October 6th, 2009
Just a quick update to keep you all in the loop about when our payments page is going live.
We’ve been in touch with PayPal and most of the issues have been resolved. The remaining issue is that we are not a registered organisation, and therefore we cannot supply PayPal with documentation to prove that we are a non-profit organistation.
Hopefully we’ll have matters resolved very soon.
Thank you for your patience.
October 1st, 2009
We’re amazed at the response we’ve had to our pledge drive, and we have already passed the 100 pledge mark.
We want to keep this positive momentum up, so we’ll be enabling you to honour your pledge using PayPal in the coming days.
We understand that some of you may not be able to use PayPal, so we are thinking of alternative means by which we can collect your payments. We will publish the details as soon as we have finalized them.
Thanks.
September 25th, 2009
A blog post by Pat Phelan ignited a fresh wave of conversation around the subject of startup funding in Ireland. Anton Mannering came at it from another angle and both discussions reminded me of a similar one a few months ago sparked by Joe Drumgoole‘s post to Web2Ireland.
While each debate has thrown up a number of good ideas there’s a certain level of frustration with the realization that these discussions tend to go around in circles, often ending up with a consensus that the government needs to do more/better. While I can sympathise with that point of view I really think it’s time that entrepreneurs in this country started doing more for ourselves, however insignificant it may seem by comparison. Initiatives like the Bizcamp, OpenCoffee Club and the IQ Prize demonstrate the power of ‘self-help’.
While lots of figures have been bandied about during each of these discussions the sum of €5,000 keeps coming up as a baseline figure that a bootstrapping startup could do something useful with. It also happens to be the amount of funding I received in 2008 as a Level 1 awardee at Social Entrepreneurs Ireland.
Which is why we’re using that same figure as the target for a new pledge drive seeking 100 people to donate €50 each to a startup competition. Outvesting is the name we’re giving to this initiative and if/when the target €5,000 is reached we’ll make a call for applications. Each of the donors will then review those applications and decide on a winner by poll. Whereupon the startup will be awarded with the €5,000 prize.
More to follow….