While the jury is still out on cloud computing’s role in future technology, there’s no question that crowd funding is here to stay, and Kickstarter is at the forefront. From helping fund food carts to beverage holders and documentaries to poetry books, Kickstarter is open to just about anyone.

Some will tell you that an unwritten rule of crowd funding is that the cause should either be charitable or that the asking party should contribute as much as they possibly can. Others will say Kickstarter is NOT for established businesses or that every project must contribute to social good.

These people are wrong. While many may not like it that a Veronica Mars movie, produced by Warner Bros., recently surpassed their funding goal (many are concerned that funds are being paid to Warner, which owns the rights), is it really anyone’s business who others give their money to? While pitching in $10k just because it sounded cool is beyond the imagination of most of us, why does it matter in the slightest?

Maybe Veronica Mars’ success will prompt more corporations to bring back shows or products with cult followings. Perhaps we’ll see Mattel offer new G.I. Joe figures to the small percentage of 30-40 somethings that remember them or maybe we’ll get Tidwells TV series (Cuba Gooding, Jr.’s family from Jerry Maguire), but is that all bad?

Selfless giving is admirable. Wanting to help those with great ideas and not much money is as well, but the market gets what the market wants. Is it too late to fund a Sports Night flick?

The idea that the whole can be greater than the sum of its parts repeated itself over and over. Sometimes my basketball team would execute a perfect fast break, other times my journalism class would produce an issue far better than any of us had thought possible before; but it wasn’t until I discovered Gangplank in Arizona that I understood exactly what it took to achieve synergy.

Synergy requires collaboration. It’s not something that can be achieved through traditional trade (either goods, services or money) and certainly isn’t possible via unfriendly competition. True, lasting collaboration that changes lives is only possible when both sides gain and grow from the experience.

At Gangplank, headquartered in Chandler, AZ, collaboration is part of daily life. The HQ itself provides space for anywhere from 7-15 companies — from freelancers to small businesses of up to 8-10 — and charges no rent. Funded through a private-public partnership with the city and founders Jade Meskill and Derek Neighbors (whose company Integrum works out of the space), Gangplank wouldn’t work unless everyone worked together.

In the past three years, Gangplankers have helped run city programs, offered space for religious groups, produced world-class tech events, hosted networking parties, constructed slingshots, live-streamed Microsoft events and built companies and products from scratch.

But there’s no set system or framework facilitating such things, each person simply speaks up when they overhear something worth doing. Need staff to work an out-of-town event on short notice? That’s how I started working with EventDay. Want a write-up on a small, but complicated, healthcare piece? That’s how I partnered with Marketing Press.

There are no NDAs, few secrets and zero soundproof enclosures at Gangplank; true collaboration requires openness. While I couldn’t take any Gangplankers with me when I moved away from AZ and to Portland, that same mentality has opened up doors faster than possible through traditional business means.

Good things happen when people and groups don’t worry about who gets credit.

(Hello! I’m new here, and excited to be writing about collaboration and cooperation here at Coop.org. Above is my audition piece that got me the gig, and serves as a background of sorts for who I am and what I’ve been up to. If you have any questions, ideas, story pitches, criticism, grants, kind words, mean comments or just want to talk, feel free to leave a comment. I’ll be writing Tuesdays and Fridays from today on. Thanks for reading.)