TimoNanda

The crowdfunding site Kickstarter has radically changed the way creative ventures can raise money in the Internet age. Last year, 3.3 million people around the world contributed more than $500 million — roughly $1,000 a minute — to finance more than 22,000 projects. Some involved notable personalities: The Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, for instance, raised almost $90,000 to fill the former federal prison on Alcatraz Island with his work. Other projects made their founders famous: An Ohio man’s $10 campaign to make a batch of potato salad became an Internet phenomenon over the summer, raising more than $55,000. The year’s most successful project — a reboot of 1980s American educational program “Reading Rainbow” — received more than $5 million in donations to support children’s literacy.

While creative projects like these grab headlines, they represent only a tiny sliver of the activity on Kickstarter, according to statistics released by the New York company. In fact, most campaigns have much more modest results — the average successful project raises about $6,000, while the average individual contribution is just $25. The site functions on an all-or-nothing financing model: If a project does not reach its preset financial goal, all donations are returned to backers and the project founder gets nothing. This is the fate of most campaigns on Kickstarter — the overall success rate is about 40 percent.

“It’s not what the creator is looking for, but for some projects the right answer will be no,” said Yancey Strickler, a Kickstarter co-founder and the company's chief executive. “I think we are as meritocratic as a place can be.”

Not all categories perform equally well. While creative enterprises that are more easily commodified — gadgets, computer games — tend to raise the most money over all, they have some of the lowest success rates. Mr. Strickler said, “Projects aligned with traditional fine arts — dance, theater, music — have a lot more success but at smaller scales.”