Today many artists and inventors and businessmen rely on donations. But a system where the donation is rewarded with shares would be better.
Then, if the business eventually becomes successful, they will get back dividends. It’s a much more inviting concept. Having shares in something really makes people loyal, in a way that being a donor does not. It would generate much more money IMO.
Patreon (or the ethical alternative whose name I forget) could add this option without much difficulty. The new relationship would be a powerful improvement. It would lead to more and better-funded independent projects everywhere.
That’s one of the choices alright. TBH I’m not talking about literal IPOs. That already exists and there’s too much faff involved, which is why nobody is using it for this purpose. The way I envisage it (though maybe this can be improved on) it would be more like a paid membership. It wouldn’t even be legally binding.
You could do votes/surveys among the donors, where voting power is proportional to payment. It would be an extra fun thing to make people happy to invest, like how there is often free merch or priority tickets etc.
I think if you donate money to someone who makes free software and you have an issue or feature request or anything the dev likely at least considers it.