I invested in Oculus Rift, and all I got was this lousy T-Shirt (originally published 4.15.2014)

With the recent purchase of Oculus Rift

by Facebook, for $2.5 Billion no less, I wonder if there will be any backlash to Kickstarter?

In case you don’t know, Kickstarter is a funding platform frequently called crowdfunding.

This has long been a misnomer, as the crowd funding is not equity funding, but really more of a gift platform.

For a project on Kickstarter you frequently have a range of gifts. This could be from a virtual high five for a $5 donation, a T-Shirt for $20, all the way to the actual product that’s being offered at a discount.

This is where the Oculus Rift story comes in. The company turned to Kickstarter to raise their initial amount of money.

The original goal was $250,000 and they have exceeded that amount by 975%.

If you had invested $300, you would have received the actual headset product itself.

Herein lies the rub. If you had “invested” that $300 in an angel round for Oculus Rift, and the company sold for $2 Billion, you would return 820x your investment.

So, an investment of $300 would have returned over $240,000!

Now, there are so many things wrong with the above assumption.

1- People invest in Kickstarter projects because they want to support the project.

2- You can’t invest small amounts in most angel rounds; it’s usually a $25,000 minimum investment.

3- Oculus selling for that amount is a complete outlier.

However, my comment is (unfortunately) money changes everything.

I wonder if people will get frustrated as more of the technology projects come to fruition and potentially get sold.

Will that serve to drive the “investing” audience to other true “equity” based platforms?

Something like www.CrowdFunder.com is a site where you can invest in startups and get actual equity in return.

The good news for that model? If it works, you get a return on your investment.

The bad news? Over 95% of all startups fail, so you may get nothing back at all.

At least with a Kickstarter program, you get a T-shirt and have something to show for it.

However, I’m waiting for the day, that I’m walking down the street and I see someone wearing a T-Shirt that says; “I invested in Oculus Rift, and all I got was this lousy T-Shirt”.

Hey, maybe I should start a project around funding THAT idea!