The etsy of electronics project, Tindie, has a brand new feature: It’s a Kickstarter-esque endeavor called a Fundraiser that allows you to sell your projects to other electron enthusiasts.
Of course the new Tindie Fundraisers may soon be just another Kickstarter clone for “exciting,” “new,” and “innovative” Arduino dev boards, something we’ve lamented before. We’re really interested in seeing Tindie used as a platform for group buys; a solution to a maker’s special hell where buying one component costs $100, but ten cost $200.
Already there are a few really cool projects up on the Tindie Fundraisers including a breadboardable Parallax Propeller dev board. Yes, someone finally made one that doesn’t cost an arm and a leg.
In addition to the new Fundraisers, [emile] also closed on $500k of seed funding for Tindie. It’s wonderful news for something that is sorely needed by the maker community. Tindie is also hiring, so if you’re a Django/Python wizard go drop everyone’s second favorite robotic dog a line.
So will the venture capitalists funding these “Fundraisers” be assured they are not funding vaporware?
The thing that worries me with group buys is getting ripped off by the person organizing it, perhaps they could do something that had a secure account for everyone to pool their money into but really i just can’t justify it without having the guy close enough to kick his ass. A rating system and the number of successful group buys (kinda like ebay ratings) would be a plus .. probably wouldn’t stop it but would be a step in the right direction,
I wonder if PayPal would work in the way…
Thanks for the link to the site. I went and checked it out. I suppose it will improve as time goes on so I’ll keep an eye on it.
Oh, yes, and I want to buy a kit for that self-balancing unicycle, and the “Pixar”-Robotlamp, and …