Awesome Stuff: Want To Make Sure The Internet Stays Open And Free For Innovation?

from the tooting-our-own-horn-a-bit dept

Each week, we post an "awesome stuff" post that looks at a few interesting (and sometimes not so interesting) crowdfunding projects. This week, however, we're doing our own. On Monday, we launched a crowdfunding campaign to support our coverage of net neutrality. The idea is to let us put more resources towards really digging into every aspect of this battle. We're a very small team trying to cover a variety of subjects, and we work quite hard at it, but if we can dedicate greater efforts towards this important debate, we're hoping to really dig deep and look at what's really happening -- beyond just the basic headlines of what's out there.

TL;DR: Support our net neutrality coverage
and double your impact right now! »

We were able to do that with the SOPA/PIPA fight, but as I mentioned in our last post, doing so meant that we lost big on the advertising side. While that didn't stop us, we'd rather not have to worry about that, but rather just focus on just getting you the best reporting we can. While we've written hundreds of stories on net neutrality, here are a few memorable ones to highlight the kinds of things we want to be able to keep bringing you: As you can see, we really try to dig deeper, past the straight up headlines to see what else is going on. We can do a lot more of that, but we need to reach our funding goal. We're off to an amazing start so far, with it getting well over a third of the way funded in less than a week. But there's still a long way to go, and it needs your help. Please, if you can, look at supporting this project, and sharing it with your friends.

Once again, if you donate now, there are matching funds that we get from a group of donors, meaning that every dollar you give creates twice as much impact. Please consider supporting this effort. We won't let you down.

Support our net neutrality coverage
and double your impact right now! »
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While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

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Filed Under: awesome stuff, crowdfunding, innovation, net neutrality


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  • This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
    identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 12 Jul 2014 @ 10:16am

    I don't know about this "Techdirt" site guys. That Mike Masnick sounds like a total sketchball...

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
    identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 12 Jul 2014 @ 1:17pm

    Hey Baldy. Enough with the tin cup already. These are FREEtards you're talking to. They're not much with the whole, "give money" thing. They're used to getting something for nothing and now you expect them to pay?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 12 Jul 2014 @ 6:37pm

      Response to: Anonymous Coward on Jul 12th, 2014 @ 1:17pm

      "If you can't compete with free..."

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
    identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 12 Jul 2014 @ 1:24pm

    Personally, I'd like to know who the two $5000 event sponsors are. I'm willing to bet Google is one. Any guesses on who else Mike is shilling for?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 12 Jul 2014 @ 6:53pm

      Re:

      Personally, I'd like to know who the two $5000 event sponsors are. I'm willing to bet Google is one. Any guesses on who else Mike is shilling for?

      Better yet, who's offering the matching grant?

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
        icon
        techrebel (profile), 12 Jul 2014 @ 9:04pm

        Re: Re:

        Some transparency would be nice, but I'm not holding my breath. Mike demands transparency from others, but he then runs from serious discussions about his own beliefs. I doubt very much he'll be upfront about who's giving him the money here. Transparency and accountability just aren't in the cards. That's, sadly, not what Mike does.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

        • This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
          icon
          Whatever (profile), 12 Jul 2014 @ 11:19pm

          Re: Re: Re:

          My guess (and it's only my guess, so the usual trolls can back down already) is that you have to look at the usual cast of characters to see what is up.

          I wouldn't be shocked to see Lessig's new PAC as a donor and / or supporter. I could also picture the groups that have had recent highlighting posts (like kickstarter) about net neutrality recently.

          The bigger concern here may be more to do with legal. Without transparency, there is no way to know if a post is in whole or in part paid for by a contributor, even as they may be the subject of the story.

          A little transparency would go a very long way here. Knowing the two 5K donors and the matching funds group would go a long way to explaining what is actually behind this semi-covert fund raising campaign.

          You have to wonder too... Techdirt has been covering this really well without the extra money (so goes the claim), so what does the extra money bring (besides an improved bottom line)?

          link to this | view in chronology ]

          • identicon
            Anonymous Coward, 13 Jul 2014 @ 6:23am

            Re: Re: Re: Re:

            On the subject of transparency :-
            1) When will you identify yourself in your profile?
            2) Are you a member of the club whose logo you are using as an avatar?
            3) Do they know you are using it in association with posts that have nothing to do with the clubs purpose?

            link to this | view in chronology ]

            • This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
              icon
              Whatever (profile), 13 Jul 2014 @ 2:59pm

              Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

              1)not relevant, I am not a dont
              2)not relevant, doesn't matter
              3)see above.

              Your troll hand is weak.

              link to this | view in chronology ]

              • This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
                icon
                Whatever (profile), 13 Jul 2014 @ 3:00pm

                Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

                not a donor... fixed that for myself (no edit command in 2014? wow!)

                link to this | view in chronology ]

        • icon
          JMT (profile), 13 Jul 2014 @ 5:45pm

          Re: Re: Re:

          "Mike demands transparency from others, but he then runs from serious discussions about his own beliefs."

          IOW...

          "I can't come up with any original criticism so I'll just regurgitate the oldest and lamest of the anti-Techdirt tropes."

          Or... is that really you AJ!

          link to this | view in chronology ]

      • icon
        Mike Masnick (profile), 13 Jul 2014 @ 5:41am

        Re: Re:

        Better yet, who's offering the matching grant?


        We'll be revealing that soon. The folks at Beacon are still trying to finalize a few additional matching grants, and after discussing it with them, we agreed to hold off announcing who's providing the matching grants until they're finalized so that they're all on equal footing.

        Suffice it to say the "speculation" in these other comments is way, way, way, way off. Ditto for the event sponsors. I'll ask the two event sponsors (one of which signed on yesterday) if they're okay with being named at this point, but I know who both of them are, and they're both entrepreneurs not associated with any large company or any sort of political group. Both are just long-time fans of Techdirt, as is the case with the donors of matching funds.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          Anonymous Coward, 13 Jul 2014 @ 7:06am

          Re: Re: Re:

          What would be even more interesting is if the shills would reveal their identity so that we can better determine who their sponsors are.

          link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 12 Jul 2014 @ 3:17pm

    Is paypal supported?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Mike Masnick (profile), 13 Jul 2014 @ 5:43am

      Re:

      Is paypal supported?


      It doesn't look like Beacon supports Paypal, so the answer appears to be no. If you would still like to support us, but only use Paypal, you can do so at our Insider Shop:

      https://rtb.techdirt.com/

      Thanks!

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        Anonymous Coward, 13 Jul 2014 @ 7:07am

        Re: Re:

        (While I'm not going to donate much) are donations anonymous?

        link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Ninja (profile), 14 Jul 2014 @ 4:38am

    Am I the only one that reads BACONreader?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      plays a holy paladin on WoW, 14 Jul 2014 @ 8:26am

      Response to: Ninja on Jul 14th, 2014 @ 4:38am

      Nope.
      /cast Bacon of Light

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    JustMe (profile), 14 Jul 2014 @ 9:04am

    Why not a one-time option below $30?

    Is this a Beacon restriction? Personally, I have no desire to read things at Beacon (given that I've never heard of them). Can I just spot you $5 or something instead?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Mike Masnick (profile), 14 Jul 2014 @ 10:25am

      Re: Why not a one-time option below $30?

      Is this a Beacon restriction? Personally, I have no desire to read things at Beacon (given that I've never heard of them). Can I just spot you $5 or something instead?

      It's how Beacon is set up. If you would like to just give $5, you could sign up for the recurring option and then cancel after the first round is charged. I recognize that's not all that appealing.

      You could also support us via our Insider Shop: https://rtb.techdirt.com/ though that won't get funds matched, nor would it count towards hitting our target number in this campaign.

      I realize those may be second best options, so I apologize for that, but that's all we can do at this point.

      link to this | view in chronology ]


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