Challenge: Good AC on the A/C please

Crowdsourced fund raising platforms are in vogue right now. We've written a lot about the growing success of Kickstarter and yesterday we posted about Quirky raising a $16 million B round. Today Peter Kafka reports that ChallengePost has raised $4 million.

In a way a ChallengePost is an inversion of the Kickstarter model. The two year old start-up helps companies and non-profits run "challenges" that pay prizes to the crowd for solving problems. Investors include betaworks, Delicious’ Joshua Schachter and Mahalo’s Jason Calacanis.

The company is looking to expand from a two man operation to a 14 person team, just another sign that tech companies with venture money in the bank could be the one bright spot left in a double dip recession.

So far ChallengePost has offered more than $40 million in prizes and is being used by Michele Obama and the City of New York. Right now the MTA is offering $15,000 in prizes through the site to software developers who can use city data to create apps that will improve the transit system. But wait, that not all. One lucky grand prize winner will also receive:

• Custom 5’ Subway Sign by Underground Signs ($325.00)
• iMac and iPad Cases by NYC Subway Line ($60-$70)
• Rug of your choice from Concord Global ($40-$125)
• Subway T-Shirt by Okey-Dokey ($20.00)

Hmmm, you know what might actually attract great developer talent?A free, unlimited Metrocard. For life.

I will pay you to help me invent something cool. Seriously

Quirky founder Ben Kaufman prefers not to give out quotes when raising new funds, focusing instead on the details of what Quirky has been up to.

But he sure does like to raise fresh capital. It raised $6 million A round last April led by RRE and, according to Venture Wire, just closed a $16 million B round led by Norwest Venture Partners with RRE participating again.

As Betabeat has written recently, start-ups are rushing to close their financing, fearful that a tanking stock market will scare off potential investors or, at the very least, drive the valuations they can negotiate way down.

Quirky is a collaborative platform for users to submit ideas and participate in the process of refining, designing and marketing that product. Based on their level of input, users receive a certain cut of any profits once the item goes on sale.

We have seen the metrics for group funding site Kickstarter explode in the last six months. Check back here soon for a growth report from Quirky to see if it backs up the big dollars they are banking. Whatever they are, expect them to grow once the TV show about Quirky starts airing on Sundance.