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Each week, dozens of journalistic endeavors turn to Kickstarter for funding. Pitching media projects to this online community brings another meaning to the concept âpublic interest journalismâ; success depends on how intrigued people are by the pitch. From the hugely popular to the barely noticed, CJRâs Kickstarter Chronicles is a look through some of these journalistic proposals.
We all know about beauty pageants for children, thanks to shows like Toddlers & Tiaras and Honey Boo Boo Child (and if you donât know what âHoney Boo Boo Childâ is, Iâm gonna do you a favor and suggest that you donât look it up and remain blissfully ignorant). It turns out there are also beauty pageants for the other end of the age spectrum, as ElĂ©onore Hamelin and Kiran Alvi discovered when they were looking for a subject for their j-school documentary workshop (Hamelin and Alvi were my classmates at the Columbia Journalism School).
Hamelin says they initially expected to end up with a light-hearted, 20-minute-long look at a counterintuitive beauty pageant. But her three protagonists â Vivien, 87, Tina, 65, and CJ Marie, the young upstart at 60 (the pageantâs minimum age) â were interesting, vibrant, inspiring women facing issues most people can identify with; things like mortality, aging, and loneliness. âIt ended up being so much more,â Hamelin says.
About 40 minutes more â Hamelin and Alvi ended up with an hourlong documentary that is a beautifully shot look at what beauty means and when it fades â or not. Theyâre turning to Kickstarter to raise $5,000, which will enable them to put the finishing touches on the film and enter it in festivals. Hamelin also hopes to pay a translator to subtitle the documentary to show in her native France.
Deadline is October 25 at 12:55 p.m.
Josh Warren wants to create a âlaw school style bookâ featuring over 300 United States federal court opinions about ⊠zombies. Yes, itâs true. As is their wont, zombies have infiltrated our society to the point that the undead are now shaping the law of the land.
Warren, a practicing attorney and doctoral student, has been tracking the use of the word âzombieâ in court opinions since last year. He says âzombieâ is often used as a way to describe the symptoms of certain medical conditions as well as side effects from medications. âIt is unclear why the Federal Courts are so prone to latch onto this description. The zombie word is just sticky right now,â he told CJR in an email. The zombies we all know and love make appearances too, usually popping up in intellectual property cases, such as this one, from Warrenâs Zombie Law blog, in which a federal court spent way too much time and energy describing the plot points of 1979âs Dawn of the Dead and a video game that featured zombies and a mall.
Warren hopes to raise $4,666 through his campaign, which will cover the cost of producing the 700-page hardcover book. There are funding rewards, such as a picture of the current US Supreme Court justices photoshopped into zombies (which I found hilarious), and one of the coolest 4GB flash drives Iâve ever seen (hint: itâs shaped like a zombieâs favorite food).
Deadline is October 9 at 2:32 a.m.
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