My bad. . . I’m a Boomer. When I grew up in rural Ontario, it was easier to deal with bullies as they were right in your face in the “school yard”. And yes, they bullied to take you lunch money. With the Gen-X and late gen Millennial types it’s changed to “cyber bullying” hiding behind the anonymity of a keyboard and a faceless avatar. And yes, the motivation changed from one of “taking your lunch money” to just being malicious. Is it because they are angry, frustrated, or because they are bored and have too much time on their hands? Who knows. Sadly, bullies just like being bullies.
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between the people who want more information and those that are quietly swallowing the news while gritting their teeth
@dan_berry. you forgot the third group which is the group of us who want more information, but realize that 300 people have already posted that sentiment, and while I understand venting, it’s tiring that people keep opening new threads, that keep reiterating what has been said repeatedly in multiple exiting threads in hundreds+ of comments.
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Well, maybe if enough people ask for a bit more information, we’ll get it?
Someone earlier said something about ‘10,000 pages of engineer notes.’ That’s not what I’m asking for and that’s not what anyone is asking for. I’m simply asking for a slightly better description of the problems they’re having and what is causing one delay after another. If the problem is ‘we want to make sure the hinge of the door won’t break after 10,000 uses’ that’s one thing. If the problem is “the laser mechanism goes off track after 1 pass and we don’t know what’s causing it” that’s a whole different story.
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It’s very helpful to hear everyone’s opinion, and I appreciate you sharing yours.
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Hmmmm…huge sense of entitlement running rampant since the delay was announced.
Oddly, I don’t see any lack of transparency in the responses we’ve gotten – or any actual requests for transparency either. I see a lot of (a) I’m pissed off, (b) I’m disappointed, (c) I’m feeling unimportant, (d) I really have no idea how a new tech device actually comes to market, or (e) any combination of the above, and then demands for accountability to satisfy the individual as to why they feel any or all of (a) thru (e) above, and what can GF do to stop the individual from feeling any or all of (a) thru (e) above.
This situation is what it is, and the agreement each of us signed was about as clear as it gets. We really aren’t OWED much of anything further, and certainly not a blow by blow accounting of everything that is going on in the development and bringing to market of the GF. From what I can tell, even if we got it, there would be so much arm-chair quarterbacking that we would all go mad 
I really think @dawime said it well with these 5 points:
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I think we are entitled to honesty and not deceit, and we were entitled to be told volume manufacture was not going ahead in Dec long before 2nd Dec and not given every indication that it was right up till then.
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Yes, this why so many on the forum have vented their anger. As Dan said, he’s happy to hear how everyone is feeling/thinking. I am sorry you felt deceived…I felt like it could have been handled better too. Hang in there (Dan too). - Rich
I understand there are a number of folks who feel they were deceived. My suggestion is to just go ahead and get your full refund and walk away. Keelhauling someone is not an option, and burning at the stake is against the law. Perhaps just take your money as the full refund, and then think twice before buying into a crowdfunded project in the future. Heaven knows I’ve lost out on one or two kickstarter and indiegogo campaigns that never came through. But I, personally, plan to stick with the GF – I really believe in it.
Mark Twain in his later years told the story of how he frequently had invested in new fangled inventions and ideas – and lost his money every time. He finally put his foot down, and when an earnest young man approached him for backing on a new invention, Mr. Samuel Clemens told him no.
Unfortunately, that young man’s name was Alexander Graham Bell…
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A difference in perception. Silly that we would get excited at each other over the difference in perspectives. We have each molded our own across life, and it is a result of our own personal experiences. That makes each one unique, it is ours alone.
Because I don’t identify with that of others, or they with mine doesn’t invalidate either one.
This one is mine
I personally don’t require a detailed explanation of issues/bugs they are chasing to polish this off. It may be interesting to know the problems, but SHOUTING a demand for a list is confrontational and suggests a perceived deception.
I don’t believe I am being deceived, just the opposite.
I was offered the opportunity to buy a world class innovative product at a greatly reduced price, that is already selling for $1,000 more than I paid, and it hasn’t even shipped yet! 
Whatever information Glowforge decides to grace me with is their decision. I understand my payment doesn’t entitle me to being privy to day to day company operations. I am grateful for all that has been shown and shared, but Dan doesn’t owe me a running report on what’s on his plate.
It is not my place to demand anything beyond what I agreed to - the best laser they can manage to build.
Personally I am very comfortable that a skilled team of engineers and professionals are dedicated to weeding out the minor issues that inevitably manifest in the final assemblage of a technically complicated product.
They are closing in on it, and it’s going to be great! 
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Don’t be so patronising. It wasn’t marketed as a crowdfunded project at the time I backed it. That was one of the deceptions if you count it as a crowdfunded project now, which I still don’t. I have experience of many which I went into with my eyes wide open and you don’t get the option of taking your money back with those.
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I apologize – I never meant to be patronizing at all. Just feel that taking action in the form of the refund is preferable to vilification of the folks trying to bring the GF to market. Hostility and accusation has never worked well for me in getting what I am hoping for.
New tech is tricky. Here, we have the world’s largest tunnel boring machine drilling under the city, and an unforeseen and unpredicted problem caused about 2 years in delay while it was being fixed.
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It might be preferable for you that I cancel but it makes no sense for me while there is no chance of losing my money and some chance of the Glowforge arriving eventually. If the VC money runs out and they lose patience then it will be like a run on a bank and I will definitely cancel at that point, hopefully just before if I see the writing on the wall.
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My recollection at the time of purchase was that it was a crowd-funding project to bring a prototype to market. I even told my wife that because it was crowd-funded, and these things tend to have massive delays, that we shouldn’t expect the GF until at least 2017.
Currently I know it for what it is, which is a crowd-funded venture capital backed project to bring a prototype to market.
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Yes but it didn’t look like that when I backed it, which was something like the second or third day I think. I see that Norm from tested also thought he would get his Dec 15, so it is not just me being stupid.
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I was according to the website among the first 10 backers and I also thought that I would get mine December 2015. I was expecting delays, but not 1.5 years.
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I think this point @palmercr makes is actually very valid, and the point of difference in the starting arguments. Like @palmercr, when I ordered the product it was certainly marketed as shipping in 3 months (see the archive.org for October 4th, 2015):
I think the starting point of expectation, and some of the discussions back earlier this year about the first or second delay come from this idea that you are pre-ordering at a discount for initial shipment.
Its easy to see when there are investments in the company ,that the impression was that it was simply getting the funds to get production started (given the 3 month schedule).
The knowledge provided by @dan that the operational costs are coming from the money invested, and not by the pre-orders is a safety net for those (like me) who believe the refund option will be viable till they start shipping.
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It is confusing because there is that huge banner that said, “The biggest 30-day crowdfunding campaign in history”. It still says that on the home page, even though we were buying pre-orders, and because they did not use our purchase money (except for interest) to develop the GFs. The terminology can be confusing. - Rich
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No doubt. Enough to interpret either way. Couple that with a snazzy marketing video, you have enough to believe that you could get something in December.
That we are in December 1 year after that, and now we have another projected 7 months delay, its not hard to understand the frustration most are feeling.
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Things can be crowdfunded in many different ways. Sometimes those funds are used for initial development etc.
In the case of the glowforge I think they just needed to hit a certain threshold of purchases to know if manufacturing was going to be viable or not. If they didnt raise enough funds, they might not have gone to market with it (speculation).
Aside from the products that have already been developed, tested, and had a pre-production run, this is my preferred method of crowdfunding.
The situations where you are also contributing to the development of the product can get hairy as things arise that were never considered a factor. I think that is why a larger percentage of those type of campaigns fail.
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Yes but that wasn’t there when I ordered. And Glowforge both claim it is the biggest crowdfunding campaign and also claim the purchase money is ring fenced and it is a VC funded development.
It can’t be both and never could be said to be crowdfunded because we the crowd could have all demanded our money back and left them with no funds at all. If they didn’t have other funding they would be on very shaky ground. A panic among the customers could leave them bankrupt out of the blue. No one in the company would have any job security.
So the fact they have always said we could claim a full refund made me think they had other funding from the beginning. If they didn’t it was a massive gamble.
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