Crowdfunding: Connecting Creators and Patrons

Our theme this month was "science and math."  I worked from 12:30 PM to 12 AM, so twelve hours and thirty minutes, allowing for breaks.  I wrote 17 poems, almost all of them medium; there were only 2 epics.  Also unusual, the majority were stand-alones, with only 4 series poems.  Everything was free verse.

Participation was lower.  There were 33 comments on LJ and another 22 on DW.  A total of 19 people sent prompts.  There were no new prompters this month.


Read Some Poetry!
The following poems from the April 1, 2014 Poetry Fishbowl have been posted:
"Dreams of Glass and Magic"
"An Equation for Conscience"
"Hard and Soft Mindcandy"
"In Which the Universe Was Written"
"Infinite Dimensions"
"Kitchen Equations"
"The Matilda Effect"
"A Nose for Trouble"
"Of Alchemy and Quantum Physics"
"Purity and Madness"
"The Real Geek Girls"
"Room at the Bottom"

"Out of His Head" (Frankenstein's Family, outside fishbowl)
"A Strange and Gentle Contagion" (The Bat Vampires, outside fishbowl)


Buy some poetry!
If you plan to sponsor some poetry but haven't made up your mind yet, read the unsold poetry list from May 6. That includes the title, length, price, and the original thumbnail description for the poems still available. There are still several verses of "A Strange and Gentle Contagion" remaining, which you can reveal by linking to the unsold poetry list or a favorite poem from the May fishbowl.

All currently sponsored poems have been posted, and prompter copies sent for the rest.  Per the $200 goal, "Out of His Head" is the free epic.  Per the $250 goal, that's a second tally toward a bonus fishbowl.  Per the $300 goal, there will be a half-price sale in several small series from May 19-25.

The donor perk-post is "The Science of Poetry." Donors this month include janetmiles, ng_moonmoth, Anthony and Shirley Barrette.  There were no new donors.


The Poetry Fishbowl project also has a permanent landing page.

The first issue of Plunge magazine is up, featuring "Women in Mythology." Enjoy poetry, fiction, nonfiction, and art about women loving women.

This month's theme was "influential women." I worked from 12:30 PM to 3 AM on Tuesday, so about 12 hours 30 minutes, allowing for lunch and supper breaks. I worked a little more on Wednesday. A surge of prompts arrived early, with more trickling in later. I wrote 21 poems on Tuesday and another 4 on Wednesday. A majority were free verse, but I had several form poems this time. I also wrote a lot that combined multiple prompts.

A couple other things I noticed: There were more typos than average, so if you spot any that I haven't fixed yet, please point them out. Some of the poems tended toward a journalistic tone, because I was often working from articles about figures not already familiar to me personally.

Activity was high this month. A total of 25 people sent prompts. There were 74 comments on LiveJournal and another 5 on Dreamwidth. Please welcome new prompters laurarey, technoshaman, and Dreamwidth user primeideal. You have them to thank for the second freebie.

Read Some Poetry!
The following poems from the September 2012 Poetry Fishbowl have been posted:
"Birthshaking Changes"
"First and Foremost"
"Counting Their Contributions"
"Gifts of Simplicity" (One God's Story of Mid-Life Crisis)
"Grandmothers of the Heart" (Hart's Farm)
"Her Burgundy Robe"
"Her Infinite Faces"
"How the Wordsmith Works"
"In Whose Strength Is Beauty"
"The Lady of Fantasy"
"The Languagewoman"
"Leading the Followers" (Fiorenza the Wisewoman)
"On Whose Shoulders"
"The Only Woman"
"The Queen of Thrones"
"A Quiet Fame" (50 comments!)
"Rarely Well Behaved"
"Say Something for the Suffragettes"
"Sisters, Brothers, Soldiers"
"Tea Service"
"Unspoken Influences"
"Unwritten License" (Torn World)

"The Demon in the Bottle" from October 2-3, 2012 (One God's Story of Mid-Life Crisis)
"The Four Maras" from October 2-3, 2012 (Kung Fu Robots)
"Listening to God" from July 3, 2012 (The Arc of Joan)
See also "The Hand on the Loom" by marina_bonomi, written in response to "Rarely Well Behaved."


Buy Some Poetry!
If you plan to sponsor some poetry but haven't made up your mind yet, read the list of unsold poems from November. That includes the title, length, price, and the original thumbnail description for the poems still available.

All currently sponsored poems have been posted. Backchannel copies have been sent to the various prompters. Per the $200 goal, "Listening to God" is the free epic. Per the $250 goal, that's one tally toward a bonus fishbowl. Per the $300 goal, there will be a half-price sale in the Fledgling Grace series from November 19-25.

The donor perk is "Women in Poetry." Donors this month include kestrels_nest, laurarey, technoshaman, marina_bonomi, the_vulture, janetmiles, laffingkat, rix_scaedu, thesilentpoet, Stephen Laird, Anthony and Shirley Barrette. We passed the previous record of donations by a large margin. The bonus material for that is "Meals in Nether-England." Thank you all so much. You are made of 24-karat WIN!


The Poetry Fishbowl project also has a permanent landing page.

 

Welcome to the ninth Crowdfunding Creative Jam! This session will run Saturday, July 21-Sunday, July 22. The theme is "women in sensible armor."  If you like visual prompts, there's a Tumblr on this topic.  (Visit the Creative Jam over on LiveJournal.)

Crowdfunding Creative Jam
Everyone is eligible to post prompts, which may be words or phrases, titles, images, etc. Prompters may request a specific creator, but everyone else may still use that prompt if they wish. Prompts may specify a particular character/world/etc. but creators may use the prompt for something else anyway and post the results. Prompters are still encouraged to post mostly prompts that anyone could use anywhere, as this maximizes the chance of having creators make something based on your prompt. Please title your comment "Prompt" or "Prompts" when providing inspiration so these are easy to find.

Prompt responses may also be treated as prompts and used for further inspiration. For example, a prompt may lead to a sketch which leads to a story, and so on. This kind of cascading inspiration is one of the most fun things about a collective jam session.

Everyone is eligible to use prompts, and everyone who wants to use a given prompt may do so, for maximum flexibility of creator choice in inspiration. You do not have to post a "Claim" reply when you decide to use a prompt, but this does help indicate what is going on so that other prompters can spread out their choice of prompts if they wish.

Creators are encouraged, but not required, to post at least one item free. Likewise, sharing a private copy of material with the prompter is encouraged but not required. Creative material resulting from prompts should be indicated in a reply to the prompt, with a link to the full content elsewhere on the creator's site (if desired); a brief excerpt and/or description of the material may be included in the reply (if desired). It helps to title your comment "Prompt Filled" or something like that so these are easy to identify. There is no time limit on responding to prompts. However, creators are encouraged to post replies sooner rather than later, as the attention of prompters will be highest during and shortly after the session.

Some items created from prompts may become available for sponsorship. Some creators may offer perks for donations, linkbacks, or other activity relating to this project. Check creator comments and links for their respective offerings.

Prompters, creators, and bystanders are expected to behave in a responsible and civil manner. If the moderators have to drag someone out of the sandbox for improper behavior, we will not be amused. Please respect other people's territory and intellectual property rights, and only play with someone else's characters/setting/etc. if you have permission. (Fanfic/fanart freebies are okay.) If you want to invite folks to play with something of yours, title the comment something like "Open Playground" so it's easy to spot. This can be a good way to attract new people to a shared world or open-source project, or just have some good non-canon fun.

Boost the signal! The more people who participate, the more fun this will be. Hopefully we'll see activity from a lot of folks who regularly mention their projects in this community, but new people are always welcome. You can link to this session post or to individual items created from prompts, whatever you think is awesome enough to recommend to your friends.

Plunge Magazine is now OPEN for submissions!  Issue 1 will feature queer women in mythology.  All flavors of queer (lesbian, bisexual, asexual, genderqueer, etc.) are welcome.  Send us fiction, poetry, or nonfiction.  Please read thesubmission guidelines for details.  Share the news with anyone you think might be interested.

I found "Bareback Ink" through a post over on LJ-asexuality which really excites me because it means folks are talking about crowdfunding in other venues, and more importantly, they are catching on to how crowdfunding can help creative people connect with niche markets serving topics that the mainstream ignores.

This play is about the relationship that develops between an asexual tattoo artist and a client. Okay, I have thousands of books in my house and I have not read this story before; I've seen very little that is even remotely like it. Allow me to gush about how incredibly awesome it is to find a story that new, that different. I don't care that it's a play and I'll probably never see it. I just care that somebody out there is breaking seriously new ground, and I want to encourage that.