Pennies from Heaven

Demo Hour co-founder He Feng (center) discusses the website's project management with colleagues.

Sixty-three people offered a total of more than 4,000 yuan to buy the app and its matching finger cot, helping the creator pay for the fee to get on the App Store.

"It's ridiculous that China is known by the world for cheap knockoffs while the country has a population of 1.4 billion," says He.

"There is not enough creativity coming out of China because we are not doing a good job to support creative people," the 34-year-old says.

Du Mengjie is one of the founders of dreamore.cn, a Shanghai-based site that stands out from its peers by offering project creators services free of charge.

Such crowd-funding websites, Du says, make it possible to launch an idea without adequate savings, rich parents, eye-catching educational background and work experience. They can also give life to a project that is too small or not profitable enough for venture capitalists.

"It may take a long time to win investment from venture capitalists, and it often involves compromising changes to cater to the investors' demands," he says. "But people won't regard it as risky to invest an average of 100 yuan per person on an interesting idea.

"At the same time, the creator is also guaranteed 100 percent of the project's intellectual property and his first batch of customers."

The 23-year-old fresh college graduate has a big vision that crowd-funding will change people's lives in the same way domestic online trading giant Alibaba has.

"Its significance is more than making ordinary people's dream come true. It also proves the power of the crowd," Du says.

A new posting on dreamore.cn on Tuesday sought to raise money for the rent and renovation of an apartment where young people can read books and host salons. More than 20,000 yuan was pledged in 80 minutes.

"It's hard to get people from around the country together quickly to make one thing happen. But a project on a crowd-funding website can accomplish this, once it strikes a chord with visitors," Du says.

For some project creators, the trust and encouragement from strangers matter more than the money.

Jia Yuhao's project of collecting second-hand objects to decorate the public living room for his youth hostel in Lhasa exceeded its funding goal by a bigger margin than any other on Demo Hour. Jia set a funding goal of 1,000 yuan, but to his surprise 2,595 fans of the project sponsored 146,400 yuan in total.

"I had more courage and motivation to overcome the difficulties during the renovation," Jia says. "I feel a sense of duty to perfect the hostel because it's now a dream for 2,595 people."

More than 400 supporters of Jia's project have visited his hostel in Lhasa, and Ran Yongzhe is one of them.

Ran admires the fact that Jia kept supporters informed of progress by posting photos and videos. Jia also started four QQ instant messaging groups, where he and the supporters can discuss the hostel's design. Ran had such a great time with Jia that he extended his stay from 10 days to 20 days, working as a volunteer at the hostel.

"I don't care about the reward. The room rate is low and I don't need a discount," the 27-year-old says. "What I value is my participation in making a dream come true."

Contact the writer at xujingxi@chinadaily.com.cn.