Danae Ringelmann, COO and cofounder of crowdsourcing site IndieGoGo stopped by on December 21st to share a bit of the history and current state of project crowdsourcing. Specifically, IndieGoGo is a platform for causes, entrepreneurs and artists to find a community of like-minded friends and strangers to help get their passions off the ground.

In the past it took a high-profile project and a high-profile communications network to use crowdsourcing effectively. Danae cites how in the 1880's the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty was threatened by a lack of funding. It needed the attention of Joseph Pulitzer to drum up the hundreds of thousands of donations for its construction.

These days it's a little easier to find a specific community for very specific or personal projects. IndieGoGo taps into social media to introduce strangers with common interests or passions. There seems to be no limits to what people are able to get off the ground. "We have fashion designers in Hong Kong using the site, we have small bakeries in Upstate New York that are raising capital to get their businesses going so they don't have to max out their credit cards or refinance their mortgages." You could say IndieGoGo takes a global village to raise dreams.