> Well, why should the average Joe not be enabled to say "hey, I'd like to take some of my money and put it towards a research project that interests me"? No p

> Well, why should the average Joe not be enabled to say "hey, I'd like to take some of my money and put it towards a research project that interests me"? No problems, like i said in another reply, give your money to whoever you want. What bothers me is them asking. > >and as i shouldn't have to explain, research outcomes aren't as cut and dry as when you fund a video game or movie. I'm not sure what the criticism is here. I do not look forward to the day where students are required (as in to be competitive) to build an a product/hand out t-shirts/etc for the 'Average Joe' in order to get the tools they need to complete their degree. > All it does is act as a pre-filter. It's not like funding guarantees publication in a peer-reviewed journal. And that filter also blocks out a lot of potentially useful research. Well, yea, of course. The process has it's own problems (promising too much and not delivering, using buzz-words to be trendy, etc) because it's competitive, and competition breeds all kinds of tricks to gain an edge. I'm worried/uneasy that the same tricks/edge will be used in crowdfunding with larger results. How many failed crowdsourcing articles are there despite successful funding (e.g. Clang)? Research often fails, but for different reasons (method is currently impractical, no longer necessary, and/or didn't live up to the hype), and putting a spotlight on what didn't deliver doesn't mean the approach should no longer be funded/trusted/used. In addition, a long term fear is that if the public sees research getting a lot of money outside of traditional channels maybe there'll be a debate as to whether to continue funding through traditional channels. Which brings me back to printing t-shirts so we can advance the state of the art.