2011 Rose & Bay Awards Followup Report & Discussion

[ysabetwordsmith]

Please check out the 2011 Rose & Bay Awards followup report and discussion. Your input is encouraged.

Are you crowdfunding in community?

[ysabetwordsmith.livejournal.com]

I'm going to write an article for Communities  magazine on "Crowdfunding: A Communal Business Model."  It will introduce the idea of crowdfunding to an audience that probably includes a lot of people who are already doing some version of this, but don't know it by that name.  I want to raise awareness of crowdfunding as a community-oriented business approach.  The article will cover various kinds of crowdfunding from community-supported agriculture to launching alternative businesses to cyberfunded creativity.  (If you're not familiar with communal living, check out the Intentional Community site or my "Householding" article.)

What I'd like to know from you folks is ...

* Are any of you crowdfunding creators living in an intentional community, shared house, or other communal living situation?
* Are any of you patrons (or for creators, patrons you know of) living in community?
* If you're not living in community now, have you done so in the past and did it affect your creative business approach?
* Do you know of anyone living in community who is interested in any type of crowdfunding, as a creator or patron?
* Have you ever done an event, such as a reading or a house concert, at an intentional community?
* How important is the concept of "community" (whether in person or online) to you?  Why?
* How do your ideals about community influence your creativity and/or patronage?

 Anything else you have to add is also welcome.  I'm hoping to get at least a few good quotes that I can use in the article.  Thanks for your help.

2011 Rose & Bay Awards Followup Report & Discussion

[ysabetwordsmith.livejournal.com]

The 2011 Rose and Bay Awards for excellence in cyberfunded creativity have now concluded.  Winners have been announced for Art, Fiction, Poetry, Webcomic, Other Project, and Patron.  We are currently working on the certificates for winners.  You can read more about this project on the 2011 Rose & Bay Awards landing page.


Special Thanks To...

These folks helped make the Rose and Bay Awards a success.  Please give them a round of applause!

eseme for managing the Fiction category.
xjenavivex for managing the Poetry, Other Project, and Patron categories.
itew for helping with the Art category.
karen_wehrstein for updating the Nominee badges.

Continued thanks to haikujaguar for the original logo art and to karen_wehrstein for the general icon, button, and banner art.

Also, thanks to all the folks who made nominations, to everyone who linked and talked about the awards, to the nominees whose projects appeared in our polls, and to the voters.  Participation has been enthusiastic all around.  Given that Fiction and Webcomic both had well over two hundred votes, and the other categories also had substantial numbers, we probably had 500 or more participants even allowing for some overlap from people voting in multiple categories.


What was new this year?

The Rose & Bay Awards launched in 2010. After the voting period ended, we held a discussion about possible improvements. Here's what we managed...

• Split off "Webcomics" as a separate category from "Other Project."  (This worked beautifully.  It gave Webcomics a chance to compete only against each other, had enthusiastic participation, and left Other Project free for things like music and movies.)


• Assign a different manager for each category. (We didn't get all the way to one manager/one category, but we did start with 4 managers for 6 categories. If this is still important to you folks, think about volunteering to manage a category next year. All we really need to meet this goal fully is personnel.)


• The Fiction category had non-transparent polling, based on that manager's preference.

What would we like to change for next year?

Some goals requested last year did not make it to manifestation in 2011. We'd like to keep trying.

• Move the Rose and Bay Awards off LiveJournal to increase accessibility.  (This would require having a crowdfunding hub site and/or a separate award website.  It seems very useful, if such can be manifested. Lots of people want this, and we've been trying to do a hub site for several years now, so far with little progress.)


• Subdivide the "Fiction" category.  (One of our biggest categories, this is the only one whose poll had to be split across two questions and then required a runoff.  Any ideas for good ways to break this into smaller categories? The subcategories would have to be easy to determine AND reflect the actual nominations; starting arguments over what belongs where is counterproductive and just peeling off a few items won't help.)


• Offer cash and/or other prizes.  (This would certainly make the winners happy, and be good publicity for the sponsors.  It would require one or more volunteers, preferably people who already have some kind of fundraising experience.)

Further Discussion

What did you like about this year's Rose & Bay award season?
Did you encounter any problems, and if so, do you have ideas for fixing them?
What do you think would improve the Rose & Bay Awards?
Do you have any expertise to offer for making next year's season even better?
Are there any other issues relating to the Rose & Bay Awards that you'd like to discuss?

Please refer other interested folks back to this discussion. The more input and ideas we get, the better our chances of making next year even better than this year.