Blipfoto is funded

Hi folks, and welcome to Blipcentral. Joe here, with some exciting news.

If you're one of the thousands of people who've been part of Blipfoto over the last year, you'll know what an amazing time it's been for us. Not only has the community steadily grown, but we've also attracted the support and interest of Channel Four Television, The Guardian, NPR, the BBC, The Sunday Times, The National Theatre for Scotland and Scottish Screen, and Edinburgh Festivals, to name but a few. (Oh, and I seem to recall collecting a BAFTA on our behalf around this time last year... did we mention we'd won a BAFTA?)

At current rates of upload, someone will post the 1 millionth Blipfoto entry in April - that's an incredible milestone, and means we'll be responsible for an archive of 2,793 years of daily human life.

Looking back, it's hard to believe those of us working behind the scenes have managed to achieve all this while depending on other day jobs to feed our families, but that's exactly the way it's been.

Thankfully that's all about to change - and I wanted you to be the first to know. After a long period of hard work, last month we finished pulling together a funding package which enables me and the others working on Blipfoto to apply ourselves full-time. This secures the long-term future of everything we've all worked so hard to build, and lets us stick to our principle of providing an ad-free website with a constant stream of new features paid for through full membership.

The challenge was to find a group of people who were prepared to support us financially but recognised what a unique and special place Blipfoto is. It wasn't easy, but that's exactly what we've done - our backers believe completely in what we're doing, and bring a wealth of experience we'll be able to draw on in the future.

I can't even begin to tell you how good this feels, and how excited I am about the opportunities it presents. I realised very early on that Blipfoto is an idea with universal appeal, so to finally have the time, space and financial support to work towards that potential is a massive privilege.

I know I'm going to thoroughly enjoy getting stuck in, and if the past is any indication of the future, I'll enjoy sharing the journey ahead with you just as much.

If you thought 2010 was a big year for Blipfoto, you ain't seen nothing yet! 

Thanks for dropping in.

(Feel free to drop in a bit closer... or even closer still.)