YIMBY: new crowd funding platform

Yes, in my backyard. It’s the best name for the platform Yimby they could have come up with. Now there were more initiatives with this name, as a counter to the more famous NIMBY (Not in my backyard). The most famous other Yimby is a network in Stockholm, where it functioned as urban development. The new U.S. Yimby is an initiative of the charity website JustGiving. A well-known example from that website is the money-raising campaign for a man who lost both his legs during the Boston Bombings.

Yimby wants to be a crowdfunding platform that focuses on people helping out their own neighborhood. In other words, through this site people can fund projects of their neighbours. Examples are a project to construct a basketball field in a deprived area  and a project to set up a business to guide young school children. Yimby aims to support local cohesion in neighborhoods. Therefore it is no major international crowdfunding platform like Kickstarter, but a platform that helps small local projects.

Of course, the question remains whether this kind of platforms are actually going to change our society, but I really hope so. I recognize more initiatives like Yimby, but unfortunately I see also signs that people embrace the NIMBY-thoughts.  After the theft of Santaclaus presents in December in the Netherlands from  poor families several spontaneous actions where start to buy new presents . But when I see how other people reacted on this kindness, I recognize the NIMBY movement again. There’s still a long road ahead of us. Long live the Yimby!