Google adds sending money to Gmail
— no fee for Google Wallet funds or bank transfers, 2.9% for credit/debit #Kevin Poulsen on Aaron Swartz's StrongBox project
— curious that it didn’t launch with Wired first #Who is Kickstarter for?
— $400k pledged to 2,200 other projects by the Veronica Mars/Zach Braff first-time backers #The Humble Bundle Double Fine Bundle
— ridiculously amazing deal, and a very creepy Tim Schafer video #How much would it cost to store every phone call in the USA?
— Neil ran the numbers and guesses around 130 TB/day #Dan Kaminsky on Bitcoin
— “It would take a massive, society-rending effort against general purpose computing to really keep Bitcoin down.” via @cdixon #Spelunky Dance
— an interpretive dance based on Spelunky, inspired by my tweet, with a cameo by Spelunky creator Derek Yu; the leaked cam #NYT Magazine profile on Y Combinator and demo day
— funny that “organically” is a curse word in the valley #Tender moments caught on Russian dashcams
— patiently waiting for a compilation of interesting moments captured by Scoble’s glasses #Jason Collins isn't the first openly gay male in pro sports
— the story of baseball’s Glenn Burke, who co-invented the high five #Rippln, the worst startup in the history of forever
— comically-awful douchebro startup; the YouTube videos are amazing #Nyan Cat and Keyboard Cat sue Scribblenauts for infringement
— who owns a meme? both were named by others, and spread only after remixed via @ibogost #The Spelunky Dance
First, I tweeted this to Cards Against Humanity co-creator Max Temkin.
@maxtemkin Still waiting for a Dance project I care about. Someone needs to do an interpretive dance based on Spelunky or something.
— Andy Baio (@waxpancake) May 1, 2013
Not long afterwards, this appeared.
$1 goal with a 24 hour limit, and a single $1 reward limited to one backer: me. So great. I can’t wait to see the finished dance.
It even got the attention of Spelunky creator Derek Yu:
Time to break some Kickstarter records, guys. RT @aeiowu Help save the world. Every little bit counts: kickstarter.com/projects/maxte…
— Derek Yu (@mossmouth) May 1, 2013
With absolutely no prompting, and with no real incentive to back the project, it’s up to 71 backers and $132. (Like me, it looks like more than a few people are using this project as an opportunity to fill their Kickstarter pie… The Dance category is almost always the last slice filled.)
Beyond our circle of friends, the reaction from the Internet to Max’s project was ridiculous. One indie comics artist called it “Kickstarter Abuse,” and people on /r/games said the project was “mocking current industry trends” and “a waste of time, and a shallow effort to hold a mirror up to society.”
The early days of Kickstarter were filled with crazy, tiny experimental projects like these. After all, Kickstarter CEO Perry Chen’s only successful project was six backers giving him $19 to videochat with him on a flight and buy drinks for random passengers. These are the roots of Kickstarter’s international success.
Playful experimentation is never abuse. It’s the best thing for a healthy, creative community.
May 6: The performance was released exclusively to me last night, and I was deep in the middle of plans to sell DVDs, when some jerks named tUNNELcREW leaked it online. First, as a camcorder leak and then the screener copy.
Since I clearly won’t be making a dime off this project, I decided to release the high-quality performance on YouTube. Enjoy.