I always try to make an excuse for Sony because they're broke but I still think its fucked up.

You're right on that and they're not asking for people to fund a product. I wonder how much it actually costs to entirely fund that FES watch. It's not possible for crowdfunding to fund it completely. It is literally a way to "test the waters" in a meaningful way versus just doing polls which are not reliable. We're more likely to see more innovative and risky products come to light with this approach versus never seeing anything because it died on the drawing board. 

"Oh, this idea for a product is risky."

"Maybe we shoudn't go with it then."

"Well, we could just see what happens with crowdfunding it and we'll know if it's worth the risk or not."

"That's a good idea. If they reach the goal we'll set for it, we'll take it to market."

 I didn't know that sheep could spend money. I guess you learn something new everyday.

uuugggghhhh ddddduuuuuudddddeeeee....read the OP man...It's only for ideas that employees come up with that otherwise wouldn't go anywhere. The alternative is these projects never seeing the light of day, like most companies do.

first you say Sony is a big cooperation then you turn around saying they are poor? Trust me this is a great concept and its allready praised by many in the Bussines Media, if Sony built its own Kickstarter platform this could be huge for them.

I think crowdfunding is better than what we have now.

For example. Look at EA whos closing down Maxis and shutting down the C&C free to play game without even asking the consumers? So this is the better model than crowdfunding? And Nintendo could also ask if people want to have another metroid or eathbound? I dont see these games happening currentley despite people saying they want them for the 1000ths of times since years.

Get it together VGChartz posters, these are products that are already mostly through R&D, these aren't early concepts, these are pretty much ready to go into production (all are ready to be shipped by november) - and mostlikely market research projected too low consumer interest for a full scale production, so they offer them to consumers via the site to organize a profitable low production run.

Additionally it's not a "Kickstarter", the products come with the full benefits of normal consumer products (guarantee, return policy etc) and there is no way to "pledge" more/less than the product is offered for (no donations).

Cool, I hope they fund my massive taco contraption. Time to get a job at Sony. LOL

Tell you what, the next person to refer to another person as a sheep, zombie or any other term related to that, wins a free ban.
This competitions forum wide, too, not limited to just this thread.

I'm happy that Sony wants to bring the ideas of their employees to the market but they clearly did not learn anything from the Shenmue 3 kickstarter.

What if a company came to you and asked for money to invest in a project because they feel it's too risky to invest their own money into it.  Does that seem cool to you?  Some people are going to say this is good for consumers and in some cases it is because there are many good products that wouldn't exist today without crowdfunding.  The problem at least to me is the prospect of large companies getting involved that have historically took on the risk of product development themselves. 

The consumer is basically taking a risk everytime they crowdfund something.  Now imagine if many large companies suddenly get involved with crowdfunding.  If the project goes bankrupt for whatever reason it's the crowdfunding people that are left holding the bag.  If the project is a huge success the company can swoop in and reap the benefits.  Basically it would be a way for large companies to get even richer at the expense of consumers.  It also puts pressure on competitors to do the exact same thing in order to remain competitive.

That's not the kind of World I'd want to live in and I doubt many people would want to either.  It's the reason the Shenmue 3 kickstarter really annoys me.  Don't get me wrong the guy behind it seems really cool it's just the fact that a large company is going to benefit from it (exclusivity, etc) and the deal was made beforehand that I don't like and I don't think it should have any place in crowdfunding.

The title of this thread is the reason so many people are seeing red. Before reading the OP my skin was crawling but after... I think this is a progressive and neat idea. Taking chances is Sony's jam with their games and it's awesome but doing so with hardware is kind of dangerous. The crowd funding is a solid way to gauge a market.