Crowdfund This

Saturday, 20 May, 2017

Read an article in the paper today about Tomoko Takebe, who crowdfunded her search for a husband. Here’s how it turned out …

Well, she succeeded in raising ~547K yen (~5K USD), had a bunch of dates, and got a boyfriend out of the deal. She makes a point on the site about being self-conscious about her 178cm height, but her choice is about the same as her, so, problem solved.

What struck me were two things: one, that people will crowdfund anything, and I guess this method is as good as any to get a bunch of dates, eh? And two, she uses the word “omiai” which was a formal meeting in the process of an arranged marriage. So, a total mix of old and new.

I marched in drum and bugle corps in the first half of the 80s, so that qualifies me as being a real dinosaur, but there was no such thing as crowdfunding. We just got jobs to pay for drum corps (yeah, you actually pay to do it), and of course our parents paid. Asking the neighbor or your friend to help was not a thing.

But now crowdfunding is a thing, and people use it for things like finding dates or, paying the few thousand dollars needed for a season of drum corps. Why not? I think if crowdfunding existed when I was a kid, we would have taken advantage of it, because we’re products of our environments.

So, well, “welcome to my lawn, kids” I guess.

👴 ⌛ 💸 😆

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