Sometimes, negative life altering events are blessings in disguise. They’re usually hard to think about and easily ignorable until they’re looking you right in the face. Sometimes you feel helpless and disappointed. Sometimes these situations leave you broke or even worse heavily in debt.
Life doesn’t have to be doom and gloom after disappointment. Let me tell you a brief story…
It seemed like yesterday that my colleagues, myself included, left the Sifteo offices together for one last time. We were no longer employees and were released into the jaws of cold reality. Some of us were just freshly starting a family or recently married. It looked like, for almost everyone, that any type of rest and relaxation would be postponed until further notice.
We didn’t know what quite to do. The only thing that seemed logical at the time was to get together and help each other find opportunities to re-kindle our careers. You hear horror stories about people getting angry or even severely depressed after something like this. It seemed like, one way or another, everyone realized that there’s so much to look forward to in life that there was no reason to fret about being laid off.
Months have passed since that fateful day in June and, in spite of the fact that most of us remain to be “jobless”, some of my colleagues decided to show what the world what they’re made of. Tirelessly working on projects that they otherwise wouldn’t have finished (or started for that matter), my colleagues are truly inspirational.
With that being said, I’m really pleased to see that two of my previous coworkers, Laurie and Albert, have recently launched KickStarter campaigns. It’s truly uplifting to see the work they have done and how their dreams are slowly becoming more of a reality each day.
Lets check out their campaigns:
Update:
I’m proud to say that both of their campaigns made their goals!
More info below:
Stranger Danger
Update
I was bitting my nails as I watched their daily numbers slowly increase. I was worried that Stranger Danger would soon belong to the 54% of KickStarter projects that fail. Luckily, due to some last minute rallying, it appears that they made it just in the nick of time.
As you can see from the chart below their progress in the last few days was nothing near their trending rate. The power of allot pleading and email sending paid off!
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Stranger Danger is a game about taking risks. The only caveat? As the name of the game alludes, they have to be with people you don’t know. This card-game forces the players to get out of their shell and approach people and ask them to help complete a certain task. When the strangers help complete the tasks the player who initiated the exercise gets a point. Who ever scores the most points wins!
It’s awesome to see Albert fuse his talent and passion for play (as a coordinator for Come Out and Play) influence the work he has done on this project.
If you want more information feel free to check out Albert’s KickStarter Campaign here.
Build and Imagine
Update
I had very little doubt about Laurie’s campaign. Many similar projects succeeded on KickStarter previously. I knew that with Laurie’s marketing chops, and the fact that it was a awesome project, that she would have no problem meeting her goals.
As you can see by the chart below, she made and exceeded her goal by Day 13! (Nice!)
I had very little doubt about Laurie’s campaign. Many similar projects succeeded on KickStarter previously. I knew that with Laurie’s marketing chops, and the fact that it was a awesome project, that she would have no problem meeting her goals.
As you can see by the chart below, she made and exceeded her goal by Day 13! (Nice!)
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A big congrats to Laurie. A job well done!
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This project is a little more near and dear to my heart. Laurie, a toy maker extraordinaire, has been working tirelessly on her new toy line called Build & Imagine. The driving idea behind Build & Imagine is to provide a platform for girls to start developing and enforcing important spacial reasoning skills required for science, technology, engineering and math.
STEM fields (unfortunately as I know all too well) are still primarily composed of men. Laurie, and a small subset of other toy makers, are working towards getting more girls interested in science and technology so they can aspire to be great scientists and engineers when they are older.
Our science and technology community desperately needs more women and I’m really happy to support the people who are making it happen! My hat is off to Laurie for courageously going where none of the giants in the arena (Lego, etc.) want to go.
If you want more information feel free to check out Laurie’s KickStarter Campaign here.
Best of luck!
Best of luck to Laurie and Albert. It looks like you guys are well on your way to being funded!
Last Modified: 2020.3.7
