http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/...-tour?ref=live
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Yeah Kickstarter is the obvious example, though it should be amended in such a way that the information produced by funding a project became public domain. Some of the projects like the Arduino-board did this.
Another example would be research going on at universities. They hire ph.d's and post-grads with tuition-income to produce research that is available to all.
This is rather late, but Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig is a very good read on the general subject of intellectual property rights.