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[miauw62]

There's one thing about kickstarter that i just noticed, and its pretty good.

I can see things i viewed previously, so i can have giggles over and over again!

[Draco18s]

The situation, when you have to buy the game after kickstarting it, is the sign of utter disrespect from the developer. It doesn't mean that I consider it a valid return of an investment.

...and represents a slim minority of the projects on Kickstarter.

There are very very few projects that do not include the result of the project in any reward level, and roughly the same number have it at some ludicrous price (such as the aforementioned book, which wasn't available until the $1000 level).

None of these projects ever succeed.

[Gantolandon]

...and represents a slim minority of the projects on Kickstarter.

There are very very few projects that do not include the result of the project in any reward level, and roughly the same number have it at some ludicrous price (such as the aforementioned book, which wasn't available until the $1000 level).

I know that. The majority at least tries to respect the people who give them money. Still, I believe there is a fundamental difference between donating and "kickstarting". The first case is paying the author for his hard work. In the second case, he is paid by the people who buy his product, so I see no reason to do this before it is even made. If he needs someone to give him money, this is something that's usually called "investment".

[Draco18s]

If he needs someone to give him money, this is something that's usually called "investment".

Kickstarter is not investing.  It's crowd sourcing.

Investing implies a financial return on the principle and that that money will be recouped.

[Lord Dullard]

Plenty of developers also go with crowd-sourcing precisely because they don't want to open themselves up to investor interference in the creative process. I'd happily contribute $30 (or whatever) to a project I thought was great if it meant keeping, say, EA from getting a hold of it.

Edit: Fix'd.

[MorleyDev]

Except if you go through investors, they take control of your project. After 6 months, they can come around *right* as you can't back out and make you turn an open-ended turn-based role-playing game into a first-person shooter. They get power over the product. It's a system where the people doing the developers putting in all of the work are at the bottom of the ladder.

Kickstarter is a crowd-sourcing service, and so far there isn't really a word in the english language to accurately convey "giving money of your choice to see a commercial product being finished, receiving services for this money which most likely will include that product at a reduced price compared to how much it will cost when finished".

[Draco18s]

Stuff

In unrelated news:
Awesome choice of avatar.  That gambit payed off, I'm sure.

[nenjin]

Investing implies a financial return on the principle and that that money will be recouped.

Except many Kickstarters wouldn't happen without crowdfunding. That's why it's not a "pre-order system." Pre-order implies there's already a product to be had and you're just getting your purchase in early. That's NOT the theme of Kickstarter. It's not for "projects that will already succeed but just want some extra publicity and money."

The only KS projects that qualify as pre-orders are the ones run by professional developers, with their own war chests, who are going to make their game anyways. And that begs the question what they're doing on KS in the first place.

[Gantolandon]

I agree with you that this is a feature, not a bug. In the standard business model, the investor holds all the cards and frequently messes with the work of the creator. But Kickstarter represents the other extreme - you pool the money and barely can expect anything in return, except some bling and things that author can afford giving away for free. You won't even see 0.01 percent of the money the creator will earn and can't demand anything from him. In fact, even if the game comes out incomplete and riddled with bugs, you won't get any refund.

It's the relation as abusive as the opposite. It's the abuser that changed. And with both models, the customer is screwed.

[Draco18s]

That's why it's not a "pre-order system."

I never called it a pre-order system.  In fact, no one did.  They compared it to a pre-order system.

Besides, it's a pre-order system that doesn't take any money up front, until it's certain that there will be a product.*

*The project failing post-kickstarter for one reason or another not withstanding.

[MorleyDev]

I think the term I used was "pre-pre-order".

I like the idea, in that it's supposed to be a reverse of the way things are done normally. Instead of product getting made and sold, you're funding the creation of the product and given what you funded.

Usually money is poured in with the expectation it'd be earned back when the product is sold. Here, the opposite happens. Money is given and used to produce the final product, which is ideally and in most scenarios then given to the people who gave money. Very few people 'donate' less than enough to get the final product, and as such projects that don't offer the final product at a reasonable price don't tend to get funded and none of the people who "donated" money are charged anything.

The best analogy or closest real-world-thing I can think of is it's like buying a house in an undeveloped area. You give the money which is then used to help further fund development of the houses, and get a house out of it at the end.

Sure, it could be tightened up, better guarantees about refunds and such could be established, the system probably needs some fine-tuning. And the customer is still in some way going to be screwed some of the time. At the end of the day the one universal constant in the universe holds: shit happens.

[nenjin]

I think your caveat is more important than the statement it was appended to. Kickstarter doesn't require squat of a final product, it just requires meeting the funding amount prior to the deadline. That's why it is in no shape or form a pre-order scheme. Having a product that is guaranteed to ship by the time the Kickstarter ends is either a happy coincidence or the result of a lot of work that was done before the project ever came to KS. And that doesn't describe the vast majority of them.

[MorleyDev]

I think your caveat is more important than the statement it was appended to. Kickstarter doesn't require squat of a final product, it just requires meeting the funding amount prior to the deadline. That's why it is in no shape or form a pre-order scheme. Having a product that is guaranteed to ship by the time the Kickstarter ends is either a happy coincidence or the result of a lot of work that was done before the project ever came to KS. And that doesn't describe the vast majority of them.

There's a reason I've only "donated" to two projects, they are two things I was willing to risk that money on seeing (and then it was like what, £10 for each project?) ^^ If people aren't going to be smart with their money and "donate" all willy-nilly, well...you know what they say about a fool and their money.

[Draco18s]

Very few people 'donate' less than enough to get the final product

Using the only numbers I have access to, 5%.  Here I am including the "no reward chosen" backers as well, regardless of amount paid.*
Another 6% donated at the lowest possible tier to get the digital-only beta-copy.
4% donated enough to get the final version, but no Kickstarter bonus goodies.
13% opted to pay that extra $4.
2% donated more than was required to get the (physical) product itself.

70% donated at a level that was enough to get the product (1/3rd of which were international).

*Keith, the AI War: Fleet Command dev, was happy to throw money at us.  I even offered him a copy of our game anyway and he turned it down.

[RedWarrior0]

One needs to note that kickstarters don't make you popular overnight. Of the big ones that worked, they almost always (if not straight always) serve as a "giving back" mechanism. Double Fine, Amanda Palmer, OotS: to have an incredible Kickstarter you need an incredible fan base to begin with. People support things they trust and like. When I supported the OotS Kickstarter, I had no intention of buying the books. I did it because Rich had put forth so much effort.