MyFitnessPal require manual input, and prove laborious when calculating home-cooked meals or more exotic cuisines. While the utility of food-logging with weight loss has been supported by medical… Read More

April 1, 2014 @ 4:37 pm By Charles Luzar  |  

I found myself believing this for about ten seconds. I’m trying to decide whether that says more about me or more about the Valley. I need a vacation.

April 1, 2014 @ 10:53 am By Charles Luzar  |  

How big is the crowdfunding market expected to be in 2014? How much of the crowdfunding market is made up of equity-based funding? How many jobs does crowdfunding create? Equity crowdfunding platform OurCrowd released the following infographic that aims to answer these questions and more…. Read More

April 1, 2014 @ 10:20 am By Charles Luzar  |  

If you live in the United States and you’re passionate about food, chances are you’ve had some exposure to mounting concerns about the links between poor health and red meat consumption. For me personally, the documentary Forks Over Knives was my first exposure to the types… Read More

March 31, 2014 @ 3:47 pm By Charles Luzar  |  

  Today crowdfunding platform CrowdIt announced the launch of a new platform feature aimed at closing a different gap for prospective fundraisers: the experience gap. The new “Suits” feature is essentially an online forum built into the CrowdIt platform where project creators – “Dreamers” as… Read More

March 31, 2014 @ 12:09 pm By Charles Luzar  |  

Fundrise recently announced their entry into the Washington DC real estate market as a crowdfunding intermediary. If deal number three is any indication, there is certainly some interest among the non-accredited crowd even as participation remains limited to investors in Maryland, Virginia and Washington DC. The… Read More

March 31, 2014 @ 11:07 am By Charles Luzar  |  

Grammy-winning recording artist Imogen Heap has toured the world and released several hits, known for her melding of airy vocals and digital soundscapes. Now she’s taking that latter bit to a pretty incredible conclusion via a new music making device and, appropriately, a currently-running Kickstarter… Read More

March 31, 2014 @ 10:33 am By Charles Luzar  |  

A bill proposed in Hawaii’s House of Representatives aims to establish a pilot program for civic crowdfunding in the island state. HB 2631 was introduced on January 23rd of 2014 and its five sponsors include members from both sides of the aisle, continuing a trend… Read More

March 29, 2014 @ 1:24 pm By Charles Luzar  |  

In the past few months, we’ve seen a steady increase in crowdfunding emails. It seems like the hip thing to do now: 5 out of 10 emails now start with “Can you help us promote our Kickstarter campaign, so we can build this cool product!” There… Read More

March 29, 2014 @ 12:41 pm By Charles Luzar  |  

This past week, Reddit did something previously unthinkable yet again, and it’s thanks in part to a crowdfunding campaign. At an upcoming NASCAR race at Talladega, Josh Wise’s #98 car will don Dogecoin livery. Yes, Dogecoin… the niche cryptocurrency created by a marketing junkie and… Read More

March 29, 2014 @ 12:13 pm By Charles Luzar  |  

If there was any doubt as to whether consumers were looking for an alternative to the image currently available dolls portray for young women, shelve said doubt. More than 13,000 people want to see a new doll – Lammily – happen, and thanks to their… Read More

March 28, 2014 @ 11:36 am By Charles Luzar  |  

CircleUp has announced a $14 million Series B round that will introduce a new venture capital firm into their existing mix. Canaan Partners has led the round, which also includes investment from previous CircleUp investors Google Ventures and Union Square Ventures. This is the second… Read More

March 28, 2014 @ 11:00 am By Charles Luzar  |  

Unless you live under a rock, you’ve probably been exposed to some of the promise everyone found in the Veronica Mars Kickstarter campaign. The democratization of film finance! People funding films they want to see made! We don’t need the studios! A new accredited-only crowdfunding platform… Read More