My main problem is that because it is billed as an "investment" (where your return is maybe a slight discount on the product), you have no recourse if the produ

My main problem is that because it is billed as an "investment" (where your return is maybe a slight discount on the product), you have no recourse if the product is never delivered. Many kickstarters are made by people with no experience in actually delivering product and are almost certainly doomed to fail from the start. Another large group are established companies that have investment already, and are using it purely as marketing because it is impossible to build their product at the funding levels kickstarters reach (outside of the big ones like Pebble). There are very few kickstarters that have non-obvious markets and are run by someone I would be willing to risk money on to have made, and zero where the return is worth my risk.