Kickstart Instead.

Next time you're out and you're about to buy a cup of coffee, why not use that money to help fund an awesome project on Kickstarter?

You were going to spend, what, three or four dollars on that coffee? And in return, you were going to get a single cup of coffee that you get to drink once? Kickstart instead. You get to feel good knowing that you're helping awesome, real people make cool stuff. Plus, you'll almost certainly get some of that cool stuff to boot!

Whuh? I'm confused. What is Kickstarter?

Kickstarter is a new way to fund ideas. People who want to create something (a book, an album, a short film, anything) crowdsource their funding by relying on people like you and I to fund their endeavour. If you like the idea of a project, you make a pledge to contribute some money to the project. Each project has a goal for how much money needs to be raised for the project to begin. The great thing about Kickstarter is that you only actually give the project your money if people contribute enough money that the project reaches its goal. To contribute, all you need is an Amazon account.

To learn more about how Kickstarter works, head over to their FAQ page.

What kind of "projects" are we talking about here?

We're talking about an 8-bit tribute to a classic jazz album. We're talking about a detective book starring a 21st-century Sherlock Holmes. We're talking about a web series about dressing like a grown-up. Heck, someone's even using Kickstarter to fund the building of their cabin.

Those are some of my favourites. To see the projects that the Kickstarter staff think are cool, check out Kickstarter's Recommended page.

Why should I contribute to strangers' creative projects?

Because helping nice people to create things is awesome. If that's not enough of a reason for you, then get this - most of the time, if you pledge just a few dollars, you get something in return (and pledging more gets you bigger rewards). You might get a PDF copy of the book the person is writing, you might get to download the short film the filmmaker is making, you might get a funding credit on the project's website, you might get some stickers sent to you. For the price of a single cup of coffee, that's a pretty good deal.

Why a cup of coffee?

It doesn't necessarily have to be the price of a cup of coffee. You could decide not to go out to dinner and stay home instead, eating noodles and watching a movie you missed when it was in cinemas. Then you could invest the money you would have spent on dinner in a Kickstarter project. I chose a cup of coffee because it's a tangible thing that everyone can relate to and because it's cheap enough that you can go without it (are you really going to miss a single cup of coffee? Just have it next time you go the coffee shop.), but expensive enough that it can be a real contribution to a project.