Note that this was run by Palladium Books and Ninja did their job as best I could tell, so "Wave 1" eventually got to us but Palladium pocketed the backer money and backed out of Wave 2.
Ninja Division seems to do well on the planning end of things but execution over long-term seems to be their weakness.
As a backer we see little of what goes on in the background so there is some conjecture.
I look at Kickstarter as a form of "pre-purchase" and have been quite appalled at how little consumer protection there is.
But to be clear:
Group-funding IS a store, rewards are promised and they must be delivered or refunded.
Unethical "creators" depend on the anonymous sponsor system to prevent backers from collectively uniting to form a class-action suit against them.
There is good evidence that the "good" creators are fantastic to back and deliver well, it now seems that known creators are the only way to go.