I’ve had a few requests from supporters of my current Shotguns & Sorcery Kickstarter to come up with a way for them to be able to get in on the original 12 for ’12 Kickstarter I ran for the Brave New World novels. On the face of it, that’s a great idea. I’d love to get more people to read the first trilogy, and I hate to penalize them for having missed word of it back when it was running. I want to encourage my readers to be enthusiastic, no matter when they jump on.
However, I want to make sure I remain fair to the people who did back the first project. They stepped up and backed those books, and I want to make sure they get everything they deserve for that. More to the point, I never want to make them feel like they should have waited for a better deal.
The best idea I have at the moment has its pros and cons. I call it “Respect the Streak.” It’s based around the idea of keeping the streak of funding all the books in each trilogy alive.
If we manage to unlock all three books for the Shotguns & Sorcery Kickstarter, which means raising $12k, then anyone who backs it at $50 or more would get the trilogy ebooks from the Brave New World Kickstarter added in for free. These ebooks will be the Kickstarter-backer editions, but they will not be autographed. That means you’d get those books earlier than the general public, and you’d get the limited editions, but you wouldn’t get my signature on them.
Does that seem cool? And more to the point, is it fair to earlier backers?
People who have pitched in $25 for each Kickstarter will get the autographed limited edition ebooks, so they have a bit of a bonus over the late-comers. They wouldn’t get the hardcopy book that comes at the $50+ levels that someone joining now gets, but if they pitch in $50 this time, they would not only get that but also a second set of ebooks they could give away.
Assuming I go with this, I’d probably do the same thing for the next two Kickstarters too, bumping the bonus level $25 each time.
So I’m turning to you. What should I do?
