Smart Computing Applications in Crowdfunding

Foreword

In 2008, the world economy was brought to its knees by the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. Many countries around the globe, if not every one of them, were impacted in one way or another, some suffered far more severely than others did. All this created a welcome breeding ground for the concept of crowdfunding: a cooperative, Internet-facilitated solution of apportioning funds and resources, across geographical confines, directly to the projects of interest, circumnavigating and complementing the incumbent financial services institutions. Unsurprisingly, crowdfunding is rapidly becoming part of the world’s advancement towards a shared and digital economy. If 2008 was signalling a great increase in crowdfunding related ...