The next time your company needs to raise funds for more people or servers, forget venture capital. That’s so, 2009.

Instead, simply ask your users to chip-in with a donation of their choice. That’s exactly what Reddit did yesterday, much to our chagrin. But, you know what? It worked!

More than 6,000 of Reddit’s eight million active users made a donation. While that represents just 0.00075% of active users, that’s apparently enough to be deemed a “huge success” by Reddit’s tiny team of developers.

We’re getting a much-needed cash infusion.

We’ve shown that, despite popular belief, people on the Internet are willing to be supportive if you treat them with honesty and respect.

It’s given everyone involved with reddit a good kick in the pants right when we needed it.

So how much did the 6,000 donate. No idea. But “a much-needed cash infusion” suggests that the total amount was in the high 5 figures, maybe even 6!

Who would have thunk it. Maybe newspapers should look at this model. Instead of ramming paywalls down our throats–and losing subscribers–why not let each reader make a donation?

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