Karsten Wenzlaff, Advisor
August 26th, 2025
Karsten Wenzlaff is a Crowdfunding and Fintech Expert from Germany. He is Secretary-General of Digit[...]
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Eruptious 24 Hours over at Kickstarter
If you haven't read Kickstarter's blog post titled '24 Hours', we encourage you to read on...
It's a testament to the infectious power of an online community of fans financially backing and supporting projects at lightening speeds beyond tipping points while creating history at the same time (at least back in February 2012). This project obviously took on a 'life of its own' and people piled in to support it and in the process become part of something greater than themselves. Well done - great post! (NCFA Canada)
There are crazy days and then there are days like yesterday. Kickstarter has experienced some frantic hours but nothing like what happened in the 24-hour span between Wednesday at 6:54pm and Thursday at 6:44pm. Two million-dollar projects, a major political speech involving Kickstarter, an amazing band launching a project for a comeback 20 years in the making... the list goes on. Here's a minute-by-minute breakdown of the day's events.
Wednesday, 6:54pm: Elevation Dock sees its $942,579th dollar, passing the TikTok to become the largest project in Kickstarter history.
Wed, 8:52pm: Double Fine Adventure, a new game project from Tim Schafer and 2 Player Productions, launches.
Wed, 9:38pm: Everyone (us included) starts freaking out.
Thursday, 12:38am: Double Fine crosses $200,000 in pledges.
Thur, 1:51am: Beloved indie band (and office favorite) Black Tambourine launches a project for new material and reunion shows, their first appearance since 1991. Any other time this is the day's big news.
Thur, 5:31am: Double Fine Adventure reaches its $400,000 goal in just eight hours. It's the fastest start to any project in Kickstarter history.
Thur, 7:33am: We notice that Double Fine creator Tim Schafer stayed up all night watching it happen (us too!).
Thur, 9:41am: We announce that Kickstarter will be featured on Portlandia on Friday at 10pm on IFC, and we talk to Fred Armisen (he was very nice). One of the coolest things that's ever happened to us but just another moment on a day like today.
Thur, 11:46am: Newly crowned Kickstarter record-holder Casey Hopkins of Elevation Dock posts an update expressing love for his backers and giving props to TikTok creator Scott Wilson.
Thur, 12:45pm: We're in attendance at the State of the City address at New York's City Hall where New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn announces a new effort by the city to support New York-based Kickstarter projects. The proposal gets a huge round of applause.
Thur, 1:15pm: TikTok creator and longtime record-holder Scott Wilson posts an update congratulating Double Fine on their achievement.
Thur, 2:08pm: Elevation Dock becomes the first Kickstarter project to see $1 million in pledges! Wow!
Thur, 2:46pm: Excitement grows...
Thur, 3:20pm: Kickstarter passes $1,000,000 in pledges for the day and it's still light out. The previous single-day record: $736,730, set the day before. The final tally for February 9th: $1,605,981 pledged.
Thur, 3:33pm: A crew from China's CCTV comes to film at the office. Oddly they speak French.
Thur, 5:40pm: Every computer in the office is refreshing Double Fine. When will it hit a million?
Thur, 6:31pm: The team gathers to watch the project on the big screen. When will it hit???
Thur, 6:40pm: USA Today marks Double Fine's impending achievement.
Thur, 6:41pm: Like everyone, we're repeatedly hitting refresh on the project page. When will it hit????
Thur, 6:42pm: DOUBLE FINE HITS $1,000,000 IN JUST 24 HOURS!!!! After not having a single million dollar project in Kickstarter's first two-plus years, there are suddenly two within four hours of each other.
Double Fine celebrates in SF:
And Kickstarter celebrates in NYC:
Thanks and congratulations to everyone on an unforgettable 24 hours. YES!!!!!
Source: Kickstarter blog post
Why now is an ideal time for startups in Canada
Erin Bury | Oct 15, 2012 10:51 AM ET | Last Updated: Oct 15, 2012 11:00 AM ET
More from Erin Bury
This week is Small Business Week in Canada — an entire week devoted to all things entrepreneurial. It’s a chance to reflect on the successes Canadian entrepreneurs have had this year, while also examining the state of entrepreneurship in the country.
There have been several notable Canadian small business milestones this year, fromEloqua’s IPO, to HootSuite’s $20-million funding from Canadian venture capital fund OMERS Ventures in March, to Salesforce acquiring GoInstant for a reported $70-million in July. Not to mention classes of startups graduating from accelerators including MaRS’ JOLT, Communitech’s HYPERDRIVE, Extreme Startups, InCubes, andTheNext36.
To get some insight into the current small business landscape, I decided to poll some Canadian entrepreneurs and investors. I asked each of them one question: Why is right now a great time to start a small business in Canada?
One entrepreneur, Kunal Gupta, Polar Mobile founder, said starting a business today is easier than it was five years ago, when he was starting his app development platform, which has worked with more than 380 media companies around the world.
“Entrepreneurship is widely recognized, celebrated and supported by the larger ecosystem of government, education providers, corporate industry and mainstream press,” Gupta said.
“This is seen through the number of entrepreneurship related degrees, startup tech incubators, grants and funding assistance programs, and mentorship opportunities. Many of these support programs did not exist even a few years ago.”
“The barrier to entry in terms of technology has never been lower, and today anyone that knows how to use email can effectively start their own online business,” said Harley Finkelstein, chief platform officer at Ottawa-based Shopify, when asked the question. The platform lets any merchant create an online store and hosts more than 35,000 online stores (2,500 in Canada) that have sold more than $1-billion worth of products on the platform.
“Moreover, the financial risks typically associated with launching a traditional company — payroll, leaseholds, inventory, and capital expenditures — are essentially non-existent in the current economy.”
On the investor side, Chris Arsenault ofiNovia Capital says his fund has invested in more than 10 Canadian tech companies in the past year, among them Top Hat Monocle, and several pre-revenue companies.
“Entrepreneurship is at its best across Canada, and we are seeing ambition now being matched by execution,” Arsenault said. “I’m driven by the high level of motivation and connectivity our entrepreneurs are showing. Feels like nothing can stop them. If we don’t fund them, then a U.S. VC firm will.”
Mark MacLeod, a partner at RealVentures, says access to funding, both via traditional avenues or through crowdfunding, is one reason it’s a great time to start a business. The fact that Canada has one of the highest Facebook penetration rates in the world means Canadian businesses can easily find local customers online, he said. (There are 18 million monthly active Facebook users in Canada, while Canada is 5th globally in terms of having the most small business professionals on LinkedIn.) MacLeod said there are additional examples of million-dollar business leaders, both in the offline and online space, that new entrepreneurs can learn from.
“Whether it’s Ryan Holmes from Hootsuite publicly stating his desire to build a $1-billion company or Harry Rosen building a globally respected fashion brand, we have great role models to learn from,” MacLeod said.
There will always be challenges to starting a small business in Canada, with an investment scene that isn’t as active as it is in Silicon Valley and a constant need for development talent. But the experts — investors and entrepreneurs — agree the barrier to entry has never been lower.
Erin Bury is managing editor at BetaKit, an emerging tech publication launched by Sprouter.com. If you have emerging tech news get in touch at erin@betakit.com.
Source: Financial Post
Montreal: Notman House Launches Indiegogo Campaign
Source: Financial Post
Christine Dobby | Oct 12, 2012 2:00 PM ET | Last Updated: Oct 12, 2012 2:02 PM ET
More from Christine Dobby | @christinedobby
Help Build Notman House
Notman House launches Indiegogo campaign
Also in Montreal, Notman House, a co-working office-space for early-stage technology startups and general hub of innovation, is looking to raise $100,000 through a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo.
Set in a historic building in the Plateau neighbourhood but near the downtown core, it has been running in “proof of concept mode” for the past year and attracted $1.7-million in government grants and a $4.3 million loan from BDC and Investissement Quebec. But that funding is conditional upon Notman House itself coming up with $1.1-million in private contributions. Law firm Fasken Martineau LLP has already kicked in $1-million.
It has raised more than $20,000 so far and hopes to reach its goal by Oct. 29.
Extreme Startups unveils its second cohort of startups
Toronto accelerator Extreme Startups recently revealed the five companies that made it into its second cohort of companies. They’re already at work preparing for demo day, which will be held on Nov. 28.
The companies are Kera, a web browsing platform, Picatic, which does crowdfunding for events, MyShoebox, a cloud-based photo backup platform, Shifthub, which offers shift scheduling for small businesses, and Venio, a healthy-eating platform.
I met Karim el Rabiey from Venio in July on the way to Montreal’s International Startup Festival. During an on-board pitch session on the Startup Train (organized by Guelph, Ont.-based co-working group ThreeFortyNine), Venio emerged as the favourite, as picked by the train’s sponsors. They’re still in beta mode but Karim tells me they’ll be launching an app soon.
Also pitching on the train was Bebedo — an online search platform that helps connect you with events in your area — which stood out to me in part because of its all-female technical team. Bebedo will be taking part in Extreme’s new Preccelerator program that gives local entrepreneurs free space.
Four other startups, Brika, MommiesFirst, Pictoreo and Relay, will also be taking advantage of that program.
FedDev Ontario loaning $4.4M to KW startups
Five Kitchener-Waterloo startups got a boost from FedDev Ontario, which is investing a total of $4.4-million in them through repayable loans, it said Thursday.
Maluuba Inc. — the company with the Siri competitor Android app we featured in last week’s Startup Roundup — will get up to $980,000 to further develop its natural language processing software.
The other companies getting help from the government agency with a mandate to spur economic growth in Southern Ontario are P&P Optica, Avenir Medical Inc., Axonify Inc. and Sweet Tooth Inc.
