Author Topic: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects  (Read 385279 times)

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Offline IanMacdonald

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #450 on: July 03, 2017, 01:39:55 pm »
:scared:




And, another YouTuber who thinks that those two things that wave about to the sound are drumsticks.  :bullshit: :bullshit: WHACK! WHACK! WHACK!
 

Offline Dave3

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Offline Kilrah

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #452 on: August 29, 2017, 02:00:32 pm »
That review is golden! The moron at Kanoa he was talkling with (only guy left, or who's ever been there I guess?) obviously did everything wrong that he could from a comms point of view. Crazy.
 
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Offline FrankBuss

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #453 on: August 29, 2017, 04:02:04 pm »
iTwe4kz is asking for too much. Why would anyone want to connect their ass to their ears? :-DD
So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish
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Offline Kiwi_frog

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #454 on: September 01, 2017, 03:56:46 am »
"Nope" Webcam cover and sound blocker

Although this item would work, the lie they tell just need to be showen https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/bungajungle/nope-sound-blocker-and-webcam-cover/description.

This line "The micro electronic circuitry in Nope Sound Blocker forces your device to sense an installed mic. This turns off the device's on board microphones which blocks out sound." Nope is about right.



It is a 3.5mm phono on a stick, it would simple switch the microphone of by being installed, worse case a resistor on the end might help(turns out that is what they have 1 2.2k resistor),  no "micro electronics" needed, and all this for $15 or $20 for 2 in a keychain.

What is worse people have been lapping this product up like it is amazing.

Mike.
« Last Edit: September 01, 2017, 04:14:28 am by Kiwi_frog »
 

Offline FrankBuss

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #455 on: September 01, 2017, 06:25:24 am »
It is a 3.5mm phono on a stick, it would simple switch the microphone of by being installed, worse case a resistor on the end might help(turns out that is what they have 1 2.2k resistor),  no "micro electronics" needed, and all this for $15 or $20 for 2 in a keychain.

It might be an SMD resistor, which is "micro" :)
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Offline McBryce

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #456 on: September 01, 2017, 10:06:46 am »
It is a 3.5mm phono on a stick, it would simple switch the microphone of by being installed, worse case a resistor on the end might help(turns out that is what they have 1 2.2k resistor),  no "micro electronics" needed, and all this for $15 or $20 for 2 in a keychain.

It might be an SMD resistor, which is "micro" :)

Only if they used an 0402 part. If it's 1206 I'm not buying it. :)

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Offline Deodand2014

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #457 on: September 01, 2017, 01:12:24 pm »
:scared:




I know that DetectiveHACC talked about that device possibly producing chlorine gas, but there is another much more obvious danger, if enough current is being passed through the device to cause electrolysis, what's going to happen if someone puts their hand in the water while it's running... After all it's basic operating principle is no different than these Chinese Water heaters.



 

Offline Deodand2014

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #458 on: September 02, 2017, 03:26:44 am »
Here's a Indygogo campaign from the early 2010s which actually did fund and was asking for money to build a Quantum Effect Generator. The explanation for how it works is classic:

Quote
In basic terms, our machine reverses the conventions used to build electric motors, i.e., instead of using low voltage/high current construction, which wastes energy, our designs use high voltage/low current construction, which gives us a HUGE surplus of energy. A portion of the surplus energy is fed back to self-power the motor, and the excess energy is collected in capacitors and converted into house current (120 or 240 volt, at 50-200 Amperes, depending on scaling). This is known as over-unity (more output than input) which traditional educational institutions have historically taught us was impossible. It is not at all impossible, and does NOT operate outside the laws of physics.

https://www.indiegogo.com/esi/en/projects/home-quantum-energy-generator#/

There is a long discussion (Now locked) on the skeptical Metabunk forum about this one and related overunity projects, there seems to be an entire subculture based around the machine sustained by various crowdfunding efforts.

https://www.metabunk.org/debunked-quantum-energy-generator-qeg-10kw-out-for-1kw-in.t3572/

 

Offline BartManInNZ

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #459 on: December 20, 2017, 10:02:37 pm »
"If you want to build a ship, don't herd people together to collect wood
and don't assign them tasks and work,
but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea." - Antoine de Saint Exupery
 

Offline ikrase

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #460 on: January 02, 2018, 04:38:24 am »
Yeah, that looks pretty bad. The energy density of lithium ion is almost enough to boil a liter of water with that size of battery... if everything is perfectly efficient. Which it certainly isn't since it does not look like they've spent a moment on improving food-to-stove coupling.
 

Offline Inverted18650

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #461 on: January 09, 2018, 04:05:45 pm »
In case you didn’t see Dave’s latelest video, the Indiegogo 121 DMM is a scam as well. Do NOT back the IndieGoGo 121GW!

Offline Cyberdragon

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #462 on: January 11, 2018, 05:10:54 pm »
Yeah, that looks pretty bad. The energy density of lithium ion is almost enough to boil a liter of water with that size of battery... if everything is perfectly efficient. Which it certainly isn't since it does not look like they've spent a moment on improving food-to-stove coupling.

What if you shorted the battery and it caught fire, that would make it work better right? >:D
« Last Edit: January 11, 2018, 05:15:07 pm by Cyberdragon »
*BZZZZZZAAAAAP*
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Offline McBryce

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #463 on: February 23, 2018, 09:54:52 am »
Has this humdinger been mentioned here before?

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/without-fuel-generator-tesla-on-4-kw#/

If any Ukrainians here have a moment to spare, it would be nice to know the general basis of his technical explaination  :-DD

McBryce.
30 Years making cars more difficult to repair.
 
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Offline Richard Crowley

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #464 on: February 23, 2018, 03:06:41 pm »
That "without-fuel-generator" has a feature I have never seen in the crowd-source arena before.

For $500K (50% off the original offer of $1M!) they will "close all activities and the spread of technology until 2030."   :-DD
 
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Offline Cyberdragon

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #465 on: February 23, 2018, 07:16:37 pm »
Wow, they are REALLY stupid free energy nuts! They don't even know how to use Indiegogo right! The project description is entirely just the template (IE it's really just blank). :-DD

I don't think this will last long before it gets removed.
*BZZZZZZAAAAAP*
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Offline Godzil

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #466 on: March 02, 2018, 02:17:39 pm »
That's also show how much IGG check the project before they can run live...
When you make hardware without taking into account the needs of the eventual software developers, you end up with bloated hardware full of pointless excess. From the outset one must consider design from both a hardware and software perspective.
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Offline beenosam

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #467 on: March 03, 2018, 07:34:18 pm »
Wow, they are REALLY stupid free energy nuts! They don't even know how to use Indiegogo right! The project description is entirely just the template (IE it's really just blank). :-DD

I don't think this will last long before it gets removed.

I don't know what's with all this weird stupid wrong free energy stuff lately. Why do people keep trying the same failed stupid ideas and deceiving people. People need to do more research into stuff before they buy it.
 

Offline ikrase

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #468 on: March 05, 2018, 06:26:08 am »
I think that there's been kind of a resurgence of optimistic enthusiasm about both clean energy and general advanced technology. Sadly, this enthusiasm tends to peak much more rapidly than actual research-development-production-deployment.

This also goes together with a few actual recent achievements: the smartphone revolution of the last ten years, SpaceX doing what NASA and the USSR never were able to achieve, electric cars seeming to become a thing, the EMdrive managing to intrigue people enough that non-crackpots will spend money testing it. Plus the appearance of a bunch of consumer products (thermal cameras, etc) that previously were only available at high, even military prices.

I think that this stuff leads to some less-well-educated people believing in amazing, impossible things like smartphone chargers that charge your phone in five seconds (without exploding it), the WashWow, and "without fuel" engines.

 

Offline PlainName

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #469 on: March 05, 2018, 08:33:56 am »
I agree with most of what you say, except for:

Quote
some less-well-educated people

Do you mean "not educated in physics"? I am sure there are well-educated people around that get sucked in (and, of course, relatively un-educated people see this stuff coming a mile 1.6km off).

Perhaps it's a question of gullibility on the part of one, and the gift of the gab on the part of the other.
 

Offline IanMacdonald

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #470 on: May 10, 2018, 06:04:43 pm »
I think that there's been kind of a resurgence of optimistic enthusiasm about both clean energy and general advanced technology. Sadly, this enthusiasm tends to peak much more rapidly than actual research-development-production-deployment.

More, I think, an intensive propaganda campaign intended to counteract the USA's withdrawal from climate policies. The worrying thing is that propaganda works, and the surprising thing is that people don't seem to be too worried that the propaganda comes from the selfsame corporations selling the 'green energy' products. Or else, from NGOs in their pay. In any other case, people would be suspicious of the motive behind the claims.

There have even been cases of these corporations setting up fake activist websites to encourage the public to campaign for their products. Imagine if a soap powder manufacturer did likewise. Suppose they then claimed than their soap was the only kind able to save the planet from pollution, and that therefore laws had to be enacted compelling everyone to buy their product. I don't think that would fool many people. Yet, when it's renewables, it's believed without question. Why?  :-//

A recent EU announcement indicates that EU CO2 emissions increased in 2017, over 2016. That shows just how well this is working, I think.
 

Offline Dave3

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #471 on: May 21, 2018, 04:33:26 pm »
How about some 3D headphones from OSSIC?

Total of $6 million raised from Kickstarter, Indiegogo and others will vaporise per techcrunch. (EDIT -Over $3  million from Kickstatrer and Indegogo total & over $3 million from "investors").

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/248983394/ossic-x-the-first-3d-audio-headphones-calibrated-t
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/ossic-x-immersive-3d-audio-headphones-vr#/
https://www.ossic.com/
http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/business/technology/sd-fi-ossic-failure-20180521-story.html
https://www.head-fi.org/threads/buy-ossic-x-or-not.799484/
https://techcrunch.com/2018/05/20/after-tens-of-thousands-of-pre-orders-high-end-3d-headphones-startup-ossic-disappears/


_________________

A Very Sad goodbye.

Hello Backers,

It is with an extremely heavy heart that we must inform you that OSSIC is shutting down and will be unable to deliver the remaining OSSIC X headphones.

The OSSIC X was an ambitious and expensive product to develop. With funds from the crowdfunding campaign, along with angel investment, we were able to develop the product and ship the initial units. However, the product still requires significantly more capital to ramp to full mass production, and the company is out of money.
Over the last 18 months, we have explored a myriad of financing options, but given VR’s slow start and a number of high profile hardware startup failures, we have been unable to secure the investment required to proceed.
This was obviously not our desired outcome. The team worked exceptionally hard and created a production-ready product that is a technological and performance breakthrough. To fail at the 5 yard-line is a tragedy. We are extremely sorry that we cannot deliver your product and want you to know that the team has done everything possible including investing our own savings and working without salary to exhaust all possibilities.

The OSSIC X was started as a campaign to create immersive and interactive audio. One of the biggest questions was, in a world of small earbuds and phone speakers, do people really care about good audio? Are they truly interested in the next generation of 3D audio? The success of the campaign was a resounding “YES” that has had a ripple in the audio industry.
We will forever be grateful to you and the team members, investors, and business partners who believed in us and helped give our dream a fighting chance. We were able to achieve some amazing things in an industry that was, and still is, ripe for innovation. Your voice of support throughout these past 2 years will continue to bring change to the industry, as bigger players than us refocus their efforts into better, smarter, and more immersive audio.

Thank you for all of your support, and we sincerely apologize that we could not deliver all of the headphones.

- OSSIC Team
 
---------
More information:
What was accomplished on the project and how were the crowdfunding funds used?
After spending over 2 years working on the Research and Development of the OSSIC X we were able to complete the development of the hardware and initial versions of the software.
The headphone went through 5 proof-of-concept level builds, 4 engineering/factory builds, and 1 pilot production build—where we completed 250 units and delivered the first ones to those backers on Kickstarter who pledged for the innovator edition reward.
It took, at times, 20 people with expertise in software, electrical, firmware, mechanical, acoustical, signal processing, and sound engineering, as well as UI/UX, industrial design, and program management to develop and ship those units.
The crowdfunding money we received played a huge role in allowing us to get as far and accomplish as much we did – funding half of the R&D and production costs needed to bring the product to life.
 
Why was this so expensive to develop?
Inventing something new while also developing complex hardware is expensive. The addition of stretch-goals to add mobile support increased the software scope from two operating systems to five, added an incredibly powerful 32-core processor onboard the headphones for processing, and required us to enter into substantial business development with mobile manufacturers to support multi-channel connectivity. It ultimately doubled the size of our development.
The unknowns that come from grounds-up development with so many new features ultimately stacked up to create delays and cost overruns.
What made this project so exciting, and ultimately ended up being its Achilles heel, was the complexity and scope. This project was complex because it had 3 large categories of development, all with new and unique elements: 1.) Hardware, 2.) Software, and 3.) Audio Ecosystem.
Hardware new/unique/different features: A typical headphone would only have 2 playback transducers, but the X has 8 playback transducers, 6 microphones, and multiple sensors. In addition to the complexity of more elements, head-tracking was a new feature, yet the trackers on the market were too slow. Thus we needed to upgrade mid-stream to achieve smooth tracking.
The software was complex because it required new algorithms to dynamically incorporate sensor information and beamform across the playback transducers. Additionally, with the stretch goals, we needed to support 5 different platforms: embedded-DSP, Windows, macOS, iOS, and Android for both UI and custom signal processing. A typical headphone has no software at all. The initial headphone units successfully incorporated custom algorithms and played back over Windows, macOS, and 3.5mm platforms. The iOS and Android app were created and were were on track to be finalized after working through the UI/UX with Beta backers on Windows and macOS.
Additionally, the audio ecosystem itself is complex as 3D audio continues to rapidly changing/developing. VR, gaming, film, and music workflows are different, with tools and formats varying across sectors, and VR/AR workflows were still being defined as we developed. 3D audio information is present in much of the media, but remained inaccessible to the user. Our goal was to ensure compatibility with as many devices as possible, and to give the best experience required ecosystem development and exploration of developer tools. To that end, developer tools including a VST plugin and FMOD Plugin were created, and released in beta to select developers.
 
How have other companies crowdfunding complex hardware projects succeeded?
Most crowdfunded companies working on similar complex hardware such as Oculus, and Doppler labs have raised >$10 Million in other investment before delivering on their projects.
As another reference, Creative labs claims to have spent over $100M working on 3D audio. http://www.businesstimes.com.sg/companies-markets/creative-brings-3d-sound-to-headphones-after-us100m-rd
 
Why can’t you ship the remaining units?
We were not able to secure additional funding, and are out of money. It would take more than 2 million additional dollars to complete mass production of the remaining backlog.
 
What about other investment?
OSSIC raised substantial Seed Investment from sources other than crowdfunding. Crowdfunding represented about half of total funding.
Initial investment traction was strong, but the slower than expected adoption of VR and the failure of several high-profile crowdfunded hardware companies made it challenging for us to raise subsequent financing.
We explored over 150 investor partnerships in total. While we had some we thought were going to come together, ultimately they did not materialize.
 
What about StartEngine?
In February of this year, OSSIC launched a crowdfunded equity campaign on the StartEngine platform, hoping it could raise the initial funds to start mass production, and be a catalyst for broader investment. While we secured $130k in commitments, it was not enough interest for us to be able to move forward into production and so we ended the campaign without taking the funds.
 
What about OSSIC the company?
The company is shutting down effective immediately. We have a very dedicated team up folks who have remained for the last 6 months, working for free, doing anything they could to try and make the company succeed. Through their efforts we were at least able to ship the innovator units.
 
Can’t someone else build the product?
We engaged with many larger companies who had interest in our technology, but ultimately none of them had both the appetite and ability to make the required investment to bring the product to market.
« Last Edit: May 22, 2018, 04:47:24 am by Dave3 »
 

Offline krho

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #472 on: May 21, 2018, 05:34:05 pm »
The kickstarter and other cloud funding platforms should change the rules that if they don't deliver, what they developed MUST be released in the public domain if they managed to get the patents the patent should also be given under public domain.
 
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Offline ez24

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #473 on: May 21, 2018, 10:16:29 pm »
YouTube and Website Electronic Resources ------>  https://www.eevblog.com/forum/other-blog-specific/a/msg1341166/#msg1341166
 
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Offline Dave3

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Re: List of Dodgy Crowd Source Funded Projects
« Reply #474 on: May 22, 2018, 03:26:29 am »
Recently, Ossic tried to raise capital on "StartEngine", which publishes some dodgy offering memos (OM) which are worth reading.

In the OM financial statements, Ossic claims to have blown through about $4.3 million in 2015 and 2016 combined. Those expenses were divided roughly: 50% marketing (!!!), 25% admin, 25% R&D.

As Ossic raised over $6 million, I suppose the remaining millions were burned in 2017 and 2018 . . .

https://www.startengine.com/ossic
https://d19j0qt0x55bap.cloudfront.net/production/startups/ossic/documents/offering_details/Ossic_Offering_Document_V5.pdf
https://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/browse-edgar?CIK=0001731373&owner=exclude&action=getcompany&Find=Search
« Last Edit: May 22, 2018, 03:37:47 am by Dave3 »
 


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