Kickstarter launches new Inside Voices campaign to help creatives in lockdown

Kickstarter has launched a new campaign called Inside Voices that champions projects that are entirely made and delivered from home. The idea is to link up makers currently in need of some income after the coronavirus pandemic has put an end to upcoming projects with people wanting to support artists, who have, let’s face it, quite a lot of time of their hands.

The crowdfunding platform tells It’s Nice That that it has (understandably) witnessed a drop in creators launching new projects in the past few weeks but those that have done so have found a lot of success, smashing their targets in record time. For example online game Frosthaven, which only launched on Tuesday (31 March), has already raised nearly £5 million from 42,000 backers, as people are desperate to find alternatives to going to the pub. The idea behind Inside Voices is to harness some of this energy and use it to support out-of-work creatives with brilliant ideas.

As long as it can be planned, run and completed from lockdown, what a project looks like is completely up for grabs. Examples that Kickstarter has suggested include shooting and editing a short film produced entirely in your apartment, launching a game that players can back to participate in online or recording a storytelling podcast where you play every character. Rewards should be simple, like PDF zines, album downloads, invites to a Zoom performance or a poetry newsletter.

Since the launch on Friday (3 April), projects already available to fund though the Inside Voices platform include a set of social distancing achievement stickers, a Covid-19-inspired survival game called Stir Crazy Quarantine!, an online puzzle hunt from mysterious body The American Society for the Protection of Magical Creatures and a digital card game called The Game of Real Life, which aims to help people deal with stressful emotions and interpersonal skills.

“It’s okay to continue to create and ask for support during these turbulent times,” the brief from Kickstarter reads. “We’ll get through this together, as makers and supporters of creative work.”

You can find out how to get involved here.