Despite its super-smart concept for crowdfunding creative projects, Kickstarter doesn’t always inspire. Donate twenty bucks to get that girl from high school’s ska band a new amp? Nah. Support your roommate’s boyfriend’s recreation of Jackass II in his studio apartment? No can do. But here are six Brooklyn Kickstarter projects we can get behind, starting with a brand new campaign to send the Atlantic Yards documentary Battle for Brooklyn to the Oscars. The film is one of 14 films shortlisted for the best doco category, and filmmakers Michael Galinsky and Suki Hawley have turned to the funding platform for an extra push to get their movie in front of nominators (at least $9K). If you haven’t seen Battle, check it on Dec. 13 at the IFC Film Centre in the West Village, and donate here. That’s not the only worthwhile Brooklyn project on Kickstarter, where 1,000 of the 15,000 campaigns funded since 2009 were hatched here in Kings County. (Or maybe more, since some people list their location as NYC.) Here are five more we’re rooting for:

PROJECT 2: FIND RUBULAD A HOME
Even if you haven’t been to a Rubulad bash, you’ve definitely heard about them. My first exposure came from a friend’s 3 AM drunken text (mistypes corrected for the sake of clarity): “Wearing fairy wings in a warehouse filled with stuffed animals. I don’t think there’s a ceiling?” The trippy theme-party powerhouse throws regular installation art-infused dance parties in shifting and undisclosed spaces around the borough, and they go hard. The problem? They need a dedicated space, and they can’t afford it. If you’re willing to help “keep the party alive,” Rubulad will show its appreciation with a limited edition tee or original artwork.

Behold the Loomi.

PROJECT 3: SEED A GROOVY DANISH LIGHT FIXTURE 
Apartment feeling a little dim lately? The creators of Loomi have invented a self-described “modular, makeable, paintable, recyclable light” to set the mood while remaining eco-conscious. Inspired by an expired patent from the ’70s, these glowing orbs are made from SBS card stock instead of the original plastic. The best part? You get to customize the products to suit your every ornamental whim. A $45 donation gets you not just the light but also the electrical fixture and free shipping.

PROJECT 4: HELP OTHERS AVOID UNNECESSARY GRAD SCHOOL DEGREES
You may know Kio Stark’s name from the Brooklyn buzz around her debut novel, Follow Me Down, from the NYC-local publishing community Red Lemonade. Her new project, Don’t Go Back to School, instructs users in the best ways to achieve career goals without paying NYU instructors a cent to listen to their advice in a lecture hall. The grad school dropout schools readers with this handbook on the art of self-teaching with expert insight on everything from coding to neurology. Backers receive a learn-o-gram or copy of the book and are spared thousands in misspent tuition fees.

PROJECT 5: HELP GET THE NEWS OUT
The brains (and formidable brains they are) behind Newsmotion are dedicated to building a better news model so that important stories around the world get told and read regardless of how far they are outside CNN’s coverage areas. In addition to creating and distributing content on under-reported topics, the folks at Newsmotion are building open-source storytelling technology that will enable citizen journalists anywhere to report the news reliably and accurately. In addition to creating the news interface, funds from this Kickstarter project will also go toward media training for at-risk youth, low-wage workers, and immigrants. Help the team of tech scholars, writers, and producers raise $35,000 and help reinvent the future of journalism.

PROJECT 6: GROW VEGETABLES IN YOUR WINDOWSILL
In a slew of urban agriculture DIY projects, only a handful are truly practical, and even fewer are affordable (compost boxes in the bedroom, anyone?). Developed by a team of “ordinary people,” Windowfarms are a solution to growing your own vegetables using readily available resources. All you need to do is snap the column together, set it in your windowsill, and start nurturing your baby plants with the included nutrients. This project with a $200,000 goal provides the feel-good benefit of creating more local green jobs. Purchase a windowfarm through Kickstarter by Wednesday, December 7 to get the discounted rate of $99 per column.

If you are trying to figure out  funding strategy, put this on your calendar: The BK-based DIY Business Association is hosting a micro conference Sept. 10: “Get Funding ASAP!“ to discuss different avenues of raising money, with expert advice from panelists such as Slava Rubin, co-founder of IndieGoGo, Sara Bacon, founder of Greenpoint Coworking, Natalia Oberti Noguera, founder of the Pipeline Fellowship and more. The cost is $25, which includes cocktails and networking groups. Oh, and what has two thumbs and is moderating this panel? This guy!

Reserve tickets here. The full list of panelists:

Natalia Oberti Noguera, Founder and CEO of Pipeline Fellowship

Matt Ruby, Comedian, writer, and 37signals’ first employee

Slava Rubin, CEO and Co-Founder of IndieGoGo

Luna Vega, Digital Marketing Entrepreneur and DJ

Sara Bacon, Founder and CEO of COMMAND C design and Greenpoint Coworking

Erica Dorn, ACCION USA’s New York Business Development Officer

Amy Chernoff, CEO of amy+owen Handbags

Moderator: Tim Donnelly, Contributor to Inc. Magazine and Managing Editor of Brokelyn.com.

Official panel description:

Do you need money to jumpstart your business, hire employees and independent contractors, rent work space, or take things up a notch? Save hours (or even months) of research for business funding options with expert advice and insights about a variety of funding options. With so many routes to take, how do you know which one (and at which point) is best for you? Successful entrepreneurs (including those who distribute funds to other entrepreneurs) share their stories and the pros and cons of small-business loans, credit cards, venture-capitalist funding, day jobs, slow growth, donations, etc. (Cocktails and a networking DIYTogether Incubator Group are included in the ticket price.)

The event takes place at Loosecubes office loft space, 20 Jay Street, suite 904, from 3-6pm Sept. 10.

Daniel Goldstein. Photo courtesy of No Land Grab.

Here’s your easiest route ever to associate producer status on a documentary film. The Brooklyn-based studio Rumur has spent the last six years producing Battle of Brooklyn, a documentary chronicling Daniel Goldstein’s fight against the Atlantic Yards development project and his effort to save his home at 636 Pacific St. Now Rumur is short on cash and time, and the studio needs some help to save its own project. With the help of the funding platform Kickstarter, they’re trying to raise $25,000 by December 1 to receive a matching grant that will meet the rest of their needs. You can pledge $1 (or more, they prefer) at Rumur’s Kickstarter page. There are several donation levels and each gets you a copy of the movie and Rumur swag like T-Shirts and DVDs. High rollers (not us) who donate $2,500 get an associate producer credit, but the producers’ perhaps more realistic hope is to raise $25 each from 1,000 people in exchange for a DVD. As of this writing, they had raised $5,381 from 66 backers. (Atlantic Yards developer Bruce Ratner also has a deadline to make—plans to develop may be nixed if bonds aren’t issued by Dec. 31.)

Kickstarter, a Brooklyn-based enterprised that launched over the summer, seems to actually work: dozens of projects have met, or even exceeded, their funding goals on the site so far, including a comedy improv game, a “floating doctors,” medical-relief cruise, a design chronicle of the Obama campaign and a pop-up camper attached to a shopping cart, along with lots of other lofty endeavors that are entertaining but difficult to discern from the descriptions.

On the site, creators film videos explaining their projects and where the funding will go. To gain supporters they offer incentives for every pledge made. One Emily Richmond is currently raising funds to document her 24-month sail around the world in a 35-foot-long fiberglass boat. She offers an origami sailboat to every $5 pledge, and if you dish out $5,000 you get to name the dinghy she sets out to sea. Singer Smith offers free tickets for a year, dinner with the band and even an original song.

All projects have a time-frame, that’s why donations are known as “pledges.” If the funds don’t add up by the end of the time-frame, all the money is returned. Some might frown at that practice, but we raise our virtual glasses, if your music video needs $2,000 to be brilliant, why create a shoddy cut with only $730? Currently Kickstarter, which is processing payments via Amazon, is accepting projects by invitation only, though come August its doors will open to all. At the moment, creators get 100 percent of the pledges.

The site’s creator is Brooklynite Perry Chen—a former waiter, an audio engineer, musician, a writer, an art gallery co-founder, and a daytrader—who has YouTube-scale ambitions for the site. He told Inc. Magazine last year that he was inspired to create it by his difficulties helping two Austrian DJs raise money to come to the States. Fundraising doesn’t seem to be a problem for Chen these days—he launched Kickstarter with a six-figure sum from backers including Arrested Development actor David Cross. 

[via Thrillist]