Out of business means out of business. At least he is not running a ScamStarter project (KS is good, the misuse is not) where you can do anything at any time and nothing happens!!
The most bizarre example I can think of was the Peachy Printer. I researched that fiasco extensively when I was bored a few years back and I think it was an experiment by some Canadian team of marketing psychologists, lmao :D
Seems to me projects like books, board games, cards and various little utilities work the best on KS. For a good reason. There are various statistics how many projects even deliver what they promised but rarely anyone talks about how many of projects that delivered actually have some future value other than quick novelty hype funding and something most backers will probably use once or twice.
I am also not counting as scams all those "inventors" who for the millionth time think they know how to bend the laws of physics or have this awesome idea how to literally spawn water out of nowhere or try a KS like: idea, concept, MAGIC, result. Those are just bad from the get-go. Only 40k Orks can do that.
Plenty of the well or less known failures also happen when the person has very little sense how to run a campaign or a business or anything similar and has close to none advice or knowledge how to run its finances. How many times the initial problem that surfaced after a fiasco was: "Now I know. I should not have put all the money on my personal bank account and hire people with promises. I also do not have a factory or a workshop and never factored that in... really." Money keeps rolling! And the person has no idea what to do AFTERWARDS.
They keep adding and hyping and adding and hyping and suddenly DING! CONGRATS! You have just obtained hundreds of thousands of dollars! Then they sit in the couch like: "Pfffffffff... And what now." I mean, that is a reaction you expect from a drunk college student a few days after a party where unprotected copulatory act was involved. LMAO :D
Hype + marketing. I do not even know where to start with that terrible combo...
KS is built on both. And promises. But I GET why some inexperienced souls are mislead. KS always liked its approach that is basically being on the sideline and saying: "Yeah! Those pesky scams! I know!" but it is not like they never marketed themselves as: "This is a place where you throw your idea, people throw all that money at you and you GET IT DONE!!" just to attract absolutely anyone with the promise that anyone can do this.
I also see some issue with rewards and stretch goals ultimately effing things up. I cannot decide which can be more problematic but probably stretch goals. THIS is where being freaking reasonable and solid at project managing comes in. A KS campaign can succeed when you KNOW what you are doing AND offering. It is doable when you start out small with small goals. Finding success there is pretty good already. But jumping at a big thing? Oh boy. Takes time to get that experience. This also shows how much of a walking advertisement big names actually are. How many more famous game producers do we need to miserably fail at KS hyped by their name only to see they were good back in the day because they had all the others on the team? Yeah. Funny how they actually are not that good on their own.
Regardless, I think stretch goals should have never been there. They implant this worm into people who go all: "Oooh! That is going to be in!!" and money keeps coming, goals are being added, money keeps coming and you end up with a monolith you cannot realistically conquer. Delays, broken promises, sudden needed funding from elsewhere because you overshot your capabilities and a spiral of total mess.
Would you work on such a project yourself? No.
But it seems to me people are getting a bit smarter about this and even big names have to cancel funding when questions start popping up and their name is a bonus on the project at most and only serves to gain some initial interest.
And perhaps people are getting smarter about hype and marketing as well since both use more and more desperate BS tactics.
The most bizarre example I can think of was the Peachy Printer. I researched that fiasco extensively when I was bored a few years back and I think it was an experiment by some Canadian team of marketing psychologists, lmao :D
Seems to me projects like books, board games, cards and various little utilities work the best on KS. For a good reason. There are various statistics how many projects even deliver what they promised but rarely anyone talks about how many of projects that delivered actually have some future value other than quick novelty hype funding and something most backers will probably use once or twice.
I am also not counting as scams all those "inventors" who for the millionth time think they know how to bend the laws of physics or have this awesome idea how to literally spawn water out of nowhere or try a KS like: idea, concept, MAGIC, result. Those are just bad from the get-go. Only 40k Orks can do that.
Plenty of the well or less known failures also happen when the person has very little sense how to run a campaign or a business or anything similar and has close to none advice or knowledge how to run its finances. How many times the initial problem that surfaced after a fiasco was: "Now I know. I should not have put all the money on my personal bank account and hire people with promises. I also do not have a factory or a workshop and never factored that in... really." Money keeps rolling! And the person has no idea what to do AFTERWARDS.
They keep adding and hyping and adding and hyping and suddenly DING! CONGRATS! You have just obtained hundreds of thousands of dollars! Then they sit in the couch like: "Pfffffffff... And what now." I mean, that is a reaction you expect from a drunk college student a few days after a party where unprotected copulatory act was involved. LMAO :D
Hype + marketing. I do not even know where to start with that terrible combo...
KS is built on both. And promises. But I GET why some inexperienced souls are mislead. KS always liked its approach that is basically being on the sideline and saying: "Yeah! Those pesky scams! I know!" but it is not like they never marketed themselves as: "This is a place where you throw your idea, people throw all that money at you and you GET IT DONE!!" just to attract absolutely anyone with the promise that anyone can do this.
I also see some issue with rewards and stretch goals ultimately effing things up. I cannot decide which can be more problematic but probably stretch goals. THIS is where being freaking reasonable and solid at project managing comes in. A KS campaign can succeed when you KNOW what you are doing AND offering. It is doable when you start out small with small goals. Finding success there is pretty good already. But jumping at a big thing? Oh boy. Takes time to get that experience. This also shows how much of a walking advertisement big names actually are. How many more famous game producers do we need to miserably fail at KS hyped by their name only to see they were good back in the day because they had all the others on the team? Yeah. Funny how they actually are not that good on their own.
Regardless, I think stretch goals should have never been there. They implant this worm into people who go all: "Oooh! That is going to be in!!" and money keeps coming, goals are being added, money keeps coming and you end up with a monolith you cannot realistically conquer. Delays, broken promises, sudden needed funding from elsewhere because you overshot your capabilities and a spiral of total mess.
Would you work on such a project yourself? No.
But it seems to me people are getting a bit smarter about this and even big names have to cancel funding when questions start popping up and their name is a bonus on the project at most and only serves to gain some initial interest.
And perhaps people are getting smarter about hype and marketing as well since both use more and more desperate BS tactics.