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by dmix
2382 days ago
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Indeed, how many Kickstarter projects will it take to convince people preordering on an unsure thing is a gamble and basically an investment in an idea that interests you. Tons of billion dollar projects, let alone those with only a few million, have been delayed for years, changed half way through, or have died before finishing. The failure rates for new businesses is pretty high, 50% in the first year. One could question if its moral to take early preorders without some form of insurance but at the same time a ton of good things have come about using this process and proper communication by the company/purchasing platform can mitigate most of these issues. Plus it’s pretty rare for people to being giving hundreds of dollars, let alone almost $1000, to an unproven product so it’s probably best not to judge based on the extremes. Obviously if shady stuff is going on and there’s some evidence the company didn’t meaningfully try to accomplish the goals for which it raised money and misused company funds for personal benefit then there’s a serious problem. There's plenty of laws in place for that already. |
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Even though you are trying to warn people, you've accidentally fallen into Kickstarter's "dark pattern in broad daylight" by using the word "preordering."
Kickstarter donations (I consider it a charity) are not pre-orders. If I preorder a book on Amazon and it is late, tough for me. If the publisher closes down, Amazon gives me my money back.
Kickstarter donations, on the other hand, don't even have that recourse. We're giving them money out of the goodness of our hearts, and if everything works out for them and they feel like giving us our reward, we receive a nice "thank you gift."
Kickstarter transactions are charitable donations. We don't get a tax receipt, but if things line up, we do get a reward. If we think of it as charity without the tax benefits, we won't go wrong.
But the moment words like "preorder" or "purchase" enter into the conversation, we've fallen into the trap of thinking that we're consumers purchasing a good or service.