Meet the Blipfuture Team

Posted on Blip Central on behalf of the Blipfuture team


Hi everyone, we’re the team behind Blipfuture, back to tell you a little more about our announcement on Friday.  First things first:
 
Who are we?
 
We are: Annie Andrews (of AnnieAndChris), Bob Hamilton (Earthdreamer), Graham Colling (GrahamColling) and Ian Stevenson (Cyclops),
 
We are four ordinary blippers, all with regular day jobs (and daily blips to get!), with useful skills for this venture and who happened to find ourselves in a position to do something for Blipfoto.  This has been complex and time-consuming for us, but we were unable to refuse because we care deeply about the site and believe in this community.  We are not taking any payment for this effort, and will be making our own pledges as part of the community.
 
It’s possible the initial post coming from the Blip Central journal caused some confusion.  We four are the Blipfuture team - we are not Blip Central; the current owners; or Polaroid Blipfoto as was.
 
Until October of this year our only involvement with Blipfoto was the same as you, as blippers.  In October we started to look at setting up Blipfuture together.  This was after an initial approach to a group of community members, via Graham and Joe, by the current owners. We have been given permission by the current owners to use the Blip Central journal to get the message out to as wide an audience of blippers as possible.  
 
Joe and Graham wanted people to know that they are doing well and remained behind the scenes at Blipfoto after Jeff Hecktman and Bobby Sager took ownership in March.  They have worked closely with the new owners, eventually securing their approval to present this buyout opportunity to the community.   While they are not part of Blipfuture, they have been helping the team, where they can.
 
We've been in negotiation with the current owners since October to find a way in which Blipfoto can be saved.  There are lots of legal complexities but the idea is essentially very simple.  If the crowd funding is successful, the community will take ownership and control of Blipfoto, including the use of the name and the original brand, through the Blipfuture Community Interest Company (CIC).  A Community Interest Company is a special type of not-for-profit company designed to operate for the benefit of a community.  You can find out more about community interest companies on the regulator's website.
 
It was never our intention to hide our identities as the Blipfuture team.  Our names and pictures are there to see in the business plan – our original post was intended to get the message out there, rather than make it all about us.  We don’t have a large PR machine behind us, so even if you felt the initial message was delivered clumsily, please take the time to read the full set of information and ask questions on the crowd funding site if anything is not clear.
 
A couple of other matters to clarify.   We sent out an email from Blipfoto to all current and recently lapsed site users, but we had to use a new bulk mail contractor.  They were sent out in batches so the contractor could monitor traffic and limit the possibility of it going into people’s junk mail folder.  We now realise some people are still receiving these emails.  Sorry about that.  As long as you have found the Blipfuture website you don’t need to worry, the email just asked you to visit the site.
 
It’s also important you know that as we are selling shares there is a lot of strict financial regulation about what we can and can’t say.  If it takes us a while to answer, or the answer appears more “corporate” than you’d expect from us as blippers, please bear that in mind.
 
The regulation is also the reason it's not possible for everyone throughout the world to buy shares. The legal fees involved with setting share selling up in multiple countries would have simply cost too much.  The minimum investment for a share (or donation) is £10.  We want Blipfoto to continue to be as inclusive as it has always strived to be.  How much you’ve invested does not need to be made public: the crowd funding benefits of the different profile badges do not have to be applied.  Whatever you are able to invest, you will have an equal say in how Blipfoto should be run.  
 
For those of you outside the UK/EEA/CH, we expect to be able to accept donations by mid-December. Donations will be every bit as important to the crowd funding as the share selling.  If you register as an investor on the Blipfuture crowd funding site you will be notified when the donations option becomes available (registering doesn't commit you to anything at that stage). 
 
We do know that not everyone will be in a position to invest or donate and that’s fine: if the crowd funding is successful we still want you to be a part of Blipfoto.  Of course, if too few people invest or donate then the crowd funding is unlikely to succeed! Whatever you decide to do, you are important to the community and we would like you to keep blipping with enthusiasm.
 
We had lots of discussion around how to make the first announcement.  The idea behind keeping the first post simple was to encourage as many of you as possible to go to the Blipfuture crowd funding site and register to read more.  Once you've registered, it commits you to nothing, but a number of documents become available to read such as the full business plan.  The FAQ's are available without registering. There are no guarantees; all we know is that this is a very special place, an extraordinary community of people, and having been given the opportunity we would never have been able to forgive ourselves if we hadn't tried to do something to keep Blipfoto running.


It's over to you now. Be aware your investments and donations will only be collected if our target is reached. Please be generous in your support.