KICKSTARTER

WHY IT CAN BE GOOD AND BAD FOR SMALL COMPANIES.

   By now,  I'm sure most everyone knows what Kickstarter is.  It's a Amazon affiliate website that let's people take a project that they are working on,  make a pitch video about what they want to create,  and put it up for people to help fund it with incentives to them from a simple thank you to merchandise.   Anyone doing a pitch has to have a minimum goal and offer rewards for anyone looking to support them.  You don't get any money unless you hit your goal, but once there you can keep going.  With some people setting high records,  in the multi millions.  

   In many ways, this helps small companies by pass would be publishers who would make a decision for the consumer.  This gives the power to the consumer, in the early stages, to decide whether they will purchase something or not.   So it's really a powerful tool for a company with little funding to get their products out there.  

   However,  it seems lately to be a place where high profile people set up a pitch idea and everyone flocks to it, showering them with tons of money.  Now, this isn't necessary a bad thing,  because the things they release are products that a publisher wouldn't even touch due to a supposed risk factor.  I have noticed though, from this, that people are seemingly starting to get a bit jaded with Kickstarter itself now.  I first noticed Kickstarter from a post on Kotaku.com, about the game Routine (one of the current Greenlight Steam products btw).  It was an indie title at the time and garnered a good amount of support (over 100k, if i'm not mistaken).  This was a little over a year ago,  so at this point Kickstarter was overflowing with small companies pitching their ideas,  trying to get a leg into the industry.  

   While nowadays it's much more popular,  if you search through it you will find many higher profile people.  Pitching ideas where they are looking for investments near 1 million,  usually going over.  Now while bringing more attention to Kickstarter itself is a good thing for a small developer.  It can also be bad being surrounded by such high profile people,  where someone might have supported your small project.  They now might get bedazzled by a bigger project from someone more well known,  therefore you are more likely to get lost at sea.  It also seems to be pushing some people away,  thinking Kickstarter has become a site where big time developers and idea men push their ideas so they can avoid publishers altogether.  While this is a good thing for them to avoid a middle man,  the people who cannot even get the middle mans attention get shoved into a corner.

   In closing,  I would say that even though I myself have been using Kickstarter for a project.  I feel good and bad about these issues.  While more exposure is a good thing,  it brings on much more people vying for attention.  So sometimes, the people who really need the support get lost at sea. 

   Thanks for reading (this is more of a personal thoughts thing) and check out my next blog on Wednesday.