

What the Kickstarter Hangover will do to the 3D Printing industry - jevanish
http://jasonevanish.com/2013/10/08/what-the-kickstarter-hangover-will-do-to-the-3d-printing-industry/

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joncameron
Like others have noted, most of this can be generally applied to Kickstarter
projects in general. Some thoughts from someone working with consumer 3D
printers almost daily:

I can't see disappointment (as he's outlined it) as a consequence of these
delays. It's something unavoidably bound up in home and hobbyist 3D printing
in general. It doesn't matter if you have a Makerbot or Kickstarter-backed
printer... there's still a learning curve in terms of mechanical operation and
maintenance, 3D modeling, etc. that the average user won't have had previous
experience with.

The greater consumer 3D printing market is not on Kickstarter. Makerbot
machines, the Afinia, the Cube series... these are the greater consumer
market. I can't see the potential pitfalls for Kickstarted 3D printers as
being much different than the usual risks/mindset of people who contribute to
crowd-funding stuff.

Obsolescence also doesn't seem like as much of an issue. If you get a reliable
printer in a medium that will work for your needs, you're good for a while...
it's more important that the user decide what they want. Print material, build
size, software and hardware niceties... it really depends on what you're doing
and what you need. And the person who put together a RepRap is probably much
different than the person who saw the Form 1 on Kickstarter and thought it
sounded cool enough to try. There are different expectations along the broad
spectrum of things the consumer can buy in the 3D printing space.

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jevanish
That makes a lot of sense. I think you don't really totally know what you're
looking for until you have one in some cases. I know I bought a Solidoodle
because it was cheaper and readily available. Now that I've used it a bit, I
see the value in paying for a more reliable printer with a larger build size
that is at a higher price point. If I had bought a Kickstarter printer first,
it would have taken much longer to get to that point simply due to the wait.
And while some of the issues plague all printers, I meant to allude to the
fact that those issues _compound_ when you add in Kickstarter- specific
problems.

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adamb_
I think this article speaks more about the general public coming to terms with
how crowd-funding works in general. Kickstarter has already made efforts to
help people identify that funding a project != buying a product.
[http://www.kickstarter.com/blog/kickstarter-is-not-a-
store](http://www.kickstarter.com/blog/kickstarter-is-not-a-store)

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omegant
When I give money on kickstarter, I give it on a "cound and forget" basis.
Usually they are not products, but projects, like the human powered helicopter
and such, also my amounts are small, 5 or 10 euros. So I don't mind if I don't
see results.

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omegant
It´s "Found and forget", I was writting from the Iphone.

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egypturnash
I, personally, _expect_ Kickstarter projects to be later than their original
delivery promises. Especially if the scope expanded due to stretch goals. I've
backed about two dozen campaigns at this point, and I'm not sure _any_ of them
have delivered "on time".

I'm halfway through running my second kickstarter campaign. I'm hoping to
deliver the rewards a lot faster than I did for the first one; I learnt a lot
about making and shipping stuff during the first one, and tried to structure
the rewards in such a way as to eliminate the biggest time-sink on my end.

~~~
jevanish
I totally agree with you to expect delays from estimates, but I also think
many people either A) won't do the same or B) It's just hard to comprehend how
different things might be in the market when you finally get it 6-12 months
after you "ordered" it.

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ijk
_Is_ there a Kickstarter hangover? Genuine question--I've been hearing about
"Kickstarter fatigue" for years now, and I'm not sure the data is there to
support it. Anyone have any figures on this?

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fudged71
In my opinion, it's not kickstarter itself that will experience the fatigue,
but the 3D printing category itself. Very similar products are coming out in a
very short amount of time. I expect a dozen new printers to come out on
kickstarter before these are even shipped. What's that going to do to people's
expectations?

We couldn't be higher on the hype cycle right now. I think many people will be
disappointed with 1. the a huge difference in quality between printers, 2. you
can usually only print one color, 3. it's typically not a simple process to
print, 4. printing takes a long time, 5. learning how to
use/maintain/calibrate the printer takes a really long time

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DennisAleynikov
I'm assuming at least a small factor of why delivery gets delayed is the fact
that they became significantly overfunded with a lot more perks needed to be
fulfilled/produced/shipped over the original amount that was planned to be
provided in the timeline that these projects originally laid out.

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ChikkaChiChi
The worst part about being on the bleeding edge is that we are bored by the
time something hits the mainstream.

The fact is that 3D printing is still in its incubation stage. The market
hasn't seen any concept hit storefronts in which the average middle class
consumer can decide whether or not they should buy a printer...it's still
'magic'

One of these companies is going to figure out how to source at a scale that
gets them into Best Buy. Then you can expect this segment to truly explode.

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taybin
I'm not sure that adding features to an already late project is the best idea.

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jevanish
If they can cheaply and quickly add it (by leveraging someone else's hardware
or software) it could be worth it, but certainly not suggesting you change the
design you sent to a contract manufacturer or anything like that.

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leishulang
peachy printer only costs $100, that is the same price for a hot-end for
normal printers. What else can go wrong with $100?

