Dark Musings
DARK MUSINGS #16 – Fundraising Sites are just a big Scam by Andrew Zar 9/7/11 There are a lot of interesting businesses on the Internet.  Not the least of which, to me, is Google – who has a financial empire in just showing people how to get to free content.  The ultimate “tour guide,” if you will.  They didn’t invent the content, manage it, police it, propose it, research it, or add value to it –they just suggest to you how to get there (if you do an accurate search).  And, it turns out, that is worth billions and billions of dollars.  For me, being an early adopter of Internet technology, I really didn’t see that one coming – I never had a problem finding places to go, investigating, trying new things, etc – but it showed me that I am not the average consumer.  Guides exist for a reason – convenience – and people will pay for convenience.   This same model is why Apple is so successful, as I had mp3 players years before an iPod, yet look who stormed the market?  Why?  Because it is easy.  And easy is worth 30%. Instead of the Internet getting rid of “middlemen,” as it was originally designed to do, we have instead created the largest middlemen in the history of mankind.  I suppose it is a social inevitability, as there is really no other reason for these middlemen companies to be successful – we clearly want them, and want them desperately. Now let’s consider fundraising. There are now many sites that will “help” your project get funding.   Sounds like a cool idea to me – help great projects get started?  Rockin.  But, hold on a sec, let me break down how this help works: You create the content on your own dollar and effort You post it on their site at your own effort You get people to come and donate on their site, using your own advertising and networking time and money They get a percentage – sometimes even if you aren’t successful in your efforts I just ended up scratching my head at this one.  Yet, they are successful!  I dunno, seems to me that a service should BRING YOU CUSTOMERS – not just take a percentage of your work.  Am I just missing something fundamental here?  I tried two of these services myself and found out that my early thoughts on this remained accurate and I just don’t “get” them at all… not even a little.  I think the reason they are successful is because people can’t figure out how to buy their own payment system (like, say, PayPal – ever heard of them?) – as that is really the only part of the service that is useful. So, in the next few months, you will see several fundraising efforts at DarkBrain as we work on content for the next 12-18 months – yes, we work that far ahead and work at a considerable debt-based scenario.  So, some fundraising will be very important.  But, when it happens, just know that nobody else is going to get a percentage of it… because, well, why the fuck should they? Till next time, Andrew The above piece is a page from Brandi Bandit, one of our many titles on hold due to budget issues.  Lines by Baris Syilmaz.  Copyright 2011, DarkBrain, LLC, All Rights Reserved.  

DARK MUSINGS #16 – Fundraising Sites are just a big Scam
by Andrew Zar 9/7/11

There are a lot of interesting businesses on the Internet.  Not the least of which, to me, is Google – who has a financial empire in just showing people how to get to free content.  The ultimate “tour guide,” if you will.  They didn’t invent the content, manage it, police it, propose it, research it, or add value to it –they just suggest to you how to get there (if you do an accurate search).  And, it turns out, that is worth billions and billions of dollars. 

For me, being an early adopter of Internet technology, I really didn’t see that one coming – I never had a problem finding places to go, investigating, trying new things, etc – but it showed me that I am not the average consumer.  Guides exist for a reason – convenience – and people will pay for convenience.   This same model is why Apple is so successful, as I had mp3 players years before an iPod, yet look who stormed the market?  Why?  Because it is easy.  And easy is worth 30%.

Instead of the Internet getting rid of “middlemen,” as it was originally designed to do, we have instead created the largest middlemen in the history of mankind.  I suppose it is a social inevitability, as there is really no other reason for these middlemen companies to be successful – we clearly want them, and want them desperately.

Now let’s consider fundraising. There are now many sites that will “help” your project get funding.   Sounds like a cool idea to me – help great projects get started?  Rockin.  But, hold on a sec, let me break down how this help works:

  • You create the content on your own dollar and effort
  • You post it on their site at your own effort
  • You get people to come and donate on their site, using your own advertising and networking time and money
  • They get a percentage – sometimes even if you aren’t successful in your efforts

I just ended up scratching my head at this one.  Yet, they are successful!  I dunno, seems to me that a service should BRING YOU CUSTOMERS – not just take a percentage of your work.  Am I just missing something fundamental here?  I tried two of these services myself and found out that my early thoughts on this remained accurate and I just don’t “get” them at all… not even a little.  I think the reason they are successful is because people can’t figure out how to buy their own payment system (like, say, PayPal – ever heard of them?) – as that is really the only part of the service that is useful.

So, in the next few months, you will see several fundraising efforts at DarkBrain as we work on content for the next 12-18 months – yes, we work that far ahead and work at a considerable debt-based scenario.  So, some fundraising will be very important.  But, when it happens, just know that nobody else is going to get a percentage of it… because, well, why the fuck should they?

Till next time,

Andrew

The above piece is a page from Brandi Bandit, one of our many titles on hold due to budget issues.  Lines by Baris Syilmaz.  Copyright 2011, DarkBrain, LLC, All Rights Reserved.  

Posted 9 months ago