Show HN: Kickstart Your Own X-Prizes with FuturePrize
futureprize.com
futureprize.com
This isn’t a minimum viable product (we had a couple of alternate takes on the site that we ended up scrapping), but it’s definitely a more basic version of what we have in mind. It’s still a little rough around the edges, but we would greatly appreciate any feedback HN might have.
We’ve gone ahead and seeded the site with half a dozen prizes of varying degrees of crazy, that we hope illustrate the range of projects you might see on FuturePrize – from absurdly ambitious, literal moonshots like the Icy Moon FuturePrize, to something pretty basic like “A Software Fix for Glowing Pet Eyes in Photos” that just represents an unmet consumer need.
We realize this site could be a bit controversial on HN, where the “Idea vs Execution” debate happens frequently, and usually leans pretty heavily towards “Execution” being everything. That’s mostly true, but it’s our view that ideas can definitely be very important. People seem to know this instinctively when they hang on to them like Gollum from Lord of the Rings, even if deep down they know that they may never get the chance to execute on them. It’s our belief that providing a platform that allows the free exchange and funding of ambitious or novel ideas - where people can get a bit of recognition for their idea, and maybe even choose to keep a very small portion of the funds raised - could be a very beneficial thing.
Also, just to clarify, when we picture our average prize creator, they look more like your average HNer with a folder full of side projects that they don’t have the time or exact skillset to take on, rather than your stereotypical “Idea Guy” - although there could definitely be a lot of diamonds in the rough from them as well.
If the site is successful, there will probably be a lot more “noise” than on Kickstarter or Indiegogo – unfunded prizes, or crazily unrealistic prizes that get a lot of pledges but have very little chance of being won. It’s our view that this is actually a good thing. These prizes would be more like crowdfunded moonshots… stretch goals for humanity. If no one wins, none of the donors are charged – no harm, no foul… but, if someone manages to pull it off, there are tremendous benefits for everyone.
Also, just wanted to post this before anyone else does:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkGMY63FF3Q
;)
However, some feedback:
It seems the time span involved could cause problems. Consider things like changing financial circumstances, expiring credit cards, closed accounts, deaths of backers, forgetful backers contesting charges, etc.
How will you prevent fraud? A dollar buys a vote, but the dollar goes to the winner... so just register two accounts and contribute enough to unilaterally decide that you yourself (on the other account) are the winner. Get your own money back plus everyone else's.
Similarly, what's to stop a backer from pledging some huge sum to get someone to develop something and then withdrawing their pledge at the last minute to get the benefit of the finished development without paying for it?
This isn't intended as my way of saying "you shouldn't do this", it's intended as my way of saying "don't get yourself into trouble by neglecting these issues."
Regarding the points you made:
1. Time span - there may be some "erosion" in the prize amount as it goes on, but we follow up with pledgers to update payment information as necessary, and update the prize amount accordingly. Unfortunately the time span can't really be helped due to the fact that prizes have to have time to build in value in order to attract teams to the prize, and then there's R&D time for those teams to actually accomplish the prize's goals.
2. Regarding fraud, there is a final up or down vote on any leading prize applicant that didn't receive 70% or greater of the vote. I don't want to get into too much detail publicly on fraud prevention, because it's obviously counter-productive. ;) - but we're certainly confident we'll be able to prevent someone from pledging 70% of the prize in order to capture the remaining 30%. Also, the majority of that 30% would surely cancel their pledges if a sub-par project was about to win - that is if we hadn't already disqualified the fraudulent applicant.
3. Regarding free R&D for a big contributor, I suppose that's a possibility, but I'm not sure it would be a very big concern. Presumably any R&D that would motivate a scheme like that would be pretty valuable, and all I.P. would still belong to the prize applicants themselves.