ICOs are a true innovation in the traditional venture-funding model. Usually, a project could take months to be financed by investment funds and needs to have already been financed by angel investors, to have conducted strong marketing research, and have shown a real usefulness and need from customers.
Today, for an ICO to take off, all it takes is to write a nice description of a project through a so-called white paper, design a beautiful website, and showcase some drawings or pictures of the product. As simplistic as it sounds, some projects and pre-product start-ups actually raised a significant amount of money without any prototype or demonstration.
Many ICOs are launched every month, reaching new sky-high records in terms of funds raised. According to ICObench.com, a rating and listing website for ICOs, the biggest ICO ever was completed...