The purpose is not to raise $500k, but to have around 10k committed users - committed enough that they paid and will likely contribute content. This is what the

The purpose is not to raise $500k, but to have around 10k committed users - committed enough that they paid and will likely contribute content. This is what they feel they need to get off the ground. So nothing is fishy. It's quite clever actually. They can almost guarantee that they will have a nice launch if the strategy works.