5 ms·

I'm not sure I absorbed the message as it was supposed to be put across. The video showed a (seemingly) quite advanced prototype, and they expect to be able to

by weego 14y ago

I'm not sure I absorbed the message as it was supposed to be put across. The video showed a (seemingly) quite advanced prototype, and they expect to be able to ship before the end of the year. So what is the $200k for? Seemingly to "make it happen" but it appears to be happening already, so it's kickstarting a hefty salary? If I did somehow miss the point and this seems like a cynical response then obviously I apologise in advance, but that's how it came across. Edit, cancel the nicety... I just saw that it's retailing for $299. It all feels rather cynical. Perhaps I have too much of a rose-tinted view of the attraction of Kickstarter?

ericdykstra 14y ago
Kickstarter is being used, more and more, as a way to build interest and create revenue before the official "launch" of a product; even a product that would be produced anyway. It seems to be a rather effective way to get press coverage for a percentage of projects, and presents a clean interface on a trusted system for interested potential purchasers. The risk, of course, is that a huge goal is less likely to be reached than a smaller goal. The ideal situation is that you have a reasonable goal that will actually help maybe some outsourcing or consulting costs or distribution set-up or what have you, blow away the goal early, and keep interest to drive revenue. Personally, I don't find this kind of Kickstarter project very interesting, and I believe it's a suboptimal way to launch a product that could instead just be released as a MVP and iterated on based on user feedback.
- jack-r-abbit 14y ago
  It feels like a lot of kickstarters are barely more than a "pre-order" mechanism. I'm not sure what happens if a project gets funded but then fails to deliver. It seems like when you give to a kickstarter, you should go into it fully prepared to never get your money back and never get the finished product.
  - objclxt 14y ago
    It's a cynical way to pre-order, because you're not really pre-ordering at all: you're giving some money and the rewards are a side-effect. You don't get any of the usual consumer protection at all.
  - EwanG 14y ago
    You mean like the Astronaut MMO that got all the press earlier this year, and now even the forums are gone? Yes, that is the risk with Kickstarter and any other investment. It's just there seems to be less visibility into the viability of the company or person behind the project than most investments. Since I rarely go beyond the $20 range, I only feel mildly burned on the ones that don't go anywhere. For folks who hit the maximum (I've seen some with $10K options), I suspect the hurt is a little more real.
- pippin 14y ago
  Running a Kickstarter project early on in a product's life allows anyone to see what kind/size of audience they'll be dealing with. I don't believe all products should do this, but they'll receive valuable feedback, and if they don't meet their goal, they'll be better off with decent feedback from potential customers.
DanielRibeiro 14y ago
Note that they also have YC funding: Q. What's your background? Paul and Kevin were accepted into Y-Combinator this summer to launch Pixate into it's current prototype phase
- andyfleming 14y ago
  Does everyone in the YC program have funding? Obviously, they have access to funding, but does everyone without exception take on funding?
  - jchung 14y ago
    Yes
  - simonw 14y ago
    To participate in YC you need to accept a very small equity deal from YC - this is usually around $17,000 for 7%, but I believe it can vary depending on the stage of the company. You later get the option to take a $150,000 convertible note at extremely good terms. This isn't mandatory, but the terms are designed to make it almost a no-brainier to say yes.
andyfleming 14y ago
It looks like these guys have plenty of money. They show a nice house, nice cars, etc. Sounds like they could fund themselves pretty easily, right?
Animus7 14y ago
I'm getting the same vibe. And I'm beginning to think that allowing this kind of thing will be the downfall of Kickstarter. Yes, I will explain. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love the Kickstarter concept. But in practice, their scaling seems to quickly be turning hem into a sales platform that has no controls or accountability. And I have nothing bad to say about this project in particular, but they are a YC company, and the state of the prototype shows that they already have all they need to make it happen. This project doesn't need money. The campaign seems to me to be nothing more than a simple "I'm making something cool, so give me cash". And I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that -- by all means, people should be free to do what they wish with their money, and the Kickstarter campaign will probably work out beautifully for them. That's great. But this whole perception of Kickstarter being a place for bootstrapping interesting projects is turning into a dangerous myth. Like many things before it, Kickstarter is becoming a place for people with money (and/or obvious ability to make money), to make even more money, though marketing under a vague guise of "bootstrapping", with no checks or balances to keep people honest. This isn't an accusation leveled at Pixate -- I don't believe they're doing anything wrong and I have huge faith in YC's filtering. But once enough clever people figure out that you can earn a killing or huge bonus on top of anything, just by tacking on a nice Kickstarter campaign, it will become impossible to separate the wheat from the chaff. And then people will move on to the next thing, and the cycle will repeat. </bubble-y doomsaying>
- rotw 14y ago
  > And I have nothing bad to say about this project in particular, but they are a YC company, and the state of the prototype shows that they already have all they need to make it happen. This project doesn't need money. The campaign seems to me to be nothing more than a simple "I'm making something cool, so give me cash". I fully agree. Honestly, I hope both that this campaign fails and that the guys at Pixate are able to develop and launch their product successfully. The point of Kickstarter is to enable creative endeavours that would have trouble succeeding in a market environment -- a talented friend of mine financed his first short film via a similar site, which will hopefully get him a foot in the door of filmmaking. In his case, the Kickstarter idea is a great thing: It guarantees artistic independence and audience involvement. This app, however, already has backing and will easily make plenty of money on the market. It's not a catastrophe in the long haul, but I sincerely hope this doesn't catch on: That's not audience involvement, that's a commercial transaction. You give me money, I give you product. On a larger scale, it's abusing opportunities for people who have few, which is particularly nefarious if it comes from people who have no need to beg.
daleharvey 14y ago
It is very very easy to create a nice demo, the difference beteween that and a nice product is lots and lots of time, effort and money. There is a balance to be made between 'we have this idea and need money to build it' and 'we are serious about this, we have done X much already, we need money to go over the finish line'
webwright 14y ago
"I just saw that it's retailing for $299. It all feels rather cynical." Huh? For a $99 pledge, you get the $299 license when it launches, it looks like. This looks like every other product kickstarter, which essentially are saying, "We've invested considerable time and money. We're committed. We'd love to have you pitch in to help accelerate us and get us over the finish line. In exchange, your pledges entitle you to discounts and other favors."
- PufferBuffer 14y ago
  Why don't they just create the product and have me pay for it? The company is already funded, why should I go ahead and pre-order something now, knowing it might not work as advertised when it's ready. I'd much rather pay $300 when the product is on the shelf, when I can evaluate the pro's and con's. Sure, if this was a project that hasn't been started and looked very promising, I would give it some money, for a chance to get something great. In this case, it seems I don't have to risk, but rather just have to wait.
  - loceng 14y ago
    It's an investment round that that don't have to give equity up for.
montecarl 14y ago
I'd love to see complete or nearly complete software on kickstarter. One could finish a software project, then recoup all of the development costs plus profit and then offer the final product for free since you have already made all your money. This model allows the people that are most interested to fund the entire development cycle of the software and pay for everyone else to have it too. It also avoids all of the immoral intellectual property laws.

by weego 14y ago

ericdykstra 14y ago

Kickstarter is being used, more and more, as a way to build interest and create revenue before the official "launch" of a product; even a product that would be produced anyway. It seems to be a rather effective way to get press coverage for a percentage of projects, and presents a clean interface on a trusted system for interested potential purchasers. The risk, of course, is that a huge goal is less likely to be reached than a smaller goal. The ideal situation is that you have a reasonable goal that will actually help maybe some outsourcing or consulting costs or distribution set-up or what have you, blow away the goal early, and keep interest to drive revenue. Personally, I don't find this kind of Kickstarter project very interesting, and I believe it's a suboptimal way to launch a product that could instead just be released as a MVP and iterated on based on user feedback.

jack-r-abbit 14y ago
It feels like a lot of kickstarters are barely more than a "pre-order" mechanism. I'm not sure what happens if a project gets funded but then fails to deliver. It seems like when you give to a kickstarter, you should go into it fully prepared to never get your money back and never get the finished product.
- objclxt 14y ago
  It's a cynical way to pre-order, because you're not really pre-ordering at all: you're giving some money and the rewards are a side-effect. You don't get any of the usual consumer protection at all.
- EwanG 14y ago
  You mean like the Astronaut MMO that got all the press earlier this year, and now even the forums are gone? Yes, that is the risk with Kickstarter and any other investment. It's just there seems to be less visibility into the viability of the company or person behind the project than most investments. Since I rarely go beyond the $20 range, I only feel mildly burned on the ones that don't go anywhere. For folks who hit the maximum (I've seen some with $10K options), I suspect the hurt is a little more real.
pippin 14y ago
Running a Kickstarter project early on in a product's life allows anyone to see what kind/size of audience they'll be dealing with. I don't believe all products should do this, but they'll receive valuable feedback, and if they don't meet their goal, they'll be better off with decent feedback from potential customers.

DanielRibeiro 14y ago

Note that they also have YC funding: Q. What's your background? Paul and Kevin were accepted into Y-Combinator this summer to launch Pixate into it's current prototype phase

andyfleming 14y ago
Does everyone in the YC program have funding? Obviously, they have access to funding, but does everyone without exception take on funding?
- jchung 14y ago
  Yes
- simonw 14y ago
  To participate in YC you need to accept a very small equity deal from YC - this is usually around $17,000 for 7%, but I believe it can vary depending on the stage of the company. You later get the option to take a $150,000 convertible note at extremely good terms. This isn't mandatory, but the terms are designed to make it almost a no-brainier to say yes.

andyfleming 14y ago

It looks like these guys have plenty of money. They show a nice house, nice cars, etc. Sounds like they could fund themselves pretty easily, right?

Animus7 14y ago

I'm getting the same vibe. And I'm beginning to think that allowing this kind of thing will be the downfall of Kickstarter. Yes, I will explain. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love the Kickstarter concept. But in practice, their scaling seems to quickly be turning hem into a sales platform that has no controls or accountability. And I have nothing bad to say about this project in particular, but they are a YC company, and the state of the prototype shows that they already have all they need to make it happen. This project doesn't need money. The campaign seems to me to be nothing more than a simple "I'm making something cool, so give me cash". And I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that -- by all means, people should be free to do what they wish with their money, and the Kickstarter campaign will probably work out beautifully for them. That's great. But this whole perception of Kickstarter being a place for bootstrapping interesting projects is turning into a dangerous myth. Like many things before it, Kickstarter is becoming a place for people with money (and/or obvious ability to make money), to make even more money, though marketing under a vague guise of "bootstrapping", with no checks or balances to keep people honest. This isn't an accusation leveled at Pixate -- I don't believe they're doing anything wrong and I have huge faith in YC's filtering. But once enough clever people figure out that you can earn a killing or huge bonus on top of anything, just by tacking on a nice Kickstarter campaign, it will become impossible to separate the wheat from the chaff. And then people will move on to the next thing, and the cycle will repeat. </bubble-y doomsaying>

rotw 14y ago
> And I have nothing bad to say about this project in particular, but they are a YC company, and the state of the prototype shows that they already have all they need to make it happen. This project doesn't need money. The campaign seems to me to be nothing more than a simple "I'm making something cool, so give me cash". I fully agree. Honestly, I hope both that this campaign fails and that the guys at Pixate are able to develop and launch their product successfully. The point of Kickstarter is to enable creative endeavours that would have trouble succeeding in a market environment -- a talented friend of mine financed his first short film via a similar site, which will hopefully get him a foot in the door of filmmaking. In his case, the Kickstarter idea is a great thing: It guarantees artistic independence and audience involvement. This app, however, already has backing and will easily make plenty of money on the market. It's not a catastrophe in the long haul, but I sincerely hope this doesn't catch on: That's not audience involvement, that's a commercial transaction. You give me money, I give you product. On a larger scale, it's abusing opportunities for people who have few, which is particularly nefarious if it comes from people who have no need to beg.

daleharvey 14y ago

It is very very easy to create a nice demo, the difference beteween that and a nice product is lots and lots of time, effort and money. There is a balance to be made between 'we have this idea and need money to build it' and 'we are serious about this, we have done X much already, we need money to go over the finish line'

webwright 14y ago

"I just saw that it's retailing for $299. It all feels rather cynical." Huh? For a $99 pledge, you get the $299 license when it launches, it looks like. This looks like every other product kickstarter, which essentially are saying, "We've invested considerable time and money. We're committed. We'd love to have you pitch in to help accelerate us and get us over the finish line. In exchange, your pledges entitle you to discounts and other favors."

PufferBuffer 14y ago
Why don't they just create the product and have me pay for it? The company is already funded, why should I go ahead and pre-order something now, knowing it might not work as advertised when it's ready. I'd much rather pay $300 when the product is on the shelf, when I can evaluate the pro's and con's. Sure, if this was a project that hasn't been started and looked very promising, I would give it some money, for a chance to get something great. In this case, it seems I don't have to risk, but rather just have to wait.
- loceng 14y ago
  It's an investment round that that don't have to give equity up for.

montecarl 14y ago

I'd love to see complete or nearly complete software on kickstarter. One could finish a software project, then recoup all of the development costs plus profit and then offer the final product for free since you have already made all your money. This model allows the people that are most interested to fund the entire development cycle of the software and pay for everyone else to have it too. It also avoids all of the immoral intellectual property laws.