Okay guys, this might sound a bit crazy, but trust me, even if you don't think it's a good investment, it's still a very interesting business idea. I'm just gonna plunge right in, whoever is brave enough can follow me!
FundYourselfNow is basically Kickstarter / Indiegogo / any other crowfunding platform, but with blockchain.
Does just adding blockchain to the back of any business make it a superior one? No, it does not. However, in this instance, there actually does seem to be some benefits.
Personally, one of the business models that I've always loved is all these crowdfunding websites. Sure, the backend and the technology is probably very complicated, but the actual business idea is freaking simple:
Step 1: Create an easily accessible gathering point
Step 2: Target a niche, or let campaigns select a category
Step 3: Collect and account for contributor's funds
Step 4: Disburse funds to campaign if funding target / milestone is hit
Step 5: Don't forget to keep your cut of the campaign funds! (usually 5%)
Step 6: Wash, rinse, repeat for a $35,000,000,000 USD market (figures from 2015, and growing!)
In case you are lost on the mathematics, if all platforms take a 5% cut (and some take more), that's $1,750,000,000 worth of profits flying around for platforms to fight for!
And like I said, that figure was in 2015, and it has since been growing.
So, as you might rightfully ask, what are the benefits of adding "blockchain" into this sort of business model?
They themselves have a bunch of reasons to sell themselves to you (which you can check for yourself at their website). There's a ton of information there, especially for those that want to dig in deeper themselves, especially super important things for investors, like the ICO information, profit distribution to tokenholders and of course their whitepaper. However, I'm going to cut out the bells and whistles and focus on the 2 main actual competitive business advantages that I see, in this order:
Advantage #1: (Almost No) Transaction Fees
If you already didn't know, one of the huge benefits of blockchain tech is the ability to send money really cheap. Like really really cheap. Like 0.01% cheap.
Compare that to Kickstarter and Indiegogo. The minute a donor / funder / contributor decides to send money over, the payment processing monster eats up between 3-5% of the amount BEFORE it even reaches the platform.
FYN basically has a 2.99% - 4.99% cost advantage over the incumbents.
Lower transaction fees means more funding for the campaign. The campaign is happy that they receive more money. The backers are happy that their money isn't being burnt by payment processors. It's a win-win situation.
Advantage #2: Scam Protection
Unlike the traditional way of crowdfunding, which has had many, upon many people try to conduct huge scams, blockchain tech has smart contracts which FYN will employ.
Basically, the campaign has to hit certain milestones, and backers will vote if the milestone is hit to their sanctification, and only then would the next sum of money be released to the campaign.
This prevents fraud because if a campaign is unable to deliver on some of its initial milestones, the remaining bulk of the funds would not be released to the campaign. Of course, only scams and weak projects would be unable to deliver. Allowing backers to vote on this greatly reduces both the likelihood (since scammers would avoid the platform) and severity (since funds are released based on milestones) of getting scammed.
Summary:
A lot about FundYourselfNow has already been said and covered by quite a few articles and videos circulating the web.
My personal take is that FYN is being smart by quickly moving into a currently unserved cryptomarket and establishing a foothold. They do have a demo up and running, so risks of a dud project is mitigated on that front. They also do have a strong and responsive team, which is critical in manouvering in this extremely fast-paced segment (How do I know that they are responsive? Their initial logo was FUGLY, but they got it improved and changed quickly based on feedback!). Almost nothing these days moves faster than the progress happening in the cryptoworld.
Of course, nothing is without risks. The main risk that I can identify is that FYN might actually be too early and not well-known, meaning that they might not have many campaigns on their platform until the general idea of cryptocurrencies take off. However, within the cryptosphere, ICOs, crowdsales and funding projects are almost announced on a daily basis. If FYN can on-board the crypto-ethusiasts, they actually have a very big likelihood of becoming HUGE.
Ask any investor if they wish they could have gotten in with any of the major crowdfunding platforms when they were just taking off, and I bet everyone would jump at that opportunity.
FYN is now the crypto equivalent to that. Right now, even without cryptocurrencies being mainstream, FYN already has a massive opportunity to become the market leader within the cryptosphere ($100 billion market). If cyrptocurrencies become mainstream (which they are slowly, but surely moving towards), the potential of FYN is actually mindblowing.
Their Initial Coin Offering starts on the 13th of June.
Disclaimer: I am not vested in this project at the time of writing. I have not been paid to write this article. No one has told me what to write and these are my own opinions.
This information has been prepared without taking into account your objectives, financial situation or needs. If any products are detailed in this post, you should independently conduct your own due diligence before making any decisions.
Have there been any success stories so far? I guess from your enthusiasm for the project that you are a stakeholder in some form?
South park at it's finest :D go fund yourself :D if you haven't watched it, please search the washington redskins episode :)