Veronica Mars campaign rattles movie industry

NEW YORK (AP) - After years of hope, stalled efforts and studio frustration, Veronica Mars creator Rob Thomas watched a long-held dream come to fruition in a sudden digital rush.

"There were a few minutes of nothing happening," he says. "Then in an hour, watching that ticker go was mesmerising. I had an attention span of, like, four seconds because everything on my computer screen I wanted to look at at the same time. The Twitter feed was going crazy, the emails were going crazy and then watching that Kickstarter total go up."

Thomas last week launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund a movie of his cult TV show, which was cancelled after three seasons in 2007. It met its stated goal of raising US$2 million (S$2.5 million) in less than 11 hours, meaning it would be greenlit to begin shooting this summer. It's surpassed US$3.7 million with more than two weeks still to go.

The resounding, immediate success of the crowd-funding campaign sent shockwaves through the movie business.