Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Web
  3. News

Kickstarter’s 2013: 19.9K projects got off the ground thanks to 3 million backers

By
kickstarter ends 2013 480 million funding pebble
Image used with permission by copyright holder

In the old days, embarking on a creative project that required a bit of financial backing involved potentially awkward conversations with friends and family, or, if you were really desperate, a visit to the bank with a stocking over your head.

And then along came the Internet and the crowd funding platform, with Kickstarter emerging as the main player among an ever-growing bunch of sites offering artists and others a way to get their projects off the ground and their dreams realized.

Recommended Videos

The New York-based company, which has been in operation since 2009, has just published some stats for the last 12 months, and by the looks of it things are going well for the team and its enthusiastic community, with more than three million people pledging ankickstarter stats impressive $480 million to Kickstarter projects. Break that down and you have daily pledge totals of $1.31 million, or $913 a minute.

This is a decent increase on the 2.2 million backers who pledged $320 million in 2012, indicating people’s growing awareness of the site, not to mention the arrival consistently awesome project ideas cool enough to motivate Kickstarter visitors to dig into their pockets.

According to the site’s stats, those who pledged cash in 2013 came from 214 countries and territories spanning all seven continents – that’s right, there was at least one backer in Antarctica who saw something they liked (possibly this?).

As you might expect, community members appear to rather enjoy perusing the profusion of projects, with 807,733 backing more than one project, and 81,090 backing 10 or more projects. Almost a thousand people were enthusiastic enough to lend financial support to 100+ projects.

The stats reveal that 19,911 Kickstarter projects were successfully funded in 2013 (up from 18,109 in 2012), while “thousands more came to life” – presumably this means via additional funding methods.

Highlighting some of the projects that made waves in the last 12 months, Kickstarter mentions the Pebble smartwatch, the Oculus Rift virtual reality headset, and the Ouya game console.

Though funding can currently only be requested by creators in five countries – the US, UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand – anyone around the world can back a project, and with 2013 turning out to be a pretty active year for the Kickstarter community, we can surely look forward to more groundbreaking proposals via the site this year, too.

Trevor Mogg
Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
How to change margins in Google Docs
Laptop Working from Home

When you create a document in Google Docs, you may need to adjust the space between the edge of the page and the content --- the margins. For instance, many professors have requirements for the margin sizes you must use for college papers.

You can easily change the left, right, top, and bottom margins in Google Docs and have a few different ways to do it.

Read more
What is Microsoft Teams? How to use the collaboration app
A close-up of someone using Microsoft Teams on a laptop for a videoconference.

Online team collaboration is the new norm as companies spread their workforce across the globe. Gone are the days of primarily relying on group emails, as teams can now work together in real time using an instant chat-style interface, no matter where they are.

Using Microsoft Teams affords video conferencing, real-time discussions, document sharing and editing, and more for companies and corporations. It's one of many collaboration tools designed to bring company workers together in an online space. It’s not designed for communicating with family and friends, but for colleagues and clients.

Read more
Microsoft Word vs. Google Docs
A person using a laptop that displays various Microsoft Office apps.

For the last few decades, Microsoft Word has been the de facto standard for word processors across the working world. That's finally starting to shift, and it looks like one of Google's productivity apps is the heir apparent. The company's Google Docs solution (or to be specific, the integrated word processor) is cross-platform and interoperable, automatically syncs, is easily shareable, and perhaps best of all, is free.

However, using Google Docs proves it still has a long way to go before it can match all of Word's features -- Microsoft has been developing its word processor for over 30 years, after all, and millions still use Microsoft Word. Will Google Docs' low barrier to entry and cross-platform functionality win out? Let's break down each word processor in terms of features and capabilities to help you determine which is best for your needs.
How does each word processing program compare?
To put it lightly, Microsoft Word has an incredible advantage over Google Docs in terms of raw technical capability. From relatively humble beginnings in the 1980s, Microsoft has added new tools and options in each successive version. Most of the essential editing tools are available in Google Docs, but users who are used to Word will find it limited.

Read more