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The $100M Deal for Kickstarter to use Blockchain

fortune.com

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Re: The $100M Deal for Kickstarter to use Blockchain

#61

Post by the__alchemist »

lostmsu wrote: post #58
the__alchemist wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are historically many scams associated with both, so it's a fair analogy. My recollection was that Kickstarter was a mix, and Indiegogo was 90%+ scams.

There's a different level of association though. It is nearly impossible to see if Kickstarter project will flop or not and if you will see your money back ever. In crypto you can at least make reasonable judgement based on technology merits. All good projects are 100% transparent and developed in the open.

Your currency could evaporate because the price of the asset was fine, but your broker ran away with the money. Or, the hardware wallets etc are the best/safest alternative, assuming, of course, you never make a mistake when doing X, Y, Z...

Re: The $100M Deal for Kickstarter to use Blockchain

#62

Post by CM30 »

bcrosby95 wrote: post #22
CM30 wrote: post #6

Ah Kickstarter. I see why they tried the blockchain thing, but it probably wasn't the best decision for that particular company given their audience's utter disdain for crypto and web 3 in general. As for this: > The biggest problem for Kickstarter, though, may be that time has simply passed it by. “I feel like they just were left in the dust culturally" I'm not sure that's really the whole story. The story (at least…

Crowdfunding is big in the table top rpg industry. Lots of small companies used it for new products and even reprints. But for the past 6 months or so, they've been slowly moving to backerkit. Including a $4mil funding of one of them: https://www.backerkit.com/c/projects/mcdm-productions/mcdm-r...

It's interesting many people mention crowdfunding as working for tabletop games. Seems like the setup lends itself better to those than video games, consumer products or traditional forms of media.

Are there any reasons that may be the case?

Re: The $100M Deal for Kickstarter to use Blockchain

#63

Post by yieldcrv »

ceejayoz wrote: post #3

https://www.web3isgoinggreat.com/?id=kickstarter-continues-w... Back in 2022: > Kickstarter's COO, Sean Leow, did an interview with The Beat to discuss the announcement. He seemed to be a little bit confused on the whole concept throughout, and seemed to believe that "open source" is some sort of competing idea to blockchains. At one point he stated, "We believe that that data can be structured in a way through a blo…

the files are in the computer!?

so people are validating their own feelings on blockchain based on an incoherent ignorant executive trying to shoehorn blockchain into something to stay relevant? fascinating

addendum: its funny that the investors were trying to use this ignorance to shove Celo EVM down their throat, but even funnier that there are waaay more EVMs now, with another one launching every week

Re: The $100M Deal for Kickstarter to use Blockchain

#64

Post by acaloiar »

jprete wrote: post #20
CM30 wrote: post #6

Ah Kickstarter. I see why they tried the blockchain thing, but it probably wasn't the best decision for that particular company given their audience's utter disdain for crypto and web 3 in general. As for this: > The biggest problem for Kickstarter, though, may be that time has simply passed it by. “I feel like they just were left in the dust culturally" I'm not sure that's really the whole story. The story (at least…

I agree with you! I have some visibility into this space through the lens of "high-end" boardgaming (big boxes, frequently lots of minis, very high production value, and usually high time commitment to learn and play). Crowdfunding's first use case was speculative investment in projects that might not ever succeed. I think this space has a big inherent trust deficit and Kickstarter can never solve it because Kickstar…

> I think this space has a big inherent trust deficit and Kickstarter can never solve it because Kickstarter will always have strong local incentives to not kick sketchy founders off of the platform

I understand where you're coming from; I believe the premise is that because Kickstarter receive their fee whether projects deliver or not, that it's profitable to not remove any projects. That's of course true in the short term.

But the cumulative effect of that myopia is that the projects seeking funding on the platform has plateaued for years. The resulting lack of trust in the system has culminated in fewer projects using Kickstarter, because fewer users trust Kickstarter to adequately police projects. Robust project policing would lead to greater trust, a greater number of projects reaching funding goals, and ultimately more fees for the company. It's emphatically in their interest to remove unsavory projects, regardless of the immediate fee loss. The increase in trust is a multiplier that'll far exceed any immediate loss.

Re: The $100M Deal for Kickstarter to use Blockchain

#65

Post by CM30 »

bmer wrote: post #23
CM30 wrote: post #6

Ah Kickstarter. I see why they tried the blockchain thing, but it probably wasn't the best decision for that particular company given their audience's utter disdain for crypto and web 3 in general. As for this: > The biggest problem for Kickstarter, though, may be that time has simply passed it by. “I feel like they just were left in the dust culturally" I'm not sure that's really the whole story. The story (at least…

Although, even Patreon has this issue, since there is no hard requirement to be showing your work regularly; just more of an expectation due to the design of the system. Part of this seems to be due to the reality of creative work: you need to be willing to fund failures as much as successes, or you'll end up getting more-of-the-same rather than something new. E.g. existing creators with well-established patron bases…

> lack of focus on realistic, achievable goals ("go small, then incrementally bigger")

This is basically the problem with stretch goals in a nutshell. Once you get a lot of money and interest, it's easy to add more and more promises to keep people adding money to the pot.

The problem is that each of these things requires more time and effort (sometimes even exponentially more), so you end up stuck in a quagmire of 'fulfil a huge laundry list of promised features before you run out of money'.

I suspect Patreon has some of this for similar reasons. The more money you make, the higher people's expectations are, and the more insane your own promises will get to try and justify the amount of money you're bringing in.

Re: The $100M Deal for Kickstarter to use Blockchain

#66

Post by rtkwe »

flir wrote: post #49
rtkwe wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pure anecdata but I've backed ~180 projects on KS and I've only had If you're a bit choosier about the things you back you can get pretty good results from the site.

That's an insane number (to me). What do you consider to be your "best buy"?

A few I use every day; the Wyrmwood Modular Gaming table (dining room table with removable top leaves and a game vault), the Keyboardio Model 100 (wood ortholinear split keyboard that's been my daily driver for WFH since I got it), Sandsara, Radiant Urban Sling (been my daily bag for a few years now). Then there's some not every day uses I still enjoy a lot; a couple board games and TTRPG settings, Lancer, FANG, Root, Mind MGMT are the big ones I've had a lot of fun with friends playing.

Re: The $100M Deal for Kickstarter to use Blockchain

#67

Post by throw4847285 »

k33n wrote: post #31
mritchie712 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

some blockchains (e.g. bitcoin) have been reliable, but you'd have to be joking to say "crypto" (as an industry) has been reliable.

As a generator of wealth, it has been very reliable.

Generator of wealth for whom?

Re: The $100M Deal for Kickstarter to use Blockchain

#68

Post by throw4847285 »

hanniabu wrote: post #44
rsynnott wrote: post #5

> The blockchain plan seemed impossible—and that would soon prove to be the case. As is tradition. (Did any company _ever_ launch anything borderline successful with The Almighty Blockchain(TM) that wasn't just some sort of token?)

Farcaster

I've never heard of it, but I love that there's another startup named after a malevolent technology from fantasy or science fiction.

Re: The $100M Deal for Kickstarter to use Blockchain

#69

Post by bcrosby95 »

CM30 wrote: post #62
bcrosby95 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Crowdfunding is big in the table top rpg industry. Lots of small companies used it for new products and even reprints. But for the past 6 months or so, they've been slowly moving to backerkit. Including a $4mil funding of one of them: https://www.backerkit.com/c/projects/mcdm-productions/mcdm-r...

It's interesting many people mention crowdfunding as working for tabletop games. Seems like the setup lends itself better to those than video games, consumer products or traditional forms of media. Are there any reasons that may be the case?

I think it's because these projects are usually 80-100% done, and the riskiest part that's left is the print run. Potential customers are given sample PDFs so they can see if they will like the final product, and there is significantly less risk compared to a video game or something with a more complex mechanical design.

It effectively acts as a pre-order system for many projects, letting them know how many to print. The more you print at once the cheaper things are - print on demand is very expensive even for books. Many of these projects do one print run to fulfill the kickstarter then toss the pdf over on drivethrurpg.

The project I linked is unique as far as projects I tend to back goes. It's an RPG system where they haven't even figured out advancement yet. There's going to be more inherit risk due to that, but it's being ran by a big name in the community with experience in delivering these projects.

Contrast this with Shadowdark: it had design, art, layout, etc. ready to go. All they needed to do was the print run. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/shadowdarkrpg/shadowdar...

Re: The $100M Deal for Kickstarter to use Blockchain

#70

Post by samatman »

rsynnott wrote: post #5

> The blockchain plan seemed impossible—and that would soon prove to be the case. As is tradition. (Did any company _ever_ launch anything borderline successful with The Almighty Blockchain(TM) that wasn't just some sort of token?)

The purpose of a blockchain is digital scarcity. If the application doesn't need digital scarcity, it doesn't need a blockchain.

So yes, if you exclude the use case for a blockchain, there aren't a lot of blockchain use cases left. But what have you actually accomplished by structuring the question this way?

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