Question
What are some significant pros and cons when launching a Kickstarter campaign? Are there any risks in terms of intellectual property protection? What about equity-based funding options?
Answers: 1 public & 0 private
Essentially Kickstarter is a pre-sale social networking platform so standard contractual arranges on the international sale of goods/services apply. Note that all of these sites ask you to supply your own social network, they can't market the product for you but it is a neutral mechanism for international pitching. However, one specific risk is that if an invention is offered to the public, it is barred from patent protection (some grace periods may apply depending on jurisdiction). As always, you need to make sure there are no infringement of your product on registered designs, competing trademarks or passing off, and have necessary copyright clearance if bundling embedded code.
Equity based crowd-investing is a completely different matter is and country-specific with quite stringent requirements so best ask your local lawyer.
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