
Why 84% of Kickstarter's top projects shipped late - kjhughes
http://money.cnn.com/2012/12/18/technology/innovation/kickstarter-ship-delay/index.html
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casca
I can't find the reason in the article, but I'd like to propose that it's
because making new things is hard and people are optimists?

An interesting comparison would be to know how many projects in general are
shipped late. Otherwise it will be another case of "1/4 of all crimes in
London are committed by foreigners!" where 24% of Londoners are foreigners.

~~~
rm999
This part:

> Why are so many crowdfunded projects blowing their deadlines?

>Over and over in our interviews, the same pattern emerged. A team of
ambitious but inexperienced creators launched a project that they expected
would attract a few hundred backers. It took off, raising vastly more money
than they anticipated -- and obliterating the original production plans and
timeline

~~~
ChuckMcM
It is sort of buried, at one of my startups we made a 1U server that went into
the phone closet, we found a place in Milpitas that could make us 20 - 30 at a
time, and then when we started growing and needed 100 at a time they basically
told us "No, we can't do that."

That was my first experience with a manufacturer where I got to see what it
was that making 100 changed vs making 20. In our case it was mostly all of the
various parts that came from different places, so you needed to stage a bunch
of things and that difference in delivery times meant that to build a 100
reliably for some components you were holding on to stock of like 500 of other
things. That tied up a tremendous amount of money, and the risk was if
something went wrong you might have parts to make 80% of 500 things but not
the same 80%! It was maddening, and very complex. We had a gal whose job it
was was to talk to suppliers basically all day every day and help get things
'kitted'.

~~~
potatolicious
This is why I'm very, very skeptical about hardware Kickstarters by people who
have never shipped hardware. Manufacturing is a _hugely_ complicated endeavor
that outsiders like to trivialize ("I bet it cost $1 in China!"), and
ambitious entrepreneurs like to underestimate.

It's the same reason I didn't fund Ouya - I didn't see anyone on the team who
has actually successfully shipped a hardware product. It's the same reason I
_did_ fund Pebble, because they have, albeit on a much smaller scale.

This shit is _hard_ , and people need to realize this.

~~~
endersshadow
Manufacturing and supply chain is one of the most complicated processes that
occurs at businesses, by and large. We're talking about logistics to get your
stuff to the warehouse, storing said inventory, monitoring inventory levels to
know when to order, manufacturing goods that take time, then storing the
finished goods until they can be shipped, and finally, sending them on their
way. I've seen companies from all walks of life, and manufacturing goods is
_by far_ the most complicated process I've ever had to dive into.

People think it's easy because it's simple on the small scale. There's nothing
I know of that's harder to scale than manufacturing operations.

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pessimizer
Because there's absolutely no economic incentive to ship on the estimated ship
date, unless you plan to do more Kickstarter projects.

At a guess, funding will go up inversely with the estimated wait for shipping,
and that relationship will be counteracted by some believability factor that
is directly related to the apparent complexity of the project/apparent
expertise of the project leaders i.e. people will not believe that you are
shipping a flying car a week after the funding date, esp. if you don't have
any pictures or graphs and you're three art students.

Unfortunately, the apparent complexity of the project/apparent expertise of
the project leaders is going to be consistently _way_ wrong, due to the
credulity of the general public.

If you only plan to do one Kickstarter, fancy renders and other graphics + the
earliest physically possible estimated ship date is the rational choice. Then
just blow the date. There's absolutely no consequences. If what you get to the
backers (late) turns out to be awesome, you'll still end up getting nothing
but positive press.

The only time I've seen people get really irate about Kickstarter shipping
late (but shipping) is when the backers' "exclusive" promos were also sold in
other venues, or when retailers got a hold of stuff before backers did.

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ordinary
Honestly, I'm surprised so many of Kickstarter's top projects shipped _at
all_. I'm not being snarky here. 68% is a much better success rate than I'd
expected, even taking into account that these are their most famous (and
therefore, likely, most over-financed) projects.

If I managed to finish 68% of my projects, I'd die a happy person.

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tspiteri
It all depends on the project. For example, I backed Double Fine Adventure,
which is on the bottom section in the lateness diagram. The thing is that it
got overfunded by a factor of 8. The original plan was for a $400,000 game,
and you can't spend much time on such a game if it is to be feasible. But the
funding exceeded $3 million, so of course the game is going to take longer to
design, because it's going to be bigger.

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scott_meade
"Kickstarter co-founder Yancey Strickler responds. Backers are signing up to
participate in the development process, including all of its obstacles and
setbacks. "If you want a watch, you can go buy a watch," Strickler says.

I don't know that Kickstarter can be any more clear to backers than they are
that when you back a project you are not buying an item and you are not
guaranteed a successful result.

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savrajsingh
It's better to ship late than to ship a piece of hardware you later have to
recall (I write this as a bit of hardware from a recent kickstarter project
awaits pickup by Fedex. It's being recalled by the manufacturer to fix a
firmware bug. They were kind enough to send a postage-pre-paid box). :)

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fusiongyro
I backed HexBright in mid-2011. I should be getting my flashlight sometime in
the next few months. I was under the impression I'd be getting it in time for
Christmas last year, but going back through their updates I don't see them
mentioning a specific date so I'm not sure why I was under that impression. In
any event, a year and a half is a pretty long wait, but I think it will turn
out to have been worth it.

~~~
ghostfish
I also backed the Hexbright. You're remembering that you'd have it by last
Christmas because that was the original shipping date. I think the FAQ was
changed once the delays were announced. I agree, it looks like we'll be
getting a great light, but it took entirely too long, imo. The creator had a
video with a functional light during the backing phase, so I assumed it was
nearly complete, but sadly it wasn't the actual light we were backing in the
video and development took a year longer than expected. The creator has been
perfectly upstanding and handled things quite reasonably, it just took far
longer than expected to design and manufacture the thing, sadly.

~~~
fusiongyro
Glad I'm not completely misremembering things.

I think this is one of those cases where he got so overwhelmed with the
support he decided to do something completely different and better than what
he was originally asking for backing to do, and it looks like it's turning
into a full-fledged company. I'm pleased--I just want my programmable
flashlight. :)

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michaelochurch
The problem seems to be that no one has figured out the "right" balance of
power for these projects.

With VC, they're a small, tight-knit group and can ruin your reputation if you
waste their money or fail in bad faith (or if you fail in good faith and
they're upset about it). However, this capability is abused all over the
place. One of the reasons why extortions like multiple liquidation preferences
and participating preferred exist is that the VC can pick up a phone and turn
off other interest in firms that should be competitors.

On the other hand, with Kickstarter, average donors on the scale of $100 don't
have the "teeth" or incentive to fairly punish those who fail them in bad
faith, and in the absence of such punishments, you either get a scammer
problem (bad-faith failure is unpunished and recurs) or an overreactive "lynch
mob" behavior (good-faith failure is punished).

What's right for a growing business and artistic projects is between those two
points, I would think.

That said, if anywhere close to half of all Kickstarter projects succeed
eventually, then it's doing way better than corporate software. I'd bet that
what is completed is of high quality, as well.

Also, the reason I really want to see Kickstarter succeed has less to do with
the funding model and more with the making of cool stuff. Kickstarter means
more people can work on useful, meaningful projects rather than serving The
Man, and that's a great thing there should be more of.

~~~
jaaron
This is why I prefer bridge loans for seed phase startup funding (project
funding, like kickstarter is completely different). With convertible notes,
the early owners retain control and there's less risk for the investor. If
everything goes well, the early investors get in on a "proven" success. If
things go sour, there's still some chance of debt being repaid in a
bankruptcy. Also, there's less pressure all around, as early investors can opt
to just have their debt paid off, so they aren't anxiously waiting for the
next round of funding or a liquidity event.

~~~
michaelochurch
I really dislike the idea of entrepreneurs taking personal debt, if that's
what you're suggesting. I think that's horrid. And when a software company
goes bankrupt, how much is there to pay investors back with?

Here's an idea, more oriented toward software but applicable to hardware as
well. Every project has a hard deadline that is some multiplier (maybe 5-20x)
on the expected time-to-completion (i.e. the soft deadline). That's mainly
intended for work that is abandoned, not regular shit-happens lateness. If
you're within the deadline, you own the IP outright. If you miss it, or
abandon the project, the code is open source and the work is in the public
domain, so anyone who wants to pick it up can.

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pg_bot
This seems like a problem with the UX of KickStarter and not project creators.
Instead of asking a creator to predict the future with relative accuracy,
instead model development like real life. If project creators were prompted
with two questions asking when your product would be shipped if everything
goes (right||wrong) then you would have a more realistic shipment range, and
more products would ship "on-time". Backers would have more realistic
expectations for product shipments, and wouldn't panic when the first deadline
is missed.

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dimascyriaco
Why 84% of all projects ship late?

~~~
vannevar
Yes, I'm not sure that Kickstarter's missed deadline rate is any higher than
anywhere else. Humans almost universally underestimate complex tasks, a
phenomenon so widely known there is a particular phrase for it: the Planning
Fallacy (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planning_fallacy>). The question should
really be, why would anyone expect Kickstarter projects to meet their
deadlines?

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jscheel
I've never started a project on Kickstarter, but it seems like it would be
good for them to offer materials, guides, and potentially a mentor network for
entrepreneurs. Maybe even going as far as explicitly walking new applicants
through a business guide before they can submit their project.

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dkhenry
This article is factually inaccurate. At least two projects they list as Where
the ^%$# is it!? (Castle Story, Light Table) have delivered on time. I have
played castle Story, and have used Light Table. This is nothing more then link
bait.

~~~
evan_
The Castle Story "dev diary" just had a post three days ago titled "Rewards
sneak peak"[0] which implies that the rewards haven't shipped yet. The
comments have a bunch of people asking for the beta, so it sounds like that's
not available yet either.

Maybe this is why they thought it hadn't shipped yet?

[0] <http://www.sauropodstudio.com/dev-diary-number-thirty-five/>

~~~
dkhenry
So shipping the initial product and being a month late with the final product
is considered "Where the ?!$#!" is it ? Especially with a team that has been
in _constant_ contact with their backers about status updates and progress
reports. Like I said the article is link bait plain and simple.

~~~
evan_
If the table's inaccurate I suggest contacting its author. The information I
found seems to agree with the information in the table, so if the game has
actually shipped then the table's author is probably unaware.

If the final product has not shipped yet, though, it does belong in the "Where
is it" bucket. Everything else on the table has delivered.

A mistake in one field in the table hardly invalidates the whole article,
which I think you should probably read rather than jumping to invalidate the
whole thing.

~~~
scowley
Hi, Stacy from CNNMoney here. We talked to all 50 project creators to get the
shipping info -- it's all firsthand data. The beta was the "main" project the
Kickstarter was intended to finance, and that's not finished yet. We included
a link to Castle Story's dev diary in the profile (click the square) and made
clear that it's in active development.

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joeblau
I wonder how this data compares to real contract projects in the Government
and private sector? My hypothesis that the numbers are fairly similar because
frankly; no one really knows what they are doing :).

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nextstep
I wonder when the Pebble Watch will finally ship. As far as I know, the team
has stopped posting expected ship dates.

~~~
djloche
The 'early dev' editions have started to ship. People are reporting that
they're getting shipment notifications. However, the 'early devs' are under
NDA - so if they keep their word you won't hear much until the embargo is
lifted or until the standard shipments start.

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kevingadd
I find it interesting that Light Table's delay is largely blamed on YC. It
seems kind of strange to me that after having raised a large amount of funds
from one source, you'd risk pissing off those investors in order to secure a
_smaller_ amount of funds from a second source.

~~~
Q6T46nT668w6i3m
Light Table isn’t late.

 _The tentative plan is to release a full beta around the turn of the year and
have an official launch May of next year. As it stands currently, it will
include all the things I've shown in the video for both JavaScript and
Clojure, but should we continue to get more funding we can add even more._

<http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ibdknox/light-table>

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northisup
summary: "Because China"

