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Fundraising ideas
  • Greetings,

    Have you ever considered making small Lego-like replicas of the 50
    machines? I would totally buy a set for my 8-year-old son. And I suspect I'm not
    alone.

    I wonder if you 1) figured out the cost of production, 2) marked it up
    10X or so to ensure a sufficient return, and 3) posted on Kickstarter to
    say you'd produce the mini-machines after getting, say, 500
    subscribers, if that would result in significant fund-raising mojo?
    There's no way Boing Boing would fail to post about this.

    Maybe do a limited, numbered first edition and sell the sets for $1000 each. TED participants might be interested, among others.

    Or start selling the replicas one at a time, and have people subscribe to the "GVCS Collectors' Club".

    You could give the machines names (like "Andy the Aluminum Extractor"), sell kids' books with pictures showing how the machines interact and how they work, and sell videos like the "Mighty Machines" series: http://www.ncircleentertainment.com/content.aspx?id=NCmightyMachines .
     
  • 3 Comments sorted by
  • Vote Up0Vote Down
    mjnmjn
     
    August 2011
    Actually, this very idea crossed my mind, but since you posted it first, all the credit goes to you.  :)  I think it would work and Lego has a set up that lets you design a model using a Builder App they provide.  Once described with Builder, it will generate build instructions.  Then the pieces can be ordered directly from Lego by mail.  It is completely do-able.  Someone just has to spend the time to create the models.

    - Mark

     
  • Vote Up0Vote Down
    MetzMetz
     
    September 2011
    What about compiling the projects into a book form and selling via Cafe Press or Lulu.com?  Someone with some desktop publishing skills could assemble a nice book in a afternoon of work.
     
  • Well, the manufacturing instructions are being written into books, but they will be free for anyone to download and print as .PDFs (well, it seems pretty well accepting we'll publish as .PDFs anyhow).  Not sure if anyone would buy a printed copy when they could print their own for just the price of toner, paper and the electricity for their printer.
     

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