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Comment by aikah | Hacker News Reader

I wish people stop saying that. Backers are not investors.They are essentially pre-ordering a product,whatever it is. Today the language is vague enough to confuse the "bakers", Kickstarter knows it. What's even more amazing is that no backer has successfully sued Kickstarter for a failed project yet, because one could clearly get the money lost from them directly. They are a store, period.

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That is your impression. You seem to be relying on word of mouth i.e. the general public representation of what Kickstarter is. Unfortunately that is not accurate.

Simply reading FAQ will shows they are not a store, quoting:

At the same time, backers must understand that Kickstarter is not a store. When you back a project, you’re helping to create something new — not ordering something that already exists.

you might think they are( a store ), but that doesn't make it true.

You talk about investment, I ask you where is the Equity? it isn't an investment.

It doesn't matter what Kickstarter FAQ says, a judge need to decide once and for all what Kickstarter really is and how can its customers defend themself against fraud and scams like Triggertrap. "I was an idiot who didn't know what he is doing" is never an excuse when you take other people's money and you promise them something.

It actually looks as if there have been some changes to the Kickstarter TOS. For a long time, it seemed to imply that you needed to return the money if you didn't deliver the rewards. (However unrealistic that was--blood from stone and all that.)

Now it seems to explicitly refer to returning remaining funds. ("they offer to return any remaining funds to backers who have not received their reward (in proportion to the amounts pledged), or else explain how those funds will be used to complete the project in some alternate form.)"

Kickstarter has been tiptoeing this line forever between Not-a-store and Not-giving-people-what-they-paid-for-is-a-very-bad-thing.

At the time the triggertrap ada completed funding the TOS said full refunds if the product isn't delivered -- according to comments on the kickstarter page.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/triggertrap/triggertrap...

Interesting. I thought the terms had changed. While I'm sure not everyone will agree, the new ones seem to make a lot more sense. After all, if you had the money why would you run a Kickstarter (other than for the marketing/feeling out the market) if you were really, truly, personally on the hook to give it all back no matter what? And, if you didn't have the money before the Kickstarter, there's pretty much an inherent risk that things are going to go south as in this case.

I understand Kickstarter wanting to keep the pressure on project creators while minimizing the perceived risk in the eyes of funders, but the current TOS seems to mirror the reality much better than the old one. (Threats of lawsuits and so forth notwithstanding.)

EDIT: Ah. This seems to have happened last fall: http://arstechnica.com/business/2014/09/kickstarter-tries-to...

The fact that nobody has sued them over the (many, many) failed projects suggests that people in general understand the risk involved with Kickstarter much better than you seem to. It is all about backing speculative projects which may fail. I don't understand how you can know anything about Kickstarter and not be aware of that.

It may be true that no one has sued Kickstarter, but people -- including the State of Washington -- have sued failed Kickstarter projects.

If no one has sued Kickstarter, that may mean that Kickstarters has been successful at direct responsibility to projects rather than Kickstarter itself.

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