What am I getting when I Kickstart something?

[warpus]

I agree that established commercial companies shouldn't be using Kickstarter.

Exactly, and I have to admit that I'm not sure that in this particular case (OP's case) it is such a company or not.

It seems to be... in which case it seems to me that they're being sneaky by using kickstarter to get free money - a red flag that means maybe they shouldn't have been trusted to begin with?

 

[James Stuart]

If you put down $40 on a game and that game is still incipient, I consider that $40 an investment and not a very good one.

What I didn't know until now is how many kickstarters there are for things like "establish a community center for inner city youth". That makes more sense.

That's a wonderful idea, actually. My dojo recently shut down because the guy who owned the building closed down his business, not through any fault of our company. We were training about 200 people there every week, mostly kids. I might look into crowdfunding either a replacement or the re-opening somehow. It's not the sort of thing that I would normally do, so thanks for the idea. There should be more Kickstarters like that.

 

[Smote]

That's a wonderful idea, actually. My dojo recently shut down because the guy who owned the building closed down his business, not through any fault of our company. We were training about 200 people there every week, mostly kids. I might look into crowdfunding either a replacement or the re-opening somehow. It's not the sort of thing that I would normally do, so thanks for the idea. There should be more Kickstarters like that.

Hmm. I dunno if Kickstarter is the best option for a local community. I'm not sure what is, but I would expect there to be many possible donors that would fail to see the project if it is only on Kickstarter. Some combination with other types of advertising/social media/hype would be good, probably. This sort of thing would not appeal to a high percentage of internet users, since the dojo would only be useful locally.

 

[James Stuart]

Hmm. I dunno if Kickstarter is the best option for a local community. I'm not sure what is, but I would expect there to be many possible donors that would fail to see the project if it is only on Kickstarter. Some combination with other types of advertising/social media/hype would be good, probably. This sort of thing would not appeal to a high percentage of internet users, since the dojo would only be useful locally.

Oh, I'm sure the Kickstarter website itself isn't the best option. That's why I said I'd look into it; it's possible there's a local website, or perhaps a Facebook page, that would be better than local newspaper advertising. The newspapers in this area are mostly used solely for jobsearching.

 

[warpus]

I just want to say it's cool that you have a dojo. Nobody else I know has one of those.

 

[Smote]

Yea, he established in the "cops are above the law" thread that he's kinda a badass. Lol

 

[James Stuart]

I just want to say it's cool that you have a dojo. Nobody else I know has one of those.

They're pretty common over here. Most aren't anywhere near the size of mine, but there are dozens of martial arts dojos all over the place; at least five in my suburb. Technically mine is a dojang, since it started as a school for Hapkido, which is a Korean discipline. The guy who ran it when I first started ended up learning Brazilian jiujitsu on his own time and having a few undercard fights for the UFC, then came back to Australia and added BJJ to the school. I learnt both there, as well as freestyle wrestling and karate at other dojos, and ended up taking over the BJJ classes from him a few years back because he was honestly never that good at it. He still teaches Hapkido, and we've added tae kwon do and kickboxing classes. I had planned to start offering a freestyle wrestling class when the guy who owned the whole complex went out of business. Hopefully I can do that when we're back up and running.

 

[James Stuart]

Yea, he established in the "cops are above the law" thread that he's kinda a badass. Lol

I am the ultimate badass. You do not want to **** with me.

 

[filli_noctus]

Exactly, and I have to admit that I'm not sure that in this particular case (OP's case) it is such a company or not.

It seems to be... in which case it seems to me that they're being sneaky by using kickstarter to get free money - a red flag that means maybe they shouldn't have been trusted to begin with?

I can shed some light. Onyx Path, the company in question, is relatively new (about two years old) but the founder and the freelancers the work closely with previously worked for White Wolf before CCP (of EVE infamy) brought them, downsized them and pretty much forgot about them. Onyx Path has the tabletop licence for most of the old WW properties and produces new supplements/editions for them and is considered by many to be the spiritual successor to White Wolf.

With the background out of the way the way they use Kickstarter is slightly unorthodox. Instead of going to Kickstarter to raise money for a new book they use it once a book is more or less ready to be released to create a special limited edition that's only for the backers, sometimes stretch goals expand the book but it is pretty much done before the Kickstarter launches.

Exalted, the book the OP supported has been dragging on for ages and is, frankly, a bit of an embarrassment for the at this stage. I haven't been following it that closely but it was one of their first forays into Kickstarter and they obviously made mistakes. Obviously the book wasn't at the nearly finished stage by that point like later books have been but they could have failed to plan for just how popular the book would be and the extra content that would entail but by the sound of it some of the freelancers they've had on the project have poor understanding of the concept of deadlines. I understand at least two have been dropped because of it.