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My initial reaction was one of confusion. Surely they can't be discussing motorbikes in the Dakka news section!

And yet there are hundreds of pages and at least half a dozen threads devoted to the theme.

So, my question to my fellow dakka members is this: In layman's terms, what is a kickstarter, are they any good, and should I be interested? Ok, that's three questions!

Is it not fairly obvious what a kickstarter is?

http://www.kickstarter.com/help/faq/kickstarter%20basics?ref=nav

There have been a few good ones that have caught my eye, but not opened my wallet. I plan to buy these things if they ever go on general sale.

A good example is the recent Trollforged "Alien Host" kickstarter
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/131182444/assimilation-alien-host

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
what is a kickstarter

A crowd funding system so that companies/individuals can get the money to put out products/services/etc... assuming that people want it!

are they any good

Some are amazing and give huge value for money/great products/etc. Others not so much.

and should I be interested?

They are certainly worth a look. Just a shame that there are so many these days as we only have so much money!

I've backed 3 so far - 1 board game, 1 models project, and one computer game.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
So, my question to my fellow dakka members is this: In layman's terms, what is a kickstarter, are they any good, and should I be interested? Ok, that's three questions!

Kickstarter is a specific crowdfunding website. Indiegogo is a similar site, and there are others - your question is too specific. A better question would be, "What is crowdfunding"?

Crowdfunding is when someone comes up with a project: Lets say they want to make left handed widgets. They post up some concept art maybe, explain why they want to make left handed widgets, and explain why they need money and how much: They want to buy an automated widget press and it costs $5,000 which is their target goal.

To get the money, they offer incentives reward tiers. For example, if you pay $1, you get a thank-you card. if you pay $100, you get a left handed widget: which you get before the general public, and at some sort of discount (lets say they normally cost the public $150).

There are 2 models for this: In one model, they get all of the money if they raise their goal ($5,000) by a set date (usually 30 days); and if they don't, they get nothing. The other version is Flexiible Funding, where the project owner gets some or all of the money once they hit certain milestones.

"Stretch goals" are when they hit a number in excess of the original target. Lets say the widget guy wanted $5,000 to make left handed widgets, but people go nuts for his project and he hits his goal in a week. He can then decide he also wants to make right handed widgets if he hits $6,000, which he may or may not hit; but the project is a success nonetheless. If it's not flexible funding, the target goal is usually intentionally low so they get at least something.

So, for the last question, should you be interested? That's impossible to answer. It's like saying, "should you get a pet"? It depends on what the pet is. These projects vary wildly and it's for you to decide if it's something you want, and if the person making it is likely to succeed. There are absolutely no guarantees with these projects - the sites themselves only unite the project owners with funding, and they don't arbitrate disputes after that. If you finally get your left handed widget but it's 6 months later then estimated, or if it breaks immediately or is the wrong color or doesn't ship at all because the guy got bored and spent the money on pez instead - that's too bad; your money is gone. So you have to pick projects that have goals that seem realistic ideally from someone who seems likely to actually produce it.

Also, watch out for those stretch goals. Some projects can actually get boned from being too successful - like, left handed widget guy hit his $5,000 goal in 3 days. He then spent 27 days adding more and more stretch goals and wound up raising 3 million dollars. Due to project creep, he gets bogged down on the intricacies of deboning the rare BBQsaucebeast pelts he needs to make the ultra-universal widgets; and never ships the original left handed widgets to begin with, or some such. So, caveat emptor.


TL;DR

Not sure if trolling?

Kickstarter is a website to doing exactly what it's name implies. You have a project or idea, but need cash flow? Well come to kickstarter, and they'll put you in contact with people who want your idea. They give you money, and if you reach your goal, then you get the cash, and they get the product, generally earlier than wide-spread release.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
are they any good, and should I be interested? Ok, that's three questions!

On these two points, the majority of them is nope and finally only in niche areas to which you are actually interested.

The website here (Dakka Dakka) has a news section to which our posters are constantly plugging what they think are worthwhile investments in your hobby money. So at the very least, assume on here is worthwhile enough to peruse and if interesting enough, to pledge money towards.

Primarily there are two types I see when it comes to 'wargaming' Kickstarters:

1. An item idea which is good, which could exist if people wanted it. If the KS doesn't happen, the product won't exist. You may not get deep discounts but you may get an item you really like brought into this world.

2. An item which was going to exist anyways, but the limited launch of the item could be 'enhanced' via bulk sales, extra add-ons and expanded future growth. You sometimes can get retail discounts for 'pre-buying' the models and sometimes can get the product to be better or more numerous.


So it depends... if something you like is being KSed, it may be worth your time and money to support it. The thing is, you my give money, to get nothing for months and sometimes you may get scammed as there is zero oversight on how the money is used and satisfaction of the final product. So do your research and buyer beware.

Overall, I think KS is good, and I have supported a few that struck a chord with me. It is really good to see if a creation is something people actually want or not as well. That can save a person from making a flop and creating something of no value.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
My initial reaction was one of confusion. Surely they can't be discussing motorbikes in the Dakka news section!

I came into this thread with the sole intent to make that joke, and you went and ruined it for me! You meanie!

Thanks for the replies, but I'm still confused

Let me get this straight: Company X wants to make skeletons, and so they are saying they want money from the public to make them. But shouldn't companies with sound business plans, and an ambition to make skeletons, be making them anyway? In other words, they make them for X amount of money, and get Y amount of profit in return. In other words, how most companies work!!

Does that make sense?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

PhantomViper wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
My initial reaction was one of confusion. Surely they can't be discussing motorbikes in the Dakka news section!

I came into this thread with the sole intent to make that joke, and you went and ruined it for me! You meanie!

Ha ha ha ha

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
Thanks for the replies, but I'm still confused

Let me get this straight: Company X wants to make skeletons, and so they are saying they want money from the public to make them. But shouldn't companies with sound business plans, and an ambition to make skeletons, be making them anyway? In other words, they make them for X amount of money, and get Y amount of profit in return. In other words, how most companies work!!

Does that make sense?

It makes sense if you want to make hundreds of thousands of skeletons and have an enormous up-front capital investment to make.

it makes less sense if you sculpted a skeleton in your garage, and want to sell a few hundred on ebay but need $1500 for a vacuum pump.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
Thanks for the replies, but I'm still confused

Let me get this straight: Company X wants to make skeletons, and so they are saying they want money from the public to make them. But shouldn't companies with sound business plans, and an ambition to make skeletons, be making them anyway? In other words, they make them for X amount of money, and get Y amount of profit in return. In other words, how most companies work!!

Does that make sense?

I'd say it often goes more like this:

Either
Company X currently makes a *human* skeleton. They would like to make Shark Skeletons as well but they're not sure if people would buy it. It would take 10,000 to be able to make sharks, so they put it on kickstarter with a few options.
-If you give $5 you can have one of the human skeletons we already make.
-If you give $10 you can have one of the shark skeletons we don't make yet.
-Wow, we've already hit $15,000! If you give $15 you can have one of the shark skeletons we don't make yet *and* a dragon skeleton we just thought up, if we get at least $30,000.


OR Sculptor Y in his garage makes unique metal skeletons unlike anything made by the industry big guys (at least in his opinion). He'd like to get his foot in the door and mass produce, but doesn't want to have to take out a loan, when he's not sure if his model line is popular enough. He makes a kickstarter to expand from basement boutique to legit company. If he gets enough support, then his work is obviously popular enough to keep making him money in the future.

 Rainyday wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
Thanks for the replies, but I'm still confused

Let me get this straight: Company X wants to make skeletons, and so they are saying they want money from the public to make them. But shouldn't companies with sound business plans, and an ambition to make skeletons, be making them anyway? In other words, they make them for X amount of money, and get Y amount of profit in return. In other words, how most companies work!!

Does that make sense?

I'd say it often goes more like this:

Either
Company X currently makes a *human* skeleton. They would like to make Shark Skeletons as well but they're not sure if people would buy it. It would take 10,000 to be able to make sharks, so they put it on kickstarter with a few options.
-If you give $5 you can have one of the human skeletons we already make.
-If you give $10 you can have one of the shark skeletons we don't make yet.
-Wow, we've already hit $15,000! If you give $15 you can have one of the shark skeletons we don't make yet *and* a dragon skeleton we just thought up, if we get at least $30,000.


OR Sculptor Y in his garage makes unique metal skeletons unlike anything made by the industry big guys (at least in his opinion). He'd like to get his foot in the door and mass produce, but doesn't want to have to take out a loan, when he's not sure if his model line is popular enough. He makes a kickstarter to expand from basement boutique to legit company. If he gets enough support, then his work is obviously popular enough to keep making him money in the future.

That is the theory behind kickstarter, unfortunately it has now largely become a place for companies to essentially pre order stuff and market something before it is released, its a bit of a shame as kickstarter is a great resource, but has been taken over for the large part by companies who use it like it wasn;t supposed to be used.

Did you try Google?