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Kickstarter rage, basically. It will be interesting to see how it plays out when the payments in question are big enough to get lawyers involved.
by usrusr 8y ago
Kickstarter rage, basically. It will be interesting to see how it plays out when the payments in question are big enough to get lawyers involved.
- JKCalhoun 8y agoYeah, my impression as well. Kickstarter for the rich. Don't go handing over money without some recourse if things fail to materialize.
- toomuchtodo 8y ago"Kickstarter rage" seems to be a pejorative, but perhaps you're not intending it in such a way? The funds should've been held in escrow, and while not investors, evidence of fraud would allow customers to take legal action piercing the corporate veil and pursuing company officers directly to be made whole. Don't sell something you can't deliver, most especially to bypass accredited investor laws (by selling tickets versus securities). Don't misappropriate your customers' escrow accounts (the article specifically mentions these funds were to be held in escrow). This applies whether it's a $100k ticket to space or a $200 piece of electronic kit on Kickstarter.
- StavrosK 8y agoKickstarter isn't selling, though. It's giving a company some money in the hopes that they'll be able to make the thing they want to make and give you one of them for free in return.
- toomuchtodo 8y agoThat's one interpretation. Another is a company is selling a product they don't have yet, but they will sell it to you when they have it. It's not your problem if they can't make or deliver what they sold, it's their problem. Up to a court depending on the amount at stake.
- ghaff 8y agoIf Kickstarter were purely about pre-payments for guaranteed products it wouldn’t exist. Outside of deliberate fraud, lots of companies try to deliver things that they end up being unable to do so.
- poslathian 8y agoRight or wrong, pretty clearly your problem when you give money to someone and they lose it and are too broke to make you whole.
- adambyrtek 8y agoKickstarter goes into great lengths to communicate that it's not a store and there are risks involved: https://www.kickstarter.com/blog/kickstarter-is-not-a-store https://www.kickstarter.com/blog/kickstarter-is-not-a-store
- toomuchtodo 8y agoA disclaimer doesn’t prevent civil legal action by customers.
- Ensorceled 8y agoYou really have to stretch for that interpretation since the risk is explicitly explained in every kickstarter I’ve backed.
- gruez 8y ago>The funds should've been held in escrow I'm guessing that won't be acceptable to Xcor because they intended to spend the pre-sale money on R&D.
- shakna 8y agoXcor promised 35% of the ticket would be held in escrow.