March 17, 2011
Kickstarter is an online threshold pledge system for funding creative projects, from indie film and music to journalism to consumer products, and food-related projects. One of a new set of fundraising platforms dubbed ‘crowdfunding,’ Kickstarter facilitates gathering monetary resources from the general public, a model which circumvents many traditional avenues of investment. It was founded in 2009 by Perry Chen, Yancey Strickler, and Charles Adler in Manhattan. Project owners choose a deadline and a target minimum of funds to raise. If the chosen target is not gathered by the deadline, no funds are collected (a provision point mechanism).
Money pledged by donors is collected using Amazon Payments, and initiating projects requires a US bank account. Kickstarter turns a profit by claiming 5% of the funds raised; Amazon takes an additional percentage (around two). Unlike many forums for fundraising or investment, Kickstarter claims no ownership over the projects and the work they produce. However, projects launched on the site are permanently archived and accessible to the public. After funding is completed, projects and uploaded media cannot be edited or removed from the site.
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March 17, 2011
The threshold pledge or fund and release system is a way of making a fundraising pledge as a group of individuals, often involving charitable goals or financing the provision of a public good. An amount of money is set as the goal or threshold to reach for the specified purpose and interested individuals will pitch in, keeping the donation in an escrow fund. When the threshold is reached, the contributions are retired from the escrow fund and a contract is formed so that the collective good is supplied.
This system is often applied to creative works, both for financing new productions and for buying out existing works; in the latter cases, it’s sometimes known as ransom publishing model or Street Performer Protocol (SPP). Sometimes contributions are refunded to the donors if the threshold amount is not reached as of some expiration date, and no contract is signed: this variation is known as an assurance contract. Contributions to an assurance contract may also be collected as pledges which are only called-in when the threshold is reached.
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March 17, 2011
Freemium is a business model that works by offering a basic product or service free of charge (such as software, web services or other) while charging a premium for advanced features, functionality, or related products and services. The concept was articulated by venture capitalist Fred Wilson in 2006: ‘Give your service away for free, possibly ad supported but maybe not, acquire a lot of customers very efficiently through word of mouth, referral networks, organic search marketing, etc., then offer premium priced value added services or an enhanced version of your service to your customer base.’
After describing the business model, Wilson asked for suggestions as to what to call it. Within a matter of hours, more than 30 name suggestions were given by his blog readers. One such suggestion came from Jarid Lukin of Alacra, one of Wilson’s portfolio companies. Lukin coined the term ‘freemium,’ and Wilson and his audience adopted it for the business model.
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March 17, 2011
A paywall blocks access to a webpage with a screen requiring payment. Web sites that use them include some owned by periodical publications. In 2002 the Financial Times started charging for Web access to published stories. The Wall Street Journal has almost one million paying online readers, which generates about $65 million a year.
Utilities to circumvent paywalls are available. RefSpoof for Mozilla Firefox spoofs the referrer to Google so that multiple ‘first click free’ links can be performed. BreakthePaywall adds an option to Internet Explorer’s context menu which uses various methods (referrer and user-agent spoofing, Cookie deletion, etc.).
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March 17, 2011
Kazumasa Nagai (b. 1929) is a Japanese graphic artist and poster designer. He co-founded the Nippon Design Center in Tokyo in 1960.
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March 16, 2011
Phase-change memory (PCM) is a type of computer memory which exploits the unique behavior of chalcogenide glass; with the application of heat produced by the passage of an electric current, this material can be ‘switched’ between two states, crystalline and amorphous.
Recent versions can achieve two additional distinct states, effectively doubling its storage capacity. PCM is one of a number of new memory technologies competing in the non-volatile role with the almost universal flash memory, but is faster and uses far less power than the latter. Samsung last year announced a 512Mbit PCM RAM chip for use in mobile handsets.
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March 16, 2011
A nuclear meltdown is an informal term for a severe nuclear reactor accident that results in core damage from overheating. The term is not officially defined by the International Atomic Energy Agency. Meltdown conditions can be created when system failures lead to temperatures and heat generation that exceed cooling capacity to the extent that the nuclear fuel assemblies overheat and melt, either partially or completely.
A meltdown is considered very serious because of the potential that highly intense radioactive materials with long half-lives and lethal threat could be released into the environment. The effects of a nuclear meltdown depend on the safety features designed into a reactor. A modern reactor is designed both to make a meltdown unlikely, and to contain one should it occur.
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March 16, 2011
Joel Thomas Zimmerman (b. 1981), better known by his stage name deadmau5 (pronounced ‘dead mouse’), is a Canadian progressive, electro, and house producer based in Toronto, Ontario. His debut album, ‘Get Scraped,’ was released in 2006. He is known for often performing in a titular costume head which he originally created while learning to use a 3D program, which resembles a mouse head.
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March 16, 2011
The BMW Art Car Project was introduced by the French racecar driver and auctioneer Hervé Poulain, who wanted to invite an artist to create a canvas on an automobile. It was in 1975, when Poulain commissioned American artist and friend Alexander Calder to paint the first BMW Art Car.
This first example would be a BMW 3.0 CSL which Poulain himself would race in the 1975 Le Mans endurance race. Since Calder’s work of art, many other renowned artists throughout the world have created BMW Art Cars, including Roy Lichtenstein, Andy Warhol, and Jeff Koons.
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March 16, 2011
Tijuana bibles (also known as bluesies, eight-pagers, gray-backs, Jiggs-and-Maggie books, jo-jo books, Tillie-and-Mac books, and two-by-fours) were pornographic comic books produced in the United States from the 1920s to the early 1960s. Their popularity peaked during the Great Depression era. The typical ‘bible’ is 4 by 6 inches (approximately 10 by 15 cm) with black print on cheap white paper and running eight pages in length. In most cases the artists, writers, and publishers are unknown.
The subjects are explicit sexual escapades usually featuring well known cartoon characters, political figures, or movie stars, invariably used without permission. Tijuana bibles repeated ethnic stereotypes found in popular culture at the time. Wesley Morse (who later went on to draw ‘Bazooka Joe’) is believed to have drawn Tijuana bibles before WWII. Superman co-creator, Joe Shuster illustrated a Tijuana-bible-styled erotic work called ‘Nights of Horror’ in the early 1950s.
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March 16, 2011
Matmos is an experimental electronic music duo originally from San Francisco but now residing in Baltimore signed to the Matador Records label. M. C. Schmidt and Drew Daniel are the core members, but they frequently include other artists on their records and in their performances, including J Lesser.
Much of their work could be classified as a pop version of the musique concrète genre (a forbearer of modern electronic music). The name Matmos refers to the seething lake of evil slime beneath the city Sogo in the 1968 film Barbarella.
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March 16, 2011
Alexander Calder [kawl-der] (1898 – 1976) was an American sculptor and artist most famous for inventing the mobile.
In addition to mobile and stabile sculpture, Alexander Calder also created paintings, lithographs, toys, tapestry, jewelry and household objects.
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