Trial by Internet

WEB www.lunatik.com Scott Wilson has had a long and varied design career—formerly a global creative director of Nike, he now runs his own studio, Minimal, in Chicago—but since late 2010 he has become best known for his Kickstarter story. Wilson went to the popular crowd-funding site with the goal of raising $15,000 for a watch […]

WEB
www.lunatik.com

Scott Wilson has had a long and varied design career—formerly a global creative director of Nike, he now runs his own studio, Minimal, in Chicago—but since late 2010 he has become best known for his Kickstarter story. Wilson went to the popular crowd-funding site with the goal of raising $15,000 for a watch design. After 30 days, he had nearly one million dollars. He still seems slightly surprised. “The watch had this magical, almost impossible-to-replicate trajectory,” Wilson says. Even so, he is now attempting to repeat the experience with the dual-purpose LunaTik Touch Pen, which can function as either an ink pen or a digital stylus. Wilson’s Kickstarter goal was $75,000; as of press time, he had collected more than $280,000. Not surprisingly, he is bullish about crowd funding’s ability to not only raise money for new product designs, but also provide instant market feedback. “It’s a validation of whether you should do a product or not,” Wilson says. “It’s much better than a focus group.”

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