So far there have been several successful projects.  There is currently a project that is putting together all of the media used in the Obama Presidential campaign.  Its a sweet idea. They are trying to raise $65,000 they have all ready raised $50,000+ which is incredible!

It is an all or nothing kind of thing.  The projects are timed.  If you don’t get the full funding then you don’t get any funding.  All of the backers are charged at the same time as soon as the project’s deadline ends.

There are a ton of ideas on the site.  Any ideas that you might want to put on the site? Let me know! I am trying to get some invites!

And you may not know that the Federal Reserve also offers some pretty cool reporting too.  A lot of nerdy stats.  For example, you can go to the statistical pages of the Federal Reserve and see how consumer credit is fairing from 2004 through July of 2009 (the table below is a direct copy from the Federal Reserve site here):

CONSUMER CREDIT OUTSTANDING
Seasonally adjusted
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                                 2008                            2009
                                                                        _______________________ _______________________________________

                                2004 r  2005 r  2006 r  2007 r  2008 r   Q2 r    Q3 r    Q4 r    Q1 r    Q2 r    May r   Jun r   Jul p
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Percent change at annual rate 2
  Total                            5.6     4.5     4.1     5.6     1.6     4.1     0.6    -3.0    -3.7    -6.6    -4.2    -7.4   -10.4
   Revolving                       4.1     3.8     5.0     7.8     1.9     5.0     3.3    -7.3    -9.6    -9.7   -12.1    -6.4    -8.0
   Nonrevolving 3                  6.4     4.9     3.6     4.4     1.4     3.6    -1.0    -0.4    -0.2    -4.8     0.4    -8.0   -11.7

Amount: billions of dollars
  Total                         2191.5  2291.0  2384.8  2519.5  2559.1  2574.3  2578.3  2559.1  2535.3  2493.6  2509.2  2493.6  2472.1
   Revolving                     799.2   829.8   871.3   939.6   957.3   967.2   975.2   957.3   934.3   911.7   916.6   911.7   905.6
   Nonrevolving 3               1392.3  1461.2  1513.5  1579.9  1601.8  1607.1  1603.2  1601.8  1601.0  1581.9  1592.6  1581.9  1566.5

Note above that revolving credit by consumers started at $799 billion in 2004 (second line from the bottom), steadily rose to $975 billion by the second quarter of 2008 (22% increase over 4 years), and then started dropping. American’s credit card bills finally ended up at $905 billion by July of 2009 (a 7% decrease).  Pretty interesting to see how the recession has affected our consumer debt habits (probably should have decreased more than 7%!).

The Federal Reserve has another report called the “Beige Book”, and it is published 8 times per year by the Federal Reserve as a sort of “state of the economy” in the twelve districts around the country.  Its less statistical data, and more anecdotal in nature, making it easier for the lay person (like me) to understand.  A recent reading of the January report as compared to the most recent September report should give us cause to rejoice.  The economy finally seems to be stabilizing and possibly headed for more positive ground.

January “Beige Book” Quotes (editorial comment: “it sucked eggs”)

“Overall economic activity continued to weaken across almost all of the Federal Reserve Districts since the previous reporting period.”

“Conditions in residential real estate markets continued to worsen in most Districts.”

“Reports of retail sales during the holiday season were generally negative in most Districts.”

“According to reports from the New York District, year-end bonuses at financial firms are seen falling 20 to 30 percent from a year ago at some of the smaller firms but more substantially at the larger establishments.”

September “Beige Book” Quotes (editorial comment:  ”woot! woot!”)

“A majority of Districts confirmed that the “cash-for-clunkers” program boosted traffic and sales. Richmond, Atlanta, Chicago, and Minneapolis also noted increases or planned increases in automobile-related production.”

“Most Districts noted that demand remained stronger at the low-end of the housing market.”

“Kansas City and Richmond cited increasing demand for technology-related services. Healthcare services in Minneapolis also experienced an uptick in demand.”

“Most Districts reported modest improvements in the manufacturing sector.”

All in all, I would say these reports are exciting.  You can still read caution in the September report, but you can find optimism there too.  My clients have had a rough year, and I’m looking for some relief for them.  And that always spells relief for my firm as well.  So, chin up, America.  We’re coming out of this, dang it!

Jason M. Blumer, CPA, is the Managing Shareholder of Blumer & Associates, CPAs in South Carolina, and the writer of the THRIVEal blog.  He and his firm are notoriously addicted to preaching, installing and improving the processes in their firm, their client’s businesses and their industry as a whole.  Their interests lie in helping their clients THINK, RESPOND, GROW and  THRIVE.  With a niche focus on the newer generations in the professional services industries, Jason and his team often wear flip flops and jeans to work and refer to their client base as “dudes”.

When we are in a economic crisis?!?

YES!  Especially now! This is a global issue.  Entrepreneurs can’t find the financing to build their businesses here AND abroad. Its hard to get the financing you need in a third world country even without a global economic crisis.  This is where kiva steps in, they are a non-profit 501(c)3 company that provides mircoloans to entrepreneurs all around the world!  I have already loaned out $50 dollars to one lady and she has only 2 payments left until she is completely paid off.  I just lent out another $25 to another lady today.  No, this isn’t a money making venture.  You could potentially not get your money back … but that’s not the norm. They have a 98.61% repayment rate as of this posting.  The $25 is repaid back to you and you can then lend it to someone else who needs the money.  Its an awesome opportunity to start giving back to the community and ultimately the world!

Who doesn’t have $25 laying around? I know you do! Join the startupstudent.com lending team. Did you know if everyone who follows us on Twitter lent $25 then we would have a total of $212,625 to lend out to people who need it?! Come on. We can do it!

Google.com has been known for having made some massive innovations to the search engine world.  Everyone knows who Google is and what they do.  If you don’t you might have been living in a whole for the past 4 years .   Wolfram|Alpha is changing the game.  Stephen Wolfram calls it a omputational knowledge engine.  What the heck does that even mean.  Basically, it means that you can ask it a question and it will calculate it for you.  That doesn’t mean that it will do what Google does and search for the answer.  It physically calculates the answer for you utilzing some amazing technology.  Check out some of these blog posts for more technical details. 1 2 3

Techcrunch explained the difference between Google and Woflram|Alpha in a recent blog post:

Wolfram Alpha is like plugging into a vast electronic brain. It provides extremely impressive and thorough answers to a wide range of questions asked in many different ways, and it computes answers, it doesn’t merely look them up in a big database.

In this respect it is vastly smarter than (and different from) Google. Google simply retrieves documents based on keyword searches. Google doesn’t understand the question or the answer, and doesn’t compute answers based on models of various fields of human knowledge.

Stephen Wolfram is an entrepreneur.  He is an innovator.  This new type of engine will more than likely revolutionize the web.  Wolfram|Alpha could have the power to help many entrepreneurs as well.  Just think of all the questions you could ask it!  You could use it to find out demographics, sales for a competitive company, or find hard answers for your business plan.

Innovation is great! What do you think of the Woflram|Alpha engine?