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【Growing a Farm With Crowd-Sourced Money】
TEXT：Kickstarter is a website where people give money to support creative projects. It started in two thousand nine, mostly to help artists and musicians. Now, inventors, people starting businesses and a growing number of farmers are raising money on this site for crowd-sourced funding.
Kickstarter是一家公众可以为创意项目提供资金支持的网站。该网站创办于2009年，主要是为了帮助艺术家和音乐家。现在，发明家、创业者和越来越多的农民通过该网站筹措来自公众的资金。
Josh Brill and Meadow Squire grow vegetables and rice in Tinmouth, a town in the northeastern state of Vermont. Last year they used Kickstarter to raise more than six thousand dollars to increase their rice production.
Josh Brill和Meadow Squire在Tinmouth种植蔬菜和水稻，这是位于美国东北部的佛蒙特州的一个小镇。去年，他们通过Kickstarter网站筹集了超过6千美元来增加水稻产量。
JOSH AND MEADOW BRILL: "Hi, I'm Josh, and I'm Meadow -- and we want to grow you rice! [Dog bark]"
JOSH AND MEADOW BRILL：“大家好，我是Josh，我是Meadow。我们想要为你种点水稻！[狗叫声]”
Seventy-six people watched the couple's six-minute video and believed enough in their dream to send them money.
67人观看了这对夫妇6分钟的视频，并足够相信他们的梦想，给他们送去了资金。
Another farmer in Vermont, Scott Nelson, raised almost nine thousand dollars. He wanted to document the growth and development of his farm to teach others who are interested in organic farming, as a video explained.
另一个在佛蒙特州的农民Scott Nelson筹集了近9千美元。他想要记录自己农场里的作物的生长和发展情况，作为讲解视频来教授那些对有机农业感兴趣的人。
VIDEO: "At the end of the season, we will compile it all into a film documentary."
视频：“在本季度末，我们将把所有视频汇编成一段电影纪录片。”
Bigger ideas have raised much more for some farmers among the projects on Kickstarter. In all, on a recent day, there were forty-five hundred creative projects seeking money on the site. Site officials reported three million dollars in weekly pledges.
在Kickstarter的项目中，一些更大的创意已经为一些农民筹集了更多资金。因此，在最近一天总共有4500个创意项目在网站上寻求资金。网站负责人员称，每周认捐金额达300万美元。
To raise money on Kickstarter, people need to think of a project with a clear goal. Then they need to get the project approved by the site. Many project creators make a video to explain what their project is and why people should support it.
在Kickstarter网站上筹集资金，人们需要想出项目的明确目标，然后他们需要让项目得到Kickstarter网站的许可。许多项目创始人会制作一个视频来解释他们的项目是什么，以及人们为什么应该支持它。
Projects have a time limit, generally about thirty days, to meet their funding goal. Kickstarter uses an all-or-nothing funding method. Projects do not get any money unless they meet their goal. Kickstarter gets five percent of the money raised, but only if the goal is met. Amazon.com takes another three to five percent for credit card processing fees.
这些项目都有时间限制，一般约30天来实现他们的筹资目标。Kickstarter采用“全有或全无”的融资方法。除非实现其融资目标，否则项目得不到一分钱。如果融资目标实现，Kickstarter会收取筹集资金的5%。Amazon网站会另收取3%-5%作为信用卡手续费。
To get people to pledge money, projects also include a list of thank-you gifts for different levels of support. Josh Brill and Meadow Squire gave supporters rice, seeds and, for fun, "good karma" points. They say they are happy with their experience using the site to raise money for their new rice paddies.
为了让人们捐出资金，这些项目还为不同程度的支持提供一份感谢礼物。Josh Brill和Meadow Squire为支持者提供了大米、种子，以及纯属好玩的“好人缘”分数。他们称，他们对使用该网站为自己的新稻田筹措资金的感到高兴。
JOSH BRILL: "One of the key things that Kickstarter allowed us to do was reach out -- having the video online and being able to link with Facebook."
JOSH BRILL：“Kickstarter能够为我们做的关键事情之一就是将视频放上网并能够链接到Facebook。”
MEADOW SQUIRE: "It really was free advertising for us -- you know, so many people now know we're growing rice and they know more about our farming practices because we do a lot of alternative agricultural practices. And there's already so much anticipation about the rice coming that we would not have had if we just had gotten a loan from a bank."
MEADOW SQUIRE：“你知道，这的确是我们的免费广告。因此，现在很多人知道我们在种植水稻，并对我们的耕作方式有了更多了解，因为我们采取了很多非传统的耕作方式。而且我们现在对水稻产出有了更多期待，如果我们当时只是从银行贷款，是不会有这些期待的。”
Josh Brill says one promise of money came all the way from New Zealand.
Josh Brill说，其中一份认捐来自遥远的新西兰。
JOSH BRILL: "When someone is willing to put up their money for your farm, that means something. It's like you would feel bad if you couldn't succeed for them."
JOSH BRILL：“当有人愿意为你的农场投入资金，那带有某种意义。如果你不能为他们取得成功，你就会感觉很糟糕。
