Kickstarter or Kickstopper

Dork Tower webcomic has promoted the use of a (fictitious) service known as Kickstopper.   

    
So in spite of the idea that many creative ideas are really not worth pursuing, there have been two that I have supported recently.   

The first was a company of science guys who had an idea to bring laser cut trebuchets (catapults) to the classroom as a way to model science for kids. I received in the mail last week my own trebuchet as a reward for helping them out. I have not assembled it yet, but when I do, Whimzy better watch out. Treats will be flying across the backyard (a good way for her to exercise without me having to move much).  

And I just sponsored my second project  - Fireside magazine - which purports to be a magazine for fiction in which writers of many genres will get a chance to receive a reasonable wage for writing short stories.     

Besides wanting to publish good stories, my other goal is to pay the contributors fairly for their work. Currently, for fiction, the rate that is considered professional is 5 cents a word. For a 4,000-word story, which is the upper word limit for Fireside, that would be $200. That's not all that much, considering how much work goes into a short story. I've set my budget, and the Kickstarter goal, at 12.5 cents a word ($500 for a 4,000-word story).

Sound interesting? For $2, you can get a PDF of Fireside No. 1. For $4, you can get an eBook too. Got $10? Then you can also get the printed magazine, which will only ever be offered to supporters of the Kickstarter. (The electronic versions will be sold online.) For $25, you can get a print copy autographed by one of the writers.   

 The project leader recalls a quote from Neil Gaimin, one of my favorite authors (also mentioned in the comic above, and whose talent would be inversely proportional to Adam Sandler's):    

I was reading the introduction to the "Stories" anthology edited by Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantonio earlier this year. In it, Gaiman writes of his response to a question about what quote he would want inscribed on the wall of  the kids' section in a public library. He captured the reason why we love good stories in his response:
I'm not sure I'd put a quote up, if it was me, and I had a library wall to deface. I think I'd just remind people of the power of stories, of why they exist in the first place. I'd put up the four words that anyone telling a story wants to hear. The ones that show it's working, and that pages will be turned:

"... and then what happened?"    

If you have extra cash lying around, you may want to consider sponsoring Fireside magazine. They have quite a ways to go yet before they are fully funded.