Kickstarter by Schuyler Towne Update

[xeo]

I never considered lockpicking to be a sport. Instead I see it as an arcane craft for devious intellectuals and professional locksmiths or lockout companies (repo etc). Turning something arcane into a commercialized mainstream sport such as what these "figure head" clown fucks have done such as Mr. Toolbox Towne (who if caught by me IRL would be forced to shave his beard using a cheesegrader) derails it into lower quality rabble and it loses its potency by 90% atleast. Usually the general rule that I've noticed throughout my life is that the quality of something is inversely proportional to the level of its mainstream popularity.

[huxleypig]

I never considered lockpicking to be a sport. Instead I see it as an arcane craft for devious intellectuals and professional locksmiths or lockout companies (repo etc). Turning something arcane into a commercialized mainstream sport such as what these "figure head" clown fucks have done such as Mr. Toolbox Towne (who if caught by me IRL would be forced to shave his beard using a cheesegrader) derails it into lower quality rabble and it loses its potency by 90% atleast. Usually the general rule that I've noticed throughout my life is that the quality of something is inversely proportional to the level of its mainstream popularity.

So, so, so true! More mainstream = more shit.

One of my 'social equations' is the amount of time it takes to open a lock increases exponentially with the number of people watching!

[jeffmoss26]

Look what I found today!
http://hive.slate.com/hive/made-america ... t-lockpick

[abroxis]

Thanks for posting that update. I was wondering how the project was proceeding.

There are a lot of creative people who have no head for business and are not capable of the follow through.

Schuyler screwed up big time but hopefully his "friends" can help him sort the mess out.

Locksmith Army didn't over stretch and seems to have pulled it off.

[Alaphablue]

Why trust him to start with .spending other people's hard earned donations on you self makes you a weasel. how this weasel is the poster boy for lock sport confuses me what gave him this status . Who the he'll is this guy and why would people fork over 80 grand to him . When you don't work for the money the respect is obviously not there .

[rai]

A little perspective here, Kickstarter is a good idea that was supposed to do what wall street once was supposed to do by raising money for entreprenurs and new enterprise, now its just an insiders casino for hustling the suckers who still believe in it. As wall street went, so goes kickstarter.
investors believe in the business plan and they take a risk. its been happening since wall street started.
unfortunatly this guy didn't know anything about outsourcing to reliable suppliers. and he got a big head like every financier. you could loose a lot of money believing in an investment, but can you sue to get it back?

[piotr]

why do people keep calling the money backers gave an investment... when you buy groceries is that an investment...
a true investment gives me stock or some hold in the company... i did not invest in his company... i bought a set of his bicks before they were made...

i did the same thing with biolight... only difference is i actually got my camp stove... but i still have no stock in their company...

i did not invest in his company i bought a product... that is where the animosity comes from... if it were an investment and his company went under (which it did) i did get whay i payed for... i got my stock... it is just useless... but i did not buy stock... i bought picks...

backers are mad because they did not get what they payed for... not because they made a bad investment...

You are absolutely correct here LSA. Schuyler Towne was not rasing capital by selling equity in a company and to that extent there was no investment in the conventional sense of the term. For these reasons any comparison to venture capitalism and speculative investment is misplaced since there are no shares, no bonds and no debentures. He was essentially selling a product. The misplaced notion of "investment" I think originated from one paragraph in his original pitch:

I'm running this as a pre-sale to get the company started. The money you provide will net you the first run of these awesome tools and the profits will roll right back into the company allowing it to be self sustaining.-Schuyler Towne Jul 15, 2010

Here Towne is in effect saying, "You should buy picks from me instead of an existing commercial enterprise because I don't intend to operate at a personal profit. You money will go towards the establishment of a not-for-profit organisation which will provide high quality picks at a competitive price". He is providing an additional incentive -- namely the creation of a self-sustaining not-for-profit organisation -- to purchase picks from him. I think it is this idea, which implies a "psychological investment" (for the want of a better phrase) i.e. being part of a worthwhile project, which mistakenly leads people to think of "Open Locksport" in terms best suited to venture capital and private equity where the investors receive equity in the company in exchange for their funds. But this is a category mistake, facilitated by Towne's talk above of a "self sustaining" (sic) company. But when you strip away all of the guff (and it is guff as the turn of events has amply demonstrated) there is nothing more than a contract of sale consisting of picks and/or locks in exchange for money. He hasn't failed his investors -- there are no investors -- he has simply and unglamorously failed his customers. Just because he accepted orders and funds for a product that didn't exist at the time of the transaction doesn't render the transaction an investment. There are many business operations that require payment in full before a product is produced but no one says they are "investing" in these businesses.

[atticRR]

thats a damn shame. this guy is one of the reasons i got interested in picking- i may have donated if i would have known in time to do so. His presentation was so good- all the passion came through so clear that you just wanted to give the guy money. Its a damn shame he fucked it all off, he was on the brink of getting to follow his passion. Now his passion is sniffing around behind him hoping to sink some teeth into his ass...