Kickstopper

[ellers07]

I don't think there's really an issue here. If a movie studio wants to seek Kickstarter support for a movie they don't have total faith in but it has decent fan support, then why not? Being a larger studio should not mean we deny them access to sites such as Kickstarter.

I can't imagine this will become to common place for the big studios anyway. I don't think there's too many shows (movies, sequels, whatever) that could generate that much support. This thread alone is telling. The only thing that has been consistently mentioned is Firefly and I can't really think of many more that I'd be willing to donate towards.

In the end, I like having the option. I never watched Veronica Mars and I did not donate towards its movie, but I think its great that fans of the show were able to. So, I'm fine with any creator, producer, studio, and whoever else I'm leaving out putting up projects like this. I'll happily give them a look and see if I'm interested. As long as everyone can submit their projects, the playing field is still level (at least on my end).

 

[synobal]

Bob is just afraid of industry change. He is use to the studios making the huge decision and the consumers just hoping. What's wrong with consumers having more power over what gets produced?

 

[grigjd3]

I think this is more of a misunderstanding of what kickstarter really represents. I don't even believe the people at kickstarter really understand what they started. Kickstarter isn't about leveling the playing field. Rather, it's about charging more money to people who find more value from a project. Look, airlines do this all the time. They change up their airfares so that for the people that desire cheaper tickets will take the time out of their lives to find the cheapest prices and the people who are insensitive to cost will simply save their time and pay more money. To the perspective of a publisher or producer, people who are willing to pay more should be allowed to pay more money for something. The downside to that is that no-one wants to feel cheated, so you can't attempt direct price discrimination (accept based on age evidently). With kickstarter, however, one is not simply applying price discrimination. Every individual is allowed to choose whether they want to contribute more or not.

This way of thinking, however, does break down the nature of our current social contract: producers take a risk in producing something and consumers are given the choice of whether or not they buy it. The benefit to producers is that they control their product. This new model where consumers can directly vote with their wallet, rather than metaphorically as before, is inherently riskier for the consumer. You could be backing something that's complete crap or you could be backing something that is amazing. The fundamental problem, however, seems to be that this isn't an investment and people who support kickstarters don't get any benefit beyond the knowledge that they donated to bring a product to market. From an economic stand point, the only way one should support a kickstarter is if you very much desire a product to exist and you believe it won't come to the market without your funding.

 

[hentropy]

If they do this with Gravity Falls, I'll be so pissed. And I will donate up whatever amount of money it takes to get an official Dipper hat.

As others said, it's a difficult issue, on one hand you don't want big studios and corporations taking advantage of fandoms, on the other hand there's a lot of risk in the industry and no way to tell whether something will make money. In years past people complained about good series ending but corporations basically said "it didn't get enough watchers, if you wanted it to stay you would have gotten more people to watch!" Then DVDs of TV shows became popular, and then Family Guy came along... that's when they started to learn about cult and sleeper hits and how much money that can make them. But there's still a risk, because they can't accurately predict what will become a cult/sleeper and what won't for some time, and they have to make decisions during that amount of time.

So they do stuff like this. Liked Veronica Mars? PROVE you liked it and prove our metrics wrong, prove that it will be profitable and that you're true fans... sad, but it's a reality and it might give such poor cancelled shows a shot at being revived and renewed. Pros and cons, I guess.

 

[Entitled]

In my experience, every sentence that starts with "Kickstarter was supposed to be..." tends to end with an incredibly arbitarily chosen obsession of whoever is speaking at the moment. "Kickstarter was supposed to be like a charity!", Kickstarter was supposed to help poor indie artists as a last resort!", "Kickstarter was supposed to increase innovation and original IPs!"

Crowdfunding is just another model to fund creative projects, but with more audience involvement. That's it. Isn't that revolutionary enough on it's own?

If you think that's "exactly like what came before", then your expectations for innovation are way too high. As long as projects are based around public demands, they will always have to balance between innovation and familiarity. It's part of human nature, that whie we don't want our entertainment to be boringly same-y, we also don't want it to be disorientatingly unusual.

So far, most big Kickstarters are way more original than the media general. Sure, they describe themselves by established genres, or they are the spiritual successor of something, or there is a familiar face behind them, but that's not quite Transformers 4 either.

 

[Thunderous Cacophony]

I'm a bit torn. On one hand, Bob is right- Kickstarter was supposed to be about independents and exiles from the mainstream coming in swinging, proving that good projects could find backing in this cold cruel world of ours if they brought their message directly to We The People (cue eagles swooping, flags waving, stirring brass fanfares and/or the patriotic/revolutionary images of your choice.) I'm not thrilled with the idea of Warner Bros. co-opting that system, and I've already basically said that the moment an EA or an Activision gets involved in such a process, our collective response should be to spit in their faces and slam the door on them. If nothing else, we should make sure the Kickstarter legal process is sewn up tight so no matter how big you are, if you try to renege you get hammered for everything the fans gave you and then some.

But another part of me says, "If Joss Whedon said the whole cast was willing to make another Serenity movie and they just needed to prove that there was interest out there, would I contribute?"

Oh, holy fuck, yes, I would. And if there was a speaking part available for top-tier bidders, I would sell an organ.

We have met the gullible sheeple, and he is us.

I'd go a bit farther than that; I'd lock down the system against any big companies (Let's say above an annual revenue of 100 million). Smaller companies and start-ups can use it to kickstart a large project, while bigger companies have to rely on their own revenue.
(I know that this is unrealistic and the math is probably bad, but you get my point.)

And I would only fund a Firefly film if it was cut off entirely from 20th Century and Universal; both those companies could easily make the movie, but they haven't because they aren't sure of the profits (and they might not be able to get the cast and crew involved, etc.), and I don't want to pay them so that either a) they make a ton of money off a successful movie, or b) there is little to no financial loss to them for making a movie that doesn't sell well.

I honestly wonder if Bob would be peeing on the parade if it was a fandom he was interested in... somehow I doubt it...

It definitely helps that he isn't in love with Veronica Mars, but that doesn't mean the point isn't valid. I've seen enough Kickstarters to know that perspective goes out the window when it's something you love.

 

[Steve the Pocket]

My Point: Hardly anyone actually pays retail price for DVDs. And a Digital Download is something you often get FREE with a DVD purchase (or, more often, with Blue Ray purchase). I have a free copy of Avatar (the movie) that I have never used because I have the Blue Ray.

You probably don't even have it anymore; if you never used it, the voucher probably expired by now. And "hardly anyone" pays retail price? If that were true, they would have noticed and made the standard retail price lower. Nobody wants merch to just sit on the shelf for weeks unsold because 90% of potential customers are waiting for the price to go down. Maybe nobody you know pays retail price, but nobody I know is a Twilight fan either.

 

[Bara_no_Hime]

You probably don't even have it anymore; if you never used it, the voucher probably expired by now. And "hardly anyone" pays retail price? If that were true, they would have noticed and made the standard retail price lower. Nobody wants merch to just sit on the shelf for weeks unsold because 90% of potential customers are waiting for the price to go down.

Well, first of all, do you look at the actual retail price on most products? Amazon, Best Buy, and Walmart all typically sell below "suggested retail price" as their default. Anyone who buys at those locations at the normal shelf price is still getting it below "retail" price.

For that matter, any game you buy used is below retail price. Maybe only 5 bucks below, but still. Sure, some sales are more significant than others, but I'm pretty confident that at least 50% of sales on most consumer products like DVDs, games, and similar occur below "retail" price.

Secondly, I don't really think this is the issue. Look at my other reply on the topic.

 

[aba1]

I'm worried about this. I'm currently working on a game as a writer and I might have to use Kickstarter to fund it. Yet if this keeps up, people are going to think I'm just scamming them cause I'm secretly working for a big name studio or some BS.

I am in a similar position people won't want to sponsor me and my game with only 2 people working on it and both paying our way through college at the same time when they already are funding giant studios for projects that really don't need the money nearly as much.

I mean Veronica Mars got its chance and it got canceled and all this says it that they deserve a second chance before a lot of other people even get a first try.

 

[Stevepinto3]

Man everyone talking about backing a Firefly kickstater is EXACTLY the kind of thing Bob was talking about here. Firefly (last I checked) is still owned by Fox, a company that is not exactly short on cash. They could easily put the show back on the air with money out of their own pockets, so why would you give them money to do something they can already afford to do?

 

[Entitled]

It definitely helps that he isn't in love with Veronica Mars, but that doesn't mean the point isn't valid. I've seen enough Kickstarters to know that perspective goes out the window when it's something you love.

Yes, it means exactly that.

If all these negative portrayals of Kickstarter projects can only be agreed by those who are not the target audience, you fail to portray how the model is actually bad.

Like if you want to argue that all FPS games are bad because they have the same generic atmosphere, while a fan of the genre could enthusiastically describe several art styles and atmospheres inside a genre, your argument fails, your distance from the subject matter doesn't make you more neutral, just more ignorant.

It's the same deal with Kickstarters. If you want to argue that a given Kickstarter is bad because it's not innovative enough, or because it means that the work is "held at ransom", but anyone who actually desires the promised work is enthusisastically claiming that it's interesting enough, and that the franchise getting "held at ransom" is better than it getting buried, then you make any objective point beyond "I don't care about this Kickstarter".

 

[Entitled]

Man everyone talking about backing a Firefly kickstater is EXACTLY the kind of thing Bob was talking about here. Firefly (last I checked) is still owned by Fox, a company that is not exactly short on cash. They could easily put the show back on the air with money out of their own pockets, so why would you give them money to do something they can already afford to do?

Because I would rather watch Firefly season 2 made by Fox, than punish Fox for not making Firefly season 2.

 

[Frostbite3789]

Bob is just afraid of industry change. He is use to the studios making the huge decision and the consumers just hoping. What's wrong with consumers having more power over what gets produced?

There's a fine line between the consumer having more power, and the illusion of having power while you're really just getting jerked around.

He touched on that in the article.

 

[aba1]

I don't understand the problem at all.

I mean, worst case scenario is we get an investor who pockets an extra 2 million or whatever that he didn't need. Unless he's Scrooge McDuck and enjoys filling swimming pools with money, what's he going to do with that extra cash? Right.. invest it. Probably in another movie.

The thing of "they might run Kickstarters for things they were going to do anyway.." Uh.. yeah. So what? See above. It's not like anybody is forced to give any money.

Really, the only group this is bad for is the middle-man markets who sell licensed stuff to fandom.. because now fandom will be getting their stuff directly from funding the studio at various tiers. And that's called efficiency folks.

You make some interesting point that are valid but I think you missed the over all point. The idea is that if big companies that don't need the funding are using kickstarter the projects that actually need the money will get over looked which was the whole point to begin with to help people who can't get started without funding get started. I mean sure you could go to those middle men and attempt to get funding but that almost always involves selling your property and loosing all rights to your own creation which is a issue to begin with. So the real problem is that the people who need the funds will get glossed over and ignored while projects that are already fully funded will get extra cash that could be going to much better places.

 

[Lightknight]

I'd say that kickstarter users are somewhat aware of the projects they're backing. If the projects become insincere or obvious money grabs then people are generally aware enough to prevent such things from seeing the light of day.

Take a look at the Shaker campaign (formerly Old School RPG) in which someone appeared to be trying to muscle in on the new RPG money. The developing pedigree was solid, they had the support of a lot of people we trust (Notch was in the video) and they would likely have made something great but it ultimately came across as fake and maybe even corporate and it got no support.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lootdrop/an-old-school-rpg-by-brenda-brathwaite-and-tom-hal

Note that in the video they talked about potential mechanics but nothing about the story itselt. They used the words "Old School RPG" 17 times in less than 6 minutes (so many times I had to go back and count) as if that was a real term and their initial image of a wizard fighting a dragon had no apparent connection with the Shaker storyline they brought out later that involved a time traveling cop. Keep in mind that I don't think they were actually a big company trying to sneak in, I just believe their campaign stunk of a money grab attempt and people picked up on that even if it was just a poorly made campaign.

So while I understand the fear that companies will try to get in on this. I think kickstarter backers are more informed and more conscious of their decision making than other communities may be. Also, while $2 mil may be enough to make this kind of film, it isn't enough to make any of the large budget films. So this sort of structure really isn't that appealing to the big boys.

There are volumns to be written on crowdsourcing. Certainly the most interesting form of funding we've seen yet.

 

[Henson]

...But another part of me says, "If Joss Whedon said the whole cast was willing to make another Serenity movie and they just needed to prove that there was interest out there, would I contribute?"

Oh, holy fuck, yes, I would. And if there was a speaking part available for top-tier bidders, I would sell an organ.

We have met the gullible sheeple, and he is us.

Yeah, the idea that you pay $10,000 to get a speaking role rather than get paid for working in a speaking role kinda bothers me. I guess it's not too bad, since it's only one role with one line, but the implications make me more than a little uncomfortable.

And yet, if Madhouse organized a crowdfunding project to finish Satoshi Kon's last film, I would probably jump all over it.

 

[Entitled]

You make some interesting point that are valid but I think you missed the over all point. The idea is that if big companies that don't need the funding are using kickstarter the projects that actually need the money will get over looked which was the whole point to begin with to help people who can't get started without funding get started. I mean sure you could go to those middle men and attempt to get funding but that almost always involves selling your property and loosing all rights to your own creation which is a issue to begin with. So the real problem is that the people who need the funds will get glossed over and ignored.

Which is a nonsensical over all point. (And I'm glad that at least Bob didn't try to claim this).

How would Kickstarter possibly lead to indies being more overlooked, than they would be without Kickstarter?

And even assuming that you are only talking about big projects on Kickstarter making the smaller ones more overlooked than they would be in an "ideal" situation, how would that happen?

These 3 million dollars paid for Veronica Mars so far, are coming from the Veronica Mars fandom, not from some sort of "Kickstarter Fandom" that has a limited budget that they are pledging on a number of projects every month. And Planescape Torment is funded by Torment fans, and Godus is funded by Populus fans, and the 3Doodler is funded by Makers, and War for the Overworld is funded by Dungeon Keeper fans, and the Oculus Rift is funded by game developers and VR enthusiasts.

There being both bigger and smaller names hosting projects on the site, doesn't mean that they are taking away space from each other. If anything, it gives them an ad surface, a chance to also get noticed by a visitor who was looking for something else.

 

[Jupiter065]

It used to be that big companies had to pay to advertise their stuff to fans; now with kickstarter, the fans PAY to do the advertising for the companies!

What a great system.