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General discussion (archive)First Kickstarter flops?(95 posts)(95 posts)
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Posted April 07, 2012
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keeveek: Well, it actually depends. If the money is lost due to badwill, being spend on something else than developing a product it could be treated as tort, and the company could be liable.

The agreement is: you give them your money, and they will do their best to deliver you a product.
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hedwards: More likely it would be treated by criminal fraud. There would also be civil fraud as well, but even if the money is recovered the amount would be pennies on the dollar and the party defrauding people would probably not have enough to cover recovery costs and pay everything back.
That's why there should be compulsory organ donation for anyone properly convicted of fraud. If they can't pay in money, they can always be useful as a source of organs and other things. "You lie, you die" should be the catchphrase.
Posted April 07, 2012
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spindown: As far as I'm aware there is no security whatsoever. If the project owner decides to take the money and run there's not much the backers can do. Kickstarter explicitly rejects any responsibility for the fulfillment of promises made by the creators of a project.

I know of one case where people were apparently scammed and Kickstarter did nothing to help them:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/zioneyez/eyeztm-by-zioneyez-hd-video-recording-glasses-for
What happened to this project?
Posted April 07, 2012
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Siecje: What happened to this project?
Copying from above:

I'm not sure exactly what happened, but from reading the angry comments it seems like the owner of ZionEyez simply disappeared after he received the money. He stopped posting updates and refused to answer e-mails and phone calls (unless people pretended to be potential investors, in which case he would reply to them).
Posted April 07, 2012
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uulav: That is horrible news for those who have invested huge sums of money into one that fails.
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Paul_cz: Not really. People that pledge to kickstarters are fully aware of the uncertainty and the risk. It goes with the territory.

But for example I would not give money to someone I do not know at all. But when someone like Tim Schaffer, Brian Fargo or Chris Avellone asks for pledge, well then pledge I will. Because I trust those people and am pretty sure they would not kill their reputation by not delivering (unless there are unforseen external circumstances like meteor crashing on their building, obviously).
This +1. Generally speaking these are all potential projects & there is always a chance they may or not come to fruition (for whatever reason). We basically 'donate' with the hope the people involved in project will deliver in the future. But it is still at the end of the day a donation with no guarantee's of a positive outcome.
Posted April 07, 2012
Regardless of what Kickstarter may state in their FAQ, if you pay money in exchange for promised goods or services (which applies to every pledge level except the first in most projects), then you have a contract which should be enforceable. This may involve having to seek redress from Kickstarter themselves (who charged your credit card), Amazon (who processed the payment) or the credit card provider (via a chargeback) in the case of projects going AWOL, but shouldn't differ from the situation where you pay a deposit on an item which subsequently isn't delivered.

In the UK, Section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974 (see the Office of Fair Trading's description for an easier read) makes the credit card issuer jointly liable for transactions between £100 and £30,000. So anyone in the UK affected by this should be able to request a refund from their credit card provider.
Posted April 07, 2012
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AstralWanderer: Regardless of what Kickstarter may state in their FAQ, if you pay money in exchange for promised goods or services (which applies to every pledge level except the first in most projects), then you have a contract which should be enforceable. This may involve having to seek redress from Kickstarter themselves (who charged your credit card), Amazon (who processed the payment) or the credit card provider (via a chargeback) in the case of projects going AWOL, but shouldn't differ from the situation where you pay a deposit on an item which subsequently isn't delivered.

provider.
The thing is, its up to the donator (and im using this because is what it effectively is when your contributing to a kickstarter) to make themselves aware of what they are getting into.Do their research. I think a 'reasonable' person would be (or should be if they do their research properly) already aware of the pro's and con's of backing a Kickstart. And have plenty of time to back out of it if they decide not to go ahead (if they think its too risky).
Posted April 07, 2012
This is why I am skeptical of Kickstarter..it seems to be pretty open to Scam artist to take advantage of.
Posted April 08, 2012
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dudalb: This is why I am skeptical of Kickstarter..it seems to be pretty open to Scam artist to take advantage of.
With Google you can always check up on the person(s) mentioned in a kickstarter campaign. For example, you can look up Brian Fargo and I am sure you will find a page either on MobyGames.com or Wikipedia that will show you what games he has produced/designed.

If you treat a kickstarter campaign like a typical investment you should (using the general "you") gather all the required information before investing or donating to a project.
Posted April 08, 2012
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AstralWanderer: Snip
There is no promised good or service, there is no consideration, there is no contract. It's also unlikely to be a common law jurisdiction tort.

The reality is that the only potential redress a consumer has is to take action for breaching the relevant consumer legislation in that customer's jurisdiction relating to misleading and deceptive conduct as to future matters - which often requires there to be representations made without any reasonable basis, which is often difficult to prove.

All in all it's a moot point. Unless you donated at least $10,000 it would be unlikely to be worth pursuing.
Posted April 08, 2012
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dudalb: This is why I am skeptical of Kickstarter..it seems to be pretty open to Scam artist to take advantage of.
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JudasIscariot: With Google you can always check up on the person(s) mentioned in a kickstarter campaign. For example, you can look up Brian Fargo and I am sure you will find a page either on MobyGames.com or Wikipedia that will show you what games he has produced/designed.

If you treat a kickstarter campaign like a typical investment you should (using the general "you") gather all the required information before investing or donating to a project.
If you need to look up Brian Fargo, than you have no business of owning a Wasteland 2 copy anyway ;-).
Posted April 08, 2012
To sum up, if you are not complete retard, you have nothing to afraid of.
And if you are, pledging money on kickstarter is the least of your worries.
Posted April 08, 2012
Here's another one which I found out about through RPGCodex:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/hlogas/ill-make-the-world-you-shape-the-story-lets-b/comments
Posted April 08, 2012
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JudasIscariot: With Google you can always check up on the person(s) mentioned in a kickstarter campaign. For example, you can look up Brian Fargo and I am sure you will find a page either on MobyGames.com or Wikipedia that will show you what games he has produced/designed.

If you treat a kickstarter campaign like a typical investment you should (using the general "you") gather all the required information before investing or donating to a project.
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SimonG: If you need to look up Brian Fargo, than you have no business of owning a Wasteland 2 copy anyway ;-).
I know that :D. I was just using Brian Fargo as an example.
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lowyhong: Here's another one which I found out about through RPGCodex:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/hlogas/ill-make-the-world-you-shape-the-story-lets-b/comments
Looks like they took the money and ran on that one...look at the comments.
Post edited April 08, 2012 by JudasIscariot
Posted April 08, 2012
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hedwards: More likely it would be treated by criminal fraud. There would also be civil fraud as well, but even if the money is recovered the amount would be pennies on the dollar and the party defrauding people would probably not have enough to cover recovery costs and pay everything back.
Yeah, It could end up as criminal froud also. I used the term "do their best" cause I don't knoiw what's the US equivalent of Polish term "nalezyta starannosc". For example, it would be treated as a civil tort also if they would spend the money recklessnessly. For example, they would use almost all their resources for graphics engine, and they wouldn't have any money left for everything else. (without any badwill, just spending money without reasonable thought)

I agree, it would be difficult to recover the money, unfortunatelly. But in some cases, the threat of inprisonment would be enough to "encourage" them to work hard on their games :P

JudasIscariot , I don't agree. If you create such fund, it creates two poblems
1) if this fund based on voluntary money transfers? If not, I don't agree. There are so many companies that go bankrupt these days, no fund would cover that losses And who would decide which losses will be covered with such funds? Not everybody would receive their money.

2) it encourages the companies to waste all their money. Now they know, that every money they will ever earn will be used to cover that losses (well, it depends)


I'd say the kickstarter should provide somehow an insurance.
Post edited April 08, 2012 by keeveek
Posted April 08, 2012
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hedwards: More likely it would be treated by criminal fraud. There would also be civil fraud as well, but even if the money is recovered the amount would be pennies on the dollar and the party defrauding people would probably not have enough to cover recovery costs and pay everything back.
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keeveek: Yeah, It could end up as criminal froud also. I used the term "do their best" cause I don't knoiw what's the US equivalent of Polish term "nalezyta starannosc". For example, it would be treated as a civil tort also if they would spend the money recklessnessly. For example, they would use almost all their resources for graphics engine, and they wouldn't have any money left for everything else. (without any badwill, just spending money without reasonable thought)

I agree, it would be difficult to recover the money, unfortunatelly. But in some cases, the threat of inprisonment would be enough to "encourage" them to work hard on their games :P

JudasIscariot , I don't agree. If you create such fund, it creates two poblems
1) if this fund based on voluntary money transfers? If not, I don't agree. There are so many companies that go bankrupt these days, no fund would cover that losses And who would decide which losses will be covered with such funds? Not everybody would receive their money.

2) it encourages the companies to waste all their money. Now they know, that every money they will ever earn will be used to cover that losses (well, it depends)


I'd say the kickstarter should provide somehow an insurance.
I don't recall talking about creating a fund more like doing the research about the person(s) involved in the fundraiser before giving them your money to see if they are trustworthy.

Also "nalezyta starannosc" could be loosely translated to "extreme prejudice" at least when dealing with the American judicial system.
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General discussion (archive)First Kickstarter flops?(95 posts)(95 posts)
(95 posts)