Is Kickstarter anything more than online panhandling for $ ?

I thought maybe it was a form of small scale venture capital to get investers in a small project or business.

The background: a relative by marriage is finishing up writing a book. Because I'm interested in the writer and the subject (adventure travel) I figured I'd buy and read the book, if and when it comes out. It was "nearly picked up by a publisher" before it was finished, and now he wants to self publish it "because of advances in self publishing." But it costs money for editing, proofing, layout, and artwork that he doesn't have to self publish; ergo Kickstarter.

But this is no investment in terms of return. You don't get "stock" in the book. I mean, by sending in money you get an advance e-book of the first 5 chapters and a hard copy when it is published in a few months, and other goodies depending on donation amount.

My wife and I just don't "get" this. Some will say I'm old and stuck in the 20th century because I don't twitter, text, or take photos with my phone, or make phone calls with my camera, don't have a "tablet", etc. So let me try this analogy and see if it's any different:

Let's say I start a Kickstarter account. Send me money, and I will travel and fish the Dean River and Skeena River tributaries all next summer and fall. Then I will write a book about my adventure, and I'll send each of you a copy of the book and include a couple flies tied by me. Of course I will be donating my time to travel, fish, and then write the book. So there's really nothing in it for me, other than the joy and satisfaction of sharing my adventure with you. Right?

Does this seem as odd to you as it does to me? And if I don't donate some money to this, there could be family repercussions I suppose.

Sg

My sister, as aspiring musician, ran a Kickstarter campaign to fund the recording and distribution of her bands first album and they needed $15k to do it.

I hadn't heard of Kickstarter before that and was skeptical at first. In the end it was a hugely beneficial tool that made a potentially prohibitively difficult process much easier.

Kickstarter is a good thing. FP provides a great description of how it works and what it is accomplishing.

Like Coley, I also know a musician that was able to an album recording because of it. In that example, it is a little more like charity as the people contributing tend to be personally connected to the person looking for funding.

The most valuable aspects of kickstarter though are NOT charity and are simply mechanisms to achieve funding for manufacture. That is more about supply and demand. Just bounce around the site and look at some of what has been done.