I have two Kickstarters that were pretty notable implosions…
AGENT smart watch - https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/secretlabs/agent-the-worlds-smartest-watch
Short version (seriously): noteworthy person behind the Netduino boards, Chris Walker, jumped on the Pebble goldrush. Then he demonstrated he had no Project Management skills. He buys huge amount of chips that never eventually get used, based on a prototype design at the very start before a final design. He uses some of the cash for renovating his property into a “fabrication lab”. He spends the better part of a year to find out the watch case partner doesn’t own the rights to the case he wants to use, spends even longer giving updates about watchstraps(!), and what’s left of the $1M he collected… he kept drawing a “project management” salary, all the while leaving New York in the middle of the night. He sold off his rights to Netduino and has tried to fall off the map. There’s over 11800 comments there, and I’m not overreaching that 4000+ of them are death threats or people crowdsourcing a lynch mob.
Kraftwerk fuel cell - https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ezelleron/kraftwerk-highly-innovative-portable-power-plant
Great idea, but very uncommercially proven research. The project seemed to start well, but when additional capital funding didn’t come through there was “suddenly” a lawsuit from the band Kraftwerk over the name and the “Owner” refused to back down to changing the name. And conveniently, it leaves the project in limbo but not shut down, so those pitchforking can’t gather.
I’ve backed 27 projects on kickstarter. Of those, 2 did not deliver (one was a victim of Pebble’s demise) and 2 are late but still in the works.
One of those (Oculus) turned out to pay off big when I sold the first-gen headset for more than I paid for it, and then was gifted the final product since I was an early backer. So there’s good and bad with Kickstarters.
Horse blinders. He came from Germany. Kraftwerk = power plant. Trademark law allows for the same trademark in irrelevant areas of interest. Technically. But when you’re a nobody trying to start a new product? That’s just stupidity to continue trying to argue it, especially when the band is well known for being extremely litigious.
Honestly, right at that point, I just knew the money was gone.
Most of what I’ve backed lately has been either random circuit board stuff that’s essentially pre-orders, or else charity stuff. Still waiting on a combo ARM/FPGA board. Probably my worst mistake was a vacuum-forming box where the guy just kept iterating on the design until he ran out of money…
Ooo that is a LOT @dan. Curious, what did you think of the Mr beam 2? I backed the original but the price was a bit out there for the second one for my liking. I do like the interface of the first one though.
I don’t have a lot of money so when I do it I usually think of it as going without coffee out for a few months. I have funded things as gifts which don’t count. It’s good to share what you can and back things you believe in.
I was a backer of the Micromill (a small clever enclosed CNC milling machine) from Germany sort of a “bowden approach” to CNC milling. They apologized for shipping a month later than expected (which is basically pre-release in kickstarter time). Arrived as promised with all features enabled (one small shipping damage issue which was cosmetic but on time)
I find it interesting to see when, in a development cycle, a company decides to launch their crowdfunding campaign. There’s a lot of documentation about ‘hardware is hard’ etc but some of these guys clearly launch too early.
An interesting Kickstarter was Keymouse. They cancelled their campaign about 4 months after their ‘first batch’ due date because they realised that they needed more time to refine the product. They gave full refunds. Sticking to their deadline would mean an under-developed product and postponing the deadline could have meant another of these ad infinitum, painful campaigns.
I was convinced they were bought out after their CES 2015 appearance, where they won an innovation award.
Then, more than a year after cancelling their campaign, they offered a beta kit version, where they ship the electronics & keys and the user 3D prints the housing. They’re getting great user feedback and have now moved on to 3D printing the housing themselves and shipping the assembled product.
I much prefer this approach and I believe the Keymouse guys have a very bright future. Many other startups could learn a lot from these guys - we certainly have.
I’d never buy it for $700. I’m too cheap. Enamored by new tech, not crazed 
