My inbox is crammed with Crowdcube announcements

[hobnob]

I just imagined it to go the way the kickstarter stuff did. Initial offerings were pretty good but every daft idea on the planet seems to be on there and the success rate must be next to zero. I might have had a bad experience as I only invested in a few and two, the Spectrum Vega and some hobby re-breather both went bump.

I've had a pretty good success rate on Kickstarter: 31 campaigns completed successfully, 4 that are overdue, and 1 that's not due until next year. Out of the 4 which are overdue, 1 is (apparently) en route, and should arrive in the next couple of weeks; another is a filming project that had to be postponed due to to COVID-19. So, that's only 2 out of 36 where the creator has gone AWOL.

I think it does depend on how much of the work has already been done. E.g. there are some people who make webcomics, then publish a book every year or so. At that point, all the strips have already been drawn, so they just need to put the pictures into a pdf and send it to a printer; the purpose of the Kickstarter is to avoid the creator paying upfront and then getting stuck with a load of books that nobody wants to buy. If the same person has already done this for the past 5-10 years, you can be pretty confident about the next one. The more risky projects are the ones which need a lot of work, particularly for software.

(On a side note, I believe that the Spectrum Vega was Indiegogo; the "recreated ZX Spectrum" was Kickstarter.)

[northernladuk]

(On a side note, I believe that the Spectrum Vega was Indiegogo; the "recreated ZX Spectrum" was Kickstarter.)

Yeah, I was assuming that it's this form of funding irrespective of platfrom to be honest. That could be a very unsafe assumption though.

[SueEllen]

Yeah, I was assuming that it's this form of funding irrespective of platfrom to be honest. That could be a very unsafe assumption though.

Indiegogo is more risky than Kickstarter.

Every project I gave money to on Kickstarter got off the ground and delivered. In some cases it has been late.

I stayed away from computer games and invested in other things I'm interested in e.g. plant irrigation, stuff for bikes, historical maps, bags, books.

I avoid giving money on Indiegogo though I do check it as I noticed:
1. if stuff didn't get their funding on Kickstarter the inventors went there next, or,
2. the inventors try to put their stuff on both platforms to get money at nearly the same time.
If an item is on both platforms then I'm out.

[d000hg]

I've had a few things from KS and a few things that fell through, including one where the guy clearly just took $millions and ran. The things I HAVE got haven't been very good.

I got bored of these platforms when they started just being a marketplace. "80% cheaper than RRP" for products that are only ever sold through KS. Companies who have had multiple, hugely successful KS campaigns and are now established businesses who return to KS because they like the "let's shift all the risk to the customer by making them pay before we even make the product" angle.