I'm backing.

FarSight is responsible for showing me how awesome pinball is, led me to spend money on location pins, and now I'm a new pin owner and loving every minute of it.

Many of my friends have bought The Pinball Arcade and now are coming with me to play pins on location. One day a few of them might follow my lead and buy their own pin.

FarSight's work is true gold for the hobby so I like to support them.

Kickstarter in a nutshell:

Someone pitches an idea for a creative project. If you think "I'd like to ensure that this thing gets to exist in the world" then back it. Most projects offer the very thing that is being created if you pledge the value of that thing, so it is also a bit like a pre-order. And just like a busker: if you don't like it, don't give anything.

I recall in the promo video for this STTNG Kickstarter, Jay Obernolte said that the license fees for this pins would result in closer to a $30 cost for the table. So $10 for backers is a good deal. And even so, this isn't a pre-order. To think of it as a pre-order is to miss the point of Kickstarter.

While an admirable goal, Virtual Pinball is a million miles from the reach of average people. The Pinball Arcade being on essentially every platform that requires almost zero effort to buy, install and play, gets pinball in the hands of everyone. VP gets pinball only in the hands of existing pinheads who have capable PCs and the knowledge to install/configure/run it.

I think it is a stretch to say that fan-sourced funding builds a business for you. And it certainly doesn't equal 'raking in profits' before a product has even been made. A few high profile products have funded well past their goals, but that is because the project, and the rewards, are so compelling to so many people. It's a win-win if I ever saw it. But typically, if anything, Kickstarter is a risk for the backers.

Is everyone that funds a project with Kickstarter sleazy, or just FarSight?

A hostage situation? Mister Fantastic couldn't stretch that far

Hmm ... Maybe a different analogy would communicate your perspective better than that of a hostage situation. Hostages have a right to freedom that was otherwise taken away with threats of violence. We don't have a right to STTNG on The Pinball Arcade that was otherwise taken away with threats of violence.

Sorry Matt, I don't mean to argue with you I'm just trying to understand where you're coming from on this.

The Kickstarter ingredients are 'projects', 'pledges' (otherwise known as donations) and 'rewards'. While I see your point, I feel that it's an overly cynical angle on it to think if of these as 'hostages', 'ransoms' and 'freedom'..

I don't think there is any reason not to believe FarSight's pitch on these two Kickstarter tables.

The way I see it is the way they pitched it. They've already done the risk/reward analysis on these tables and come to the conclusion, upon completing the license agreements, that they would have to sell the tables for a price far higher than most people will pay in order to break even on the licensing fees. Not only is this a risk that people will refuse to pay it and they'll be out of pocket on the licensing fees, but it also means that the tables aren't available to the widest possible range of people — which directly contradicts their goal for making The Pinball Arcade in the first place. If they couldn't get the tables out to everyone, then they'd rather spent time, energy and resources on recreating tables that CAN be affordable for everyone rather than make a few elite tables for an elite few.

Kickstarter was an opportunity for people who also support FarSight's goal — of digitally preserving pinball and making it accessible to as many people as possible — to enable them to make these tables at a price that everyone can enjoy them, and even get a copy when it is released as a reward.

You certainly can't call FarSight sleazy for taking advantage of an opportunity that is freely available to them. If you were starting a business and a family member offered to help fund it, would you turn them down? And before you say this isn't the same thing because in this case FarSight is the one ASKING for money, remember that FarSight started this campaign because their fans were offering them money to enable them to bring these tables to life, and Kickstarter is a brilliant new model to make this happen.

One other point: if anything, Kickstarter is the best funding method for consumer-facing products like this. Kickstarter makes the investors the customers, and this leads to a customer-focused product, not an investor-focused product. The sleazy alternative would be an ad-supported model that monetizes the customer's habits and negatively affects the experience.

But they made a smart choice and avoided financial risk by taking an opportunity that presented itself with a new project funding model. That's worth getting up in arms about because REAL businesses should take risks. Wait …