$100 Million Pledged To Indie Film On Kickstarter... And 8,000 Films Made

from the but-the-industry-is-dying dept

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Less than a year after being declared the darling of Sundance -- especially for not having "the arrogance of a studio" -- Kickstarter has announced that over $100 million has been pledged to indie film via its platform (which, of course, is hardly the only crowdfunding platform that filmmakers use, though it is the most popular). There are some caveats, of course. This is over Kickstarter's lifetime (since April 2009), but the numbers have been growing rapidly. $60 million of those pledges came in 2012. Also, that's, not actual money given, since only projects that hit their target get the money. The actual total collected is $85.7 million -- which means that'll get over $100 million pretty quickly.And, yes, the "but what about my $100 million movie " crowd will scoff and argue that this number is so "small." But, two points there: first, this number is growing very, very, very fast. And if you can't understand how trends explode, then you're going to be in trouble soon. Second -- and this is the more important point -- those funds helped. For those who have been arguing about culture and how we're going to lose the ability to make movies... this suggests something amazing and important is happening which goes against all those gloom and doom predictions. By way of comparison, the UN, which keeps track of stats on film production, claimed that in 2009, 7,233 films were made . Worldwide.Also, some will inevitably suggest that these aren't "real" films and don't "count" or aren't important. But, of course, the data shows that it's creating a nice long tail of film production, and that includes some very "real" films no matter how you measure. According to the Kickstarter post:That seems like a pretty good track record that any movie studio would be proud of... And, to think: this trend is just beginning.

Filed Under: crowdfunding, movies

Companies: kickstarter