Kickstarter Too many Kickstarter projects? Is Kickstarter the new d20 glut?

[MichaelSomething]

Perhaps you can approach Kickstarter to see if they will advertise on EN World to offset the cost of a third roundup guy?

I got a better idea! Morrus could run a Kickstarter with the goal of hiring a person to sort the RPG Kickstarter projects!

 

[ExploderWizard]

Now this concerns me. I thought the purpose was to support creators that could not afford their initial start up fees. Established companies can afford launching projects (easily or otherwise), and because they have a good reputation, their risk is somewhat lower (though still very present). Ergo, established companies shouldn't be involved by design (as I understand it) but also for the reasons I've laid out. If an established company or person uses Kickstarter (yes, I'm looking right at Paizo), then my ridiculous example becomes very appropriate: They might as well start a kickstarter project for their phone bill. This is something they should be financing themselves.

It isn't so cut an dried. Reaper miniatures began a kickstarter to expand production their bones line of minis. They were very up-front about the reason for the kickstarter. The molds for these types of minis are very expensive. The company was planning on expanding the line as quickly as funds would allow. The kickstarter was just to speed up the growth of the line and provide customers with more of what they wanted NOW.

In this case, customers who don't even contribute still get the benefit of more minis being available for purchase sooner than they would be otherwise, and backers get cool actual products from a reputable company that can be trusted to deliver the goods.

So there are exceptions for larger/established companies.

 

[Someone]

I got a better idea! Morrus could run a Kickstarter with the goal of hiring a person to sort the RPG Kickstarter projects!

But in the bloated and ruthless environment that's Kickstarter now you'll need a good campaing to make your kickstarter known, a campaign that will take money! So I propose a kickstarter to get funds for a campaing for a kickstarter to hire the guy that sorts the kickstarters.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I completely agree with this.

Kickstarter is all the rage right now, just like the .dot com booms of yesteryear. And there will come a crash where we start to see more failures than successes.

The key will be what arises from that. I greatly hope we see a sustainable form of the kickstarter model arise that continues to allow the small publisher with a good idea to rise past the initial barrier of investment.

This. It's why as soon as OOTS hit it big, I immediately started ignoring all kickstarters as much as I could. (I did check out the Ogre one, since I respect Steve Jackson games as a business.) If I could set something that would hide all references to kickstarters, I would for now. Give it two or three years, and I'll start paying attention to what's emerging after the crash.

 

[ahayford]

I'm not sure this comparison, to the Dot Com's, is valid. The Dot com bubble burst largely because many of these companies that hadn't turned a profit, were overvalued (to the extreme). There are tons of kickstarters now, as it has proven itself to be a good way to generate buzz and funding. And you might be right, in the sense that there is more to choose from so its harder to get noticed. And thus, less campaigns may reach their goals...


But I don't really see the comparison to funded kickstarters failing. Its pretty much an individual basis, based on the company doing the campaign. There will be KS that fail to produce a product...it will happen....but I don't see it as a huge thing like a bust.

 

[gamerprinter]

This. It's why as soon as OOTS hit it big, I immediately started ignoring all kickstarters as much as I could. (I did check out the Ogre one, since I respect Steve Jackson games as a business.) If I could set something that would hide all references to kickstarters, I would for now. Give it two or three years, and I'll start paying attention to what's emerging after the crash.

And who is saying there's going to be a crash, for certain?

There would only be a problem if a rash of funded Kickstarters that "took the money and ran" and did not produce something - that would indeed be a problem. (Which I doubt will happen in a major way, though I expect some to do this.)

If the problem is that some Kickstarters don't get funded - that's not a problem for anyone, except the publisher or project creator. This simply means there wasn't really a market for a particular project.

Not only don't I think there's a problem, I don't see any indicators that there would be.

I am involved with a Kickstarter that started funding well after the OotS Kickstarter was over, and its already funded, though still collecting funds. Everything we've ever planned to release gets released.

And as AHayford says, there's no comparison between the .COM Bubble and this, they are not even close to being like the other. Pessimism is not enough to make it happen. I don't see the problem.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

But I don't really see the comparison to funded kickstarters failing. Its pretty much an individual basis, based on the company doing the campaign. There will be KS that fail to produce a product...it will happen....but I don't see it as a huge thing like a bust.

It's new. There are a lot of people involved, most of whom don't really know anything about each other. And then a lot of money is flying around. It will break somewhere, probably fairly soon.

Now maybe that doesn't turn into a crash, exactly. It might be more of a Wild West thing, where a bunch of people get burned (shot), others hit the goldmine, and the town moves on, while the trains are still staying mostly on the tracks.

I don't have any objection to people doing it. I'm simply not an early adopter of methods that are pretty much sure to have key failures at some point. When everyone gets the kinks worked out, I'll start paying attention to it as a possible venue. In the meantime, for me, it's a lot of noise, no signal.

 

[gamerprinter]

It's new. There are a lot of people involved, most of whom don't really know anything about each other. And then a lot of money is flying around. It will break somewhere, probably fairly soon.

Since 2008, (7 years) so it's still new, but has funded over 24,000 projects so far. The patronage funding method is quite old - much of the Renaissance art was paid for this way. So the idea isn't something new.

I see nothing overly complex in the 'scheme' to suggest that a breakdown was imminent. It's fair for you to not to early adopt anything, but that does not infer that the system will break ever.

As said by many, certainly someone will get burned, but that won't the fault of Kickstarter, rather the individual creator who failed to provide.

 

[Mark CMG]

In the meantime, for me, it's a lot of noise, no signal.

I've given this a bit more thought and have come to the conclusion that for EN World to be a good RPG News site, it needs to do a lot more than just cover the two main RPG companies, otherwise it might as well change its name. At the least, the announcement of a Kickstarter RPG project is the announcement of an RPG or RPG-related product in the works, sometimes a whole product line. Given that, EN World covering the announcement of a new Kickstarter project is solid RPG News reporting. It's not hype, it's not the announcement of a "sale" or just another design journal or blog post like many companies do to keep their brand in the public eye while they work on the next big thing. It's an actual announcement of a planned project and it seems that the vast majority get funded (most wouldn't bother unless they were pretty damned sure of success) while I'm often surprised at the huge funding garnered by some projects (1 1/4 MM by OotS?).

Anyway, each is an individual News item is worthy of front page exposure. If they happen to collectively take up a good amount of front page real estate and cause enough discussion that the two main RPG companies have to do more to compete for that front page news space, then let it happen naturally. Obviously the Kickstarters are getting funded and the products are getting made, so the complaints you might be getting aren't coming from the people who produced or backed those products and they read news too. I think buundling the product News from certain quarters and shoving it off in a pile in the corner is probably not a good idea after all and, along the same lines, bundling a week's worth of blog posts from a single company isn't the same thing. Besides, if someone is interested in only reading news from one or two main companies, then bundling their week's worth of blog posts makes it easier to find while avoiding the other news from the many tabletop RPG companies that make up the wide and diverse market.

So, let the RPG News page include all the tabletop RPG News you can get your hands on or that people submit. If people have to scroll a bit to get to the only news they are personally interested in reading, so be it. It's been a long time since this site was dedicated to just a single company's third edition release news. The ENnies alone suggest this site is about a much broader industry. A "Daily RPG Magazine" probably needs to remain fairly broad in its news coverage.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

My comments have nothing whatsoever to do with WotC or other established companies who may not see kickstarter funds as a useful avenue. But for the record, I'm against "news glut" no matter what form it takes. It just so happens that kickstarter is the particular glut being discussed here. Data is not inherently information.

There's a reason why newspapers have different sections, sub sections, etc. while they try to get you to buy it, so that they can tell your advertisers that you did. If you annoy your customers enough by burying the content that interests them intermingled with a lot of stuff that doesn't, they stop paying attention to what you are saying. (See massive declines in circulation over the last 40 years, caused in part by this.)

I realize there is a tension here between making things readily available versus technical and budget limits on filters versus the people paying the bills getting a certain amount of semi-captive eyeballs. But there is, I think, a rather short-sighted tendency among some producers to think that anything that might allow someone to avoid their crucial information is, defacto, bad for them. It's the same instinct behind the idea that of course you'll want to stop your dinner to answer my call where I try to sell you something. You can rapidly reach a point where you aren't going to buy even something you might otherwise like, because I won't stop calling or sending you junk mail.

You'll also note that I did not say that it shouldn't be there. I was quite clear that the high noise part was for me, and that I would filter it out if I could. I'm sure other people find it quite interesting, and some would like to make it even more prominent. Ultimately, it won't be much of a problem for me if it stays on its current course. I'll just avoid the news forum entirely, except when I have a link from somewhere else to it that looks interesting. That could be a problem for anyone who wants my eyeballs on something that might interest me and others like me.

You can't resolve this issue easily, as it basically involves a fight over time (and also in this case, money). Heinlein nailed it years ago, in that quote about how others would use up all your time if you let them. Salesman want your attention. Consumers want to give it only to the salesman that have something they want. Every person draws the lines in different places. It is an issue, not a problem--and thus can only be managed, not solved.