I agree with you that having customers on a waiting list or a pre-order list is a great move with regards to pre-money traction, but there are certainly compani

I agree with you that having customers on a waiting list or a pre-order list is a great move with regards to pre-money traction, but there are certainly companies out there with proprietary technologies that require funding before they can be brought to life. Particularly, in the life sciences, biotechnology, and other high-IP areas, it's not very intelligent (or feasible) to launch a Kickstarter campaign in order to get traction. But you make a _great_ point - traction doesn't apply to just users, which is something this particular post heavily emphasizes. Having 10,000 blog followers, pre-orders, enterprise customers, commitments, even endorsements from influencers who can promote and/or sell the product once commercialized, are all traction. Totally. Even IP is traction if done right. Additionally, two years ago we didn't have any crowdfunding and there were plenty of companies that raised money without any "traction" as it's commonly understood in the Techcrunch arena today.