The World's Lightest Electric Vehicle • Hacker News Board

Re: The World's Lightest Electric Vehicle

#171

Post by jonnycowboy » Wed, Sep 12, 2012, 6:35 PM UTC

shard wrote: post #133

aaroniba wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I said that. I realized my world was divided into: places I could walk to, places I could bike to, and places I could drive to. Where I live (downtown Palo Alto), driving is a hassle because of traffic and parking. Driving is annoying, boring, frustrating, life-wasting... basically I hate driving and use it only as a last resort. Walking is great, but it's slow. It's really time-consuming to walk anywhere beyond a fe…

I thought you need one hand to use the remote?

These seem to use some kind of "sliding thumb" control (see kickstarter)

Re: The World's Lightest Electric Vehicle

#172

Post by avree » Wed, Sep 12, 2012, 11:24 PM UTC

sequoia wrote: post #160

avree wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The pricing seems like a complete rip-off, to be honest. $10 for a sticker? $40 for a t-shirt? $1000 for a skateboard? For comparison, you can buy a top-of-the-line longboard for $200, full kit. An essentially equivalent product [1] is selling for $500 a pop, half the price. That's more in line with what I'd pay for a luxury product like this. Also, I'm not sure how comfortable this would actually be to carry around.…

$10 for a sticker? $40 for a t-shirt? $1000 for a skateboard? You are not "buying a sticker" or a t-shirt. The offer is " donate to this project and receive a 'thank you gift'." This is referred to as a "premium" and can be seen in the USA in Public Radio fund drives: "Give $60 and get an NPR mug" they are not "selling really expensive mugs," they are soliciting donations and giving gifts or "premiums" in exchange. A…

My understanding is that Kickstarter is a funding platform, not a donation platform.

Funding and donation have very different connotations.

Re: The World's Lightest Electric Vehicle

#173

Post by jazzdev » Thu, Sep 13, 2012, 3:25 AM UTC

I got to ride one of these at Disrupt today. Inside, in a crowd, but still impressive tech. Smooth acceleration. I do ride boards, so I'm not a newbie. Loved it. I want one.

Re: The World's Lightest Electric Vehicle

#174

Post by sequoia » Thu, Sep 13, 2012, 4:39 PM UTC

avree wrote: post #172

sequoia wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$10 for a sticker? $40 for a t-shirt? $1000 for a skateboard? You are not "buying a sticker" or a t-shirt. The offer is " donate to this project and receive a 'thank you gift'." This is referred to as a "premium" and can be seen in the USA in Public Radio fund drives: "Give $60 and get an NPR mug" they are not "selling really expensive mugs," they are soliciting donations and giving gifts or "premiums" in exchange. A…

My understanding is that Kickstarter is a funding platform, not a donation platform. Funding and donation have very different connotations.

actually I'd like to hear more about this because it looks like a donation platform to me and I'm confused about this. You give money -> don't necessarily get anything in return, this alone fits the definition of "donation" to me. When you do get "premiums", they are typically worth far less than the value of your donation (stickers for $20, eat lunch with the team for $5k etc.). Again this fits the donation model.

I'm referring to "donation" model vs. "goods/services exchanged for money" model. I think both of those can be "funding." Anyway I am very interested in this perspective and in particular why someone wouldn't consider giving money in exchange for as little as nothing a "donation."