Thursday, Feb 23, 2012    Text size: 

LOS ANGELES — A new Kickstarter-like crowd funding program for the adult industry has been announced by Extra Lunch Money, a marketplace for adult digital products.

Offbeatr.com is the first crowd funding resource specifically designed for the adult industry, according to the company, that allows producers, performers, artists, authors and other adult content creators a way to raise money for their projects from individuals in exchange for unique rewards.

The platform allows provides each Project Creator with a dedicated page that describes what their project is, how much money they are raising, and what rewards they will offer in exchange for monetary pledges from the public.

Crowd funding, or crowd financing, describes the collective cooperation of many individuals coming together to pledge funds to an individual or organization to complete a specified project from the funds raised, utilizing the public as the financing arm for the project.

One of the most well known mainstream crowd funding sites is Kickstarter, which is often used by small businesses, artists and other creatives that are seeking the support of fans or patrons for designated projects.

Supporters can use Offbeatr to pledge money to projects listed on the site that interest them, and receive the rewards offered by the Project Creators for their financial help in completing the project.

At the end of the project funding deadline, if the project reached its goal then the Supporters credit cards are charged and the money is transferred to the Creator. If the goal isn't met Supporters aren't charged.

"I would love to say Offbeatr was a totally original idea, it's not. While there are hundreds of crowd funding websites online, there are exactly zero which allow projects of an adult or sexual nature," said Extra Lunch Money and Offbeatr CEO, Ben Tao.

He added, “If your creativity involves trying to get your 'Chronicles of Narnia' porn parody made, good luck trying on a mainstream crowd funding site. So where does that leave people who have a great adult movie, website or mobile app idea, and need a little funding to get it off the ground? Offbeatr fills that gap and offers several benefits. Project Creators raise the money they need, while retaining the rights to their projects, and Supporters get unique rewards with the satisfaction of directly supporting Project Creators who are producing the type of adult content they want to see."

Ela Darling said she will post a project for the launch of Offbeatr. She explained why the concept is very welcome for performers and others in the adult industry.

"When Kickstarter launched, I sent out some feelers to see if I could bring to life this fun fairytale porn idea I had, but I was shot down by the site admins because they didn't want to host that sort of project. Then I catered an adult art project specifically to the Kickstarter community, and it was successful, but it's still disappointing that in spite of that success, I can't bring other, bigger projects to a crowd funding site like that."

Tao added, "There should be a lot of creativity and variety in the projects posted to Offbeatr. Project Creators will be able to present what they're passionate about and truly want to work on, without worrying about how to make them acceptable to the traditional sources of capital. Before Offbeatr there was little chance of any adult project idea seeing the light of day, but with Offbeatr we offer something previously not offered: Hope."

Offbeatr said it is looking for "passionate and creative Project Creators," to submit their projects to the site. Projects will be by invitation only during the advance industry preview period.

Potential Project Creators can request an invitation by visiting Offbeatr.com or by emailing info@offbeatr.com.