Today Kickstarter announced the launch of Drip – a new subscriptions tool which will enable artists and creators to receive recurring financial support from fans, friends, and new audiences. Where Kickstarter enables one-time project funding, Drip has been designed for creators seeking to fund and build community around their ongoing creative practice.
From choreographers to designers, Drip will be a new way for all kinds of creators to sustainably fund their practice and maintain creative independence. Creators will be able to use Drip as a platform to share and receive payment for their work. A creator’s Drip might offer subscribers early access to work, exclusive material, or behind-the-scenes updates on works-in-progress. Creators will be able to set up different subscription tiers and subscribers can support them every month or with each release of new material.
Drip can be used in tandem with Kickstarter’s project-based funding model. Creators on Drip will have seamless access to Kickstarter’s global community of 14 million users who will be able to use Drip with their Kickstarter account. Like Kickstarter, Drip has been built to support artists and creators across the full spectrum of disciplines supported on Kickstarter: Art, Comics, Crafts, Dance, Design, Fashion, Film & Video, Food, Games, Illustration, Journalism, Music, Photography, Podcasts & Radio, Publishing, Technology, and Theatre. Drip’s design is intentionally pared-back to allow creators to take centre-stage. The first creators on Drip will be invite-only with the platform scheduled to open up to more creators in early 2018. Drip is open to subscribers from today.
Perry Chen, Founder of Kickstarter said:
‘Funding remains one of the biggest challenges for artists and creators. Drip builds on what we’ve learned over 8+ years with Kickstarter, but instead puts creators – not projects – at the centre of the conversation. The goal is the same – helping people bring their creative work to life. That’s what creators care about, and this is hopefully a powerful way for them to connect people to their work and practice.’
Every Drip will begin with a Founding Membership period of seven to 30 days and offer limited ‘Founding Member’ subscription tiers to help creators build momentum. This feature will replicate the urgency of Kickstarter’s all-or-nothing mechanism, where a project is only successful if it reaches its funding target within a set period of time.
Drip will operate under the mission, philosophy, and values codified by Kickstarter’s Public Benefit Charter, which clarifies that it will not place profits and growth above the company’s mission. In line with this, Drip creators will not be tied to the platform and will be able to export their data, content and live subscribers to alternative platforms with ease.
