You'd be better off choosing a retailer that doesn't bill you until the product is shipped.

Anyone who has the time to go to small claims court over a small amount for the same of honor, more power to you. I'd lose more in PTO than it'd be worth to me even if I won and collected.

Quote from: estar;903531I agree as well that the ongoing changes are a good thing. In the 70s there were only a few ways of distributing your work. With huge gulfs between the choices. Now we have dozens of methods for distributing a creative work and get paid. The old methods still work for some as we still have bookstores and games store stocking RPG products and ordering them from distributors. People People who hand sell zines and products at conventions, etc, etc. But alongside that we have the new paths of Print on Demand, PDF stores, personal web stores, etc.

Yup just hoping more people change up the format a bit. The glossy full color hardbacks are more of a symptom of the hobby's retreat from the mass market into boutique status and don't really do the hobby much good. Being able to get good solid pdfs for a few bucks is great but having the electronic version of a game be a straight one for one conversion of a book really seems like a failure of imagination as pdfs aew often a pain to reference especially on a cell phone. One reason I stuck with 3.5ed and SotC as long as I did was that their SRDs made everything so much easier to navigate and look shit up.

Wouldn't mind an OSR subscription service where new contwnt got added every month and I could look up shit on my cell. Kind of like the 4ed subscription thingie except for not sucking so hard.

Quote from: Matt;903528If you think that would be worth your while for such a small amount, I would assume you've either never been to small claims court or have nothing better to do with your day than sit around waiting for your case to come up on the docket and hoping there's a way to actually collect even if you win a judgment.

BINGO!  The legal process to actually collect after the judgement is ten times the pain in the tonker.

Quote from: S'mon;903536You do know what FLGS means, right?

No, I probably would not bother suing an online retailer.

Yes, in fact that's the point I was making. I was pointing out a major way that Kickstarters are significantly different from FLGSs. And the logistical and legal hurdles of many small backers distributed over a wide area is one of the reasons why it's hard to hold creators accountable.

An economy is largely built on mutual trust, which is why Kickstarter (mostly) works. Most parties are acting in good faith. But the legal and regulatory repercussions are also important, not because they give people what they're owed (even if that happens, it's a risk; there's a cost in time, effort, and fees; there might be no money to take back; and it's just generally a pain in the ass), but because they discourage bad actors. That's largely lacking from Kickstarters. The only practical recourse backers have is spreading the word, but even that doesn't seem to work. People who have acted in bad faith and screwed over their backers, like Elizabeth Shoemaker Sampat, are still getting work from major companies and invited to panels.

Quote from: Pat;903648An economy is largely built on mutual trust, which is why Kickstarter (mostly) works. Most parties are acting in good faith.

I often teach e-Commerce Law to students from around the world. By far the biggest bar to e-commerce in most countries is lack of trust - consumers don't trust that products will be shipped, sellers don't trust consumers, banks don't trust either of them.

Quote from: Daztur;903608Yup just hoping more people change up the format a bit. The glossy full color hardbacks are more of a symptom of the hobby's retreat from the mass market into boutique status and don't really do the hobby much good. Being able to get good solid pdfs for a few bucks is great but having the electronic version of a game be a straight one for one conversion of a book really seems like a failure of imagination as pdfs aew often a pain to reference especially on a cell phone. One reason I stuck with 3.5ed and SotC as long as I did was that their SRDs made everything so much easier to navigate and look shit up.

The biggest reason you don't see born-digital products like this is because they require an entirely separate production workflow with a skillset and distribution channels largely divorced from those of book publishing.

If you build your PDF correctly, the only difference between a PDF and a print file is how you export the document. There is only a trifling amount of extra work necessary to get the thing into print. If you want to create a digital resource, however, you have to rethink your entire presentation, code it up using skills that have nothing to do with book publishing, then release it through channels that have little or nothing to do with tabletop RPG sales. There's no pre-existing market clamoring for digital resources the way that people clutch for hardbacks, and without that market, there are very few publishers incentivized to serve it. Mix this in with the fact that the vast majority of RPG shops are one-man outfits, and it essentially asks for RPG publishers to be combination writer/art director/publisher/programmer/UI designer/project manager/entrepreneurs. Anybody who has that particular skillset to a high degree of competence can find much, much more remunerative things to do than make RPG-book apps.

Call me ignorant, but I have a few questions about Kickstarters-

-Have there been any cases where someone has gone to court over them?

-Are there any 'laws' or even 'service rules' about pitching 'will do X at $15000' and not delivering that?

-Is there any truth to the rumor that Onyx Path uses Kickstarters to fund development entirely, and pockets all the profits?

Quote from: Crüesader;903682Call me ignorant, but I have a few questions about Kickstarters-

OK. You are ignorant.

Quote-Have there been any cases where someone has gone to court over them?

Yes.

Quote-Are there any 'laws' or even 'service rules' about pitching 'will do X at $15000' and not delivering that?

I wouldn't expect a law that was quite that specific. Clearly there are laws that apply to kickstarters.

Quote-Is there any truth to the rumor that Onyx Path uses Kickstarters to fund development entirely, and pockets all the profits?

Probably not.

I remember hearing this same line from Gareth-Michael Skarka a decade or more ago.  He had the same reasoning arising from the same entitlement mentality.  I want to work full time writing RPG material (living in New York City iirc) therefore I deserve to be able to do that therefore RPG buyers were obliged to pay whatever prices will make that happen.  He was rather bent out of shape when people declined to pay more to enable him to do just what he wanted to do and live just where he wanted to live while doing it.  I also remember him deciding that every person in a group needs their own copy of the game and that any player who is sharing someone else's copy is stealing.  Yes, you read that right.  If you are running a game using the GM's copy, all of the players are dirty thieves stealing from him.  All of them must buy their own copy.  The entitlement mentality of some of these people is astounding though I shouldn't really be surprised any more.

I know I feel like a thief every time I don't play Buckaroo Banzai that I preordered...oh wait, got that backwards, it feels like he's a thief...something like that.  At least I can play all these copies of Far West...

Quote from: Bren;903685OK. You are ignorant.

Call me a taxi.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;903749Call me a taxi.

ok taxi

Quote from: Matt;903747I know I feel like a thief every time I don't play Buckaroo Banzai that I preordered...oh wait, got that backwards, it feels like he's a thief...something like that.  At least I can play all these copies of Far West...

Quote from: Pat;902212Horseshit. Even the hyper-progressive Huffington Post agrees that, adjusted for inflation, the minimum wage peaked at $1.60 in 1968. In 2016 dollars, that's $11.00.

You and the 5 people who upvoted your post are idiots. It's bad enough that statistics lie, on their own. You don't have to lie for them.

Full Stop-

First off, don't quote the Huffington Post and call me an idiot. If you want to site something that's perfectly fine. However, I have an even better site if you want to take a look and this one does an even better job of making your point.

Link: https://tedtheeconomist.wordpress.com/2015/06/17/the-minimum-wage-adjusted-for-inflation-is-biased-propaganda/

I hate to break it too you but economist are people and people often disagree. Economist disagree a lot. I might of said something else here, had my own sources to site so on and so forth (and I do) which could have contributed to the conversation, but once you call me an idiot, especially for a reason I can't really perceive-other than issues I'm not privy to, cause their yours; I'm pretty much done.

If you can't be civil please don't address my points.

Quote from: J.L. Duncan;903867First off, don't quote the Huffington Post and call me an idiot. If you want to site something that's perfectly fine. However, I have an even better site if you want to take a look and this one does an even better job of making your point.

That's an interesting site. While it's apples and oranges (he uses 1947/$0.40 as the base, while HP/Inequality use 1968/$1.60, which accounts for the ~x2.5 difference when adjusted by CPI or inflation), it looks like a valid attempt to address some of the real issues that so often get masked and manipulated and misused in the various media.

But while everyone makes mistakes, if you don't like being called out for blatant inaccuracies, that's on you. One of the very real problems with the internet, and modern media in general, is the amount of sheer nonsense that's spread. People hear something they want to hear, uncritically accept it, share it, and it spreads like wildfire and becomes part of the established narrative. And once that happens, it's almost impossible to correct. The most effective way to combat that flare of irreason is to stomp it out, the moment it appears. And if even the Huffington Post couldn't come up similar numbers, well....