And furthermore starting and running a terrific business is truly a wonderful thing. They say that foxes know many things and hedgehogs know one big thing. (Or at least Isaiah Berlin said that.) Those who run businesses must be… both. They have to have both specialist and generalist knowledge.
Excuse my complete ignorance about Kickstarter. Do the people raising money keep the funds, if they don’t actually make the product? How does it work?
I’ve heard stories of backers getting screwed. Sometimes the people just fail to succeed at what they’re trying to do, sometimes they take forever to get the ‘rewards’ out, I’ve even read of people seeing the product they backed available at retail outlets while they’re still waiting for their reward.
I’m not aware of any strict contractual language that would let a backer sue the person they’re backing for non performance, and Kickstarter itself doesn’t have a method for giving the money back.
A lawyer might comment about this but obviously promising one thing and doing another is fraud. Sometimes though what is promised is simply unrealistic. Two college grads once sponsored a kickstarter to make sandals in an American factory in upstate New York. They raised a ton of money but couldn’t deliver the product on time: starting a factory is hard and frankly it’s borderline idiotic to try to compete with the third world in light manufacturing unless you have some special angle IMHO. Eventually they got 1/2 delivered or so they say. Then they had a fire in their factory. They still have a website though and have listed their product on Amazon. Yay.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/968255949/vere-sandal-company-usa-2011-collection/comments
Kickstarter is inherently risky: essentially you are providing a startup company with credit in the form of an advanced order. And sometimes poor performing creators will fail to deliver or deliver in part without clear explanation.
From Kickstarter FAQ: [INDENT]
Kickstarter is not a store. People aren’t buying things that already exist — they’re helping to create new things. Creating things isn’t always easy. Some projects will go wonderfully, and others will run into obstacles. Be prepared for a little bit of each.
Creators are responsible for their projects. When you back a project, you’re trusting the creator to do a good job, so if you don’t know them personally or by reputation, do a little research first. Kickstarter doesn’t evaluate a project’s claims, resolve disputes, or offer refunds — backers decide what’s worth funding and what’s not.
Some projects won’t go as planned. Even with a creator’s best efforts, a project may not work out the way everyone hopes. Kickstarter creators have a remarkable track record, but nothing’s guaranteed. Keep this in mind when you back a project.
[/INDENT] I understand a number of crowdfunding websites have been inundated by scammers. Kickstarter does provide some filtering, though backers should not rely on it. On occasion, I’ll back to the tune of a dollar and ask polite questions on the comments page. If I don’t get straight answers, I don’t move forward. Misrepresentation and general dubiousness can occur.
M4M gave a complete answer but for the record, Cheesesteak’s company had a stated goal. If they made $x in y days, they would produce and ship out the things the backers had had paid for at each level of backing (sometimes it’s the product itself that you get, other times just stickers, shirts or other do-dads related to the project. In his case the lowest level was a do-dad and the next levels were different amounts of the product).
Since they didn’t make the stated goal, nobody’s credit card got charged and Cheesesteak’s company did not have to produce any do-dads or product to ship out.
If the goal is met then everyone who has pledged has their credit card charged and the company has to begin producing and shipping all their stuff.
But, if they don’t…?
The first Kickstarter I gave to was supposed to send me a vinyl record from the personal collection of the man for whom I was helping to make a statue of (shit sorry bad wording). The goal was met and the statue was erected but I never got my album, even though the person running it admitted she had not done a good job of managing the shipping and asked us to resubmit info. Sucks cuz I spent $75 and that’s a lot for me.
Executing the production and shipping of do-dads seems to be the hardest part for Kickstarters to manage. I think KS has been slowly adding tools to help the “sellers” get everyone’s address and get their junk to them. But as far as I know there are several third party groups that can swoop in and offer their services. That Reading Rainbow KS was a clusterfuck - they made so much money and had so many backers that the process of getting my two magnets took for ever!
I did another Kickstarter for a musician friend of mine who was going to write a book. The topic of the book switched after he met his goal, and then he was like “oops sorry I ran out of copies of CDs you wanted” and that was that. I got screwed somehow and he got money but I know he is a flake so it didn’t grate on me too bad.
I think I’ve only backed 6 that have met their goal. The two I mentioned here that didn’t send, plus Reading Rainbow. then two more for which I got my swag. One was the “I Am Big Bird” movie and the movie was made and I got my DVD. The other was the Dr. Demento movie for which I got my swag but have yet to see the final project.
I backed a Bill Nye documentary and have given all my info to receive my swag (A doggy bow tie) but we’ll see if I get it.
Anyway…yeah so what I was saying was they don’t get any money if they don’t meet their goal.
I backed your project btw. I agree with the assessment tho. A lot more flash could have been added. Maybe next time!
Oh yeah also… Other sites like GoFundMe and IndieGoGo do let the poster keep whatever they are pledged regardless of meeting their goal. GFM is used for charitable donations and IGG is used for like movies and albums and stuff. My friend used IGG to get funding for a Web series he was trying to make. They only made $500 of $3000 and kept it, and eventually abandoned the project.
This touches upon the kickstarter logic. If you need $3000 to do a project, why keep the $500? And if you only need $500 as a bare minimum, just say so. All 3 crowdfunding models are problematic, but I like to stick with the least problematic of them.
Caveat backer.
Thanks for the clarification everyone.