Reddit launches its own crowdfunding service

Community site Reddit is starting its own crowdfunding site. Anyone with a Reddit account can start their own project through Redditmade. In particular, the site wants to support projects related to subreddits, such as merchandise for the site components.

Reddit has announced the arrival of Redditmade on its own site. “Redditmade is a new place to make the best designs and products a reality in the community,” the team wrote to the moderators. For now, it is an open beta for the service and donations only work in combination with US bank accounts.

As with competing crowdfunding sites such as Kickstarter, a bar shows what percentage of the required amount has already been committed and how many days a project is still running. Currently, there are mainly merchandise projects for subreddits, such as t-shirts, and this is also clearly one of the goals the service was created for, according to the team behind Reddit. Projects with a demonstrable link to a subreddit qualify for an ‘official subreddit campaign’ designation, which will automatically advertise on the site.

However, the site also wants to lend a helping hand for other projects. “To get started you need an idea about the type of product you want to make and approximately how many people are willing to buy it,” Reddit reports in a faq, “you also need to be able to make sketches of the product and you need an idea where the proceeds from your campaign.” If those conditions are met, the site says it can link initiators to partners, perfect designs and take them through other ‘creative, legal, logistical, promotional and financial hoops’.