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Kickstarter campaign backed by Rob Thomas, Kristen Bell, and Warner Bros. $350K out of $2 million raised in under three hours. Pretty amazing.

This is awesome, though the idea of a multi-billion dollar company using Kickstarter is a little icky. Especially since the rewards aren't advance movie tickets, exactly, like they should be. You have to donate $100 to get a Blu-ray/DVD combo pack, really Warners?

If it were totally up to Warners, the film would never happen, like it hasn't been happening for years. Since there's no downside for them except further pissing off the show's fans if they said no, they've given this their blessing as a way to test the waters. If it works, it may become a sort of new version of the old foreign presales budgeting a few decades ago, where a low-budget project breaks even (at least on its production budget) before it's even shot based on fan presales. I'm definitely Impressed with the organization of the project and the amount of money they've raised so far. Check out the comments and you'll see how many fans from overseas have already donated to the Veronica Mars film in spite of the fact that due to Warners corporate policy and copyright restrictions they won't even be eligible to collect on some of their media-related rewards. I'm really just waiting for somebody like David Lynch to try this, a serious filmmaker with a hardcore worldwide fan base.

Given how quickly the donation numbers are growing to fund a 6-year-old TV show's move to the silver screen, using Kickstarter to fund other low-budget movies with a strong fanbase could gain traction. Maybe Shawn Ryan will see the success and follow through on his plans to use the site to fund a Terriers movie.

mfunk9786 wrote:You have to donate $100 to get a Blu-ray/DVD combo pack, really Warners?

To be fair you apparently also get everything else for the lesser donations as well (script copy, t-shirt, digital copy of film and such.)

In other words, junk I would never buy anyway. If there was a $25 tier that included a Blu-ray and nothing else, I would donate. As it stands now, eh. I'll just let other people fund it and buy the movie when it comes out.

It just went over $1 million.

Already seeing some interesting Twitter handwringing about the ethics and implications of a Kickstarter/corporate megalith marriage, almost all from people who want the movie, anyhow. As do I.

Well, I donated my $10. I've been waiting for this damn film for years. Not a chance it'll play in my town though.

mfunk9786 wrote:In other words, junk I would never buy anyway. If there was a $25 tier that included a Blu-ray and nothing else, I would donate. As it stands now, eh. I'll just let other people fund it and buy the movie when it comes out.

Agreed. But just pointing out it wasn't just the BD.

I do somewhat question the Kickstarter thing, though get why they're doing it (it's a way to prove interest.) What they should probably do, though, is treat you as an actual investor and promise a cut of the profits, no matter how miniscule.

cdnchris wrote:What they should probably do, though, is treat you as an actual investor and promise a cut of the profits, no matter how miniscule.

Indie filmmakers and other small start-up businesses have been trying to get the SEC to do this for years. The Obama administration seems to be for it in theory. Though it appears they are still working out the rules for how equity crowdfunding at this level would work, what the legal protections and obligations would be.

That's right, I recall reading about that somewhere.

cdnchris wrote:What they should probably do, though, is treat you as an actual investor and promise a cut of the profits, no matter how miniscule.

As they have always done with contracts specifying a cut of the profits (as opposed to a cut of the gross), Warner Bros. would make sure that the film never turns a profit.

I don't even need a cut of the profits, it's just bullshit to offer a PDF of the screenplay or a t-shirt in lieu of the opportunity to watch the movie at a reasonable price. Why pay to fund something you're going to need to pay again to see?

Matt wrote:

cdnchris wrote:What they should probably do, though, is treat you as an actual investor and promise a cut of the profits, no matter how miniscule.

As they have always done with contracts specifying a cut of the profits (as opposed to a cut of the gross), Warner Bros. would make sure that the film never turns a profit.

Yeah, but imagine if this Veronica Mars film had to face SEC disclosure and accounting rules. You may have hit on one big reason why equity crowdfunding might never appeal to projects that involve big corporate players. As much as they wouldn't want to play fair, they certainly wouldn't want to get sued by hundreds of thousands of angry investors.

mfunk9786 wrote:I don't even need a cut of the profits, it's just bullshit to offer a PDF of the screenplay or a t-shirt in lieu of the opportunity to watch the movie at a reasonable price. Why pay to fund something you're going to need to pay again to see?

What's the standard Kickstarter practice on this for actual indie films?

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mfunk9786 wrote:I don't even need a cut of the profits, it's just bullshit to offer a PDF of the screenplay or a t-shirt in lieu of the opportunity to watch the movie at a reasonable price. Why pay to fund something you're going to need to pay again to see?

Actually that would make more sense than some of the other stuff they offer.

You know what? Something tells me it never even occurred to them to give something like a free pass or two to the film for anyone that contributes.

I assume funders of this movie would want to see it on opening weekend, and many theaters don't accept passes for at least the first week of a film's run. Also, Kickstarter prohibits offering coupons, discounts, and cash-value gift cards as rewards, and I would imagine passes fall into that category.

EDIT: Also just noticed that they prohibit as rewards financial incentives (ownership, share of profits, repayment/loans, etc.), so there's that question answered, too.

If it occurred to them to record outgoing voicemail messages, it should have occurred to them that people probably wanted to see the film. $35 is the minimum price tier that results in the ability to see the film, "A few days after the release," as a digital copy. That's a lot of cash for a digital copy of a film, especially since a digital copy will have very little actual overhead per copy made/sent. It's cool that they're doing this, but it's bizarre to prioritize a PDF of the script and especially a t-shirt over the actual product being funded.

There's too many film-related Kickstarter projects completely being unable to see the wood for the trees. There's been several restorations where you can donate up to several thousand dollars for the highest tier and still don't get even a DVD of the damn thing, yet alone a Blu-ray, and the rest of the rewards have been an insult for the amount of money spent. It's the gaming sector, computer and tabletop, that seem to have used the system best until now. It's supposed to be a way in which you get people to put money in up front to help ease start-up costs and cash flow problems, not a charitable donation site.

Or ones like the Manos restoration that haven't even come close to delivering the product after being very generously funded. They promised a Blu-ray of the restoration of that film to donors of $50 or more in August of 2012, and it's March without a date even set, even though the product was funded by nearly 500% what was asked.

I'm just surprised that some larger companies haven't looked into getting people funding financially prohibitive restorations and the subsequent home video release through Kickstarter.

mfunk9786 wrote:Why pay to fund something you're going to need to pay again to see?

To try to get it done in the first place ?

Hey, if you just want to hand over your money to Warner Bros for a t-shirt or a PDF, be my guest.

Now that the $2 mil is a foregone conclusion, I'm curious as to what happens next. Do they set a higher goal, or just take whatever continues to trickle in? Will fans be motivated by the general idea of a bigger budget, or feel their mission is accomplished at $2M? That probably sounds like a fortune to casual fans but it's half the budget of one House of Cards episode. It could end up looking cheaper than the TV show did.

Lots of Kickstarters get overfunded. They can keep collecting money until the pledge period ends in a month.