Through its powerful ability to remove intermediaries from transactions, the internet excels at making once-bizarre ideas the norm. Buy things directly from total strangers, send them your money and actually expect the items to arrive at your door, rather than have the seller abscond on a Caribbean holiday? Well, hello eBay. Give money to someone online that you’ve never heard of because they want to make something that intrigues, form a company or borrow some cash?
Image: Dan Marom, author of The Crowdfunding Revolution, at Open Innovation 2.0 in Dublin last week. Photograph: Conor McCabe Photography