1 Million Cups: Asheville man pitches street art app
ASHEVILLE – To find beautiful street art around the world, Brenden Fitzgerald says you first need to know where to look.
"Art is everywhere," Fitzgerald said Wednesday during 1 Million Cups Asheville, a weekly entrepreneurial education event held at Mojo Coworking. "A lot of it is in hidden corridors of your city that you don't know about."
To help people find, geotag and share photographs of street art around the world, Fitzgerald has come up with an idea for a new mobile app called Taggd'. Similar to Instagram, the app features photo feeds that allow users to like or share the images. Fitzgerald said he envisions three different ways to sort the feeds: by latest photos, by location art and by best-rated.
Fitzgerald said the Taggd' app gives users a global street art gallery as well as a map for how to find new pieces right at their fingertips.
"I've designed Taggd' from an artist's perspective. It's not about making money. It's not about exploiting other people's art or craft," Fitzgerald said. "People are taking these pictures because they see them and want to share them."
On Sept. 10, Fitzgerald turned to Kickstarter, an all-or-nothing fundraising site. A project on the site must meet its fundraising goal to receive the money backers have pledged.
Fitzgerald is hoping to raise $14,000 for the development of the Taggd' mobile app. The Kickstarter campaign will close at 8:52 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 9.
Though this is his first time turning to Kickstarter for fundraising, Fitzgerald is no stranger to dabbling in the startup scene.
By day, Fitzgerald works as an international and business development manager at Genova Diagnostics. By night, however, Fitzgerald can be found doing graphic design and coming up with his next idea.
"The fire just fuels itself," Fitzgerald said of his interests.
In November, he won second place in Venture Asheville's Biz Pitch for his idea for The Daily Comedy App. In January 2013, he won the 30 day photo app challenge at Startup Weekend Tri-Cities.
Before that, Fitzgerald won third place and was the people's choice winner at Startup Weekend Kentucky for Nudge, an app that challenges people to do nice things for themselves and for others.
Though none of his previous apps have been developed, Fitzgerald said he won't stop coming up with new ideas.
"Everyone has their hobbies. Mine happens to be design and technology," he said. "I like creating things. It's no different than these street artists that are creating amazing pieces of artwork. It's just something that they do. They don't make a decision to do it, but they just do it. If I have an idea, I get stuck on it and I want to see it happen and I want to take it as far as I can take it."
The next 1 Million Cups event will be 9-10 a.m. Wednesday, Nov. 5 at Mojo Coworking, 60 N. Market St. in downtown Asheville. The event is open to the public. Next week's event will feature two startup ideas instead of one.