CROWDFUNDING is all about communities getting together to pay for things people couldn’t afford on their own.

And though American celebrity businessman Donald Trump is far too rich and powerful to need a whip round he has come up with a website for others to do so.

Trump, known for having Alan Sugar’s role in the American version of The Apprentice has a new site called fundanything.com and it lets people raise money for almost anything they like.

So-called ‘crowdfunding’ has been around for a few years, spurred on by the growth of the internet making it easy to do.

You sign up and create a page on the site for free. On that page you write your story and explain why you need money, maybe adding a short video too.

Then other internet users can make contributions to your cause, chipping in with as much or as little as they like and with lots of small contributions you can make a much larger sum.

Trump’s website looks a lot like kickstarter.com, a much better known and better established crowdfunding site. But Kickstarter’s rules are quite strict, though. Trump’s site relaxes some of them, allowing charitable fundraising for example.

There’s a twist, though. Trump is putting some of his own wealth into the pot, directly funding a handful of projects he considers deserving.

Cynics might say that’s just a PR ploy to get the site better known, but the people getting cheques – or in some cases, suitcases full of cash – are grateful either way.