I too got a letter from the Illinois AG saying they're looking in to it. I'm talking to a lawyer myself to file in small claims and plan on having it filed in February. Hopefully the Illinois AG will have some action at that time. I think I'm going to update the VA AG whom I contacted to let them know Illinois is investigating and seeing what they can do now.
"I also received a letter from the Illinois AG stating that they are investigating now."
Excellent, about time. A failed project is one thing, but showing no evidence of a product - that was marketed to us as complete and only in need of funds for mass production - no evidence of more than a handful of parts and no third party investigation into their accounts. That's not only against KS TOS but just outright criminal
It's a New Year...how about you start it out right by sending us an update? Like many on this thread, I doubt I am getting any money back, but that doesn't mean you don't owe all of us some level of transparency as to what is gonig on. Just be a human for a second and own up to your responsibilities to the people who believed in you. We all signed up for the risk with you, but you are leaving us hanging on some closure.
This is becoming comical. It is because of these pathetic crooks that I will never back another project anywhere. It is refreshing to see how easy it is to steal money from people using the internet. As far as I am concerned, KickStarter themselves are to blame as well for this. They have to know how angry people are but yet they do nothing.
It doesn't surprise me that there have been no updates or communication for 6 months. Ever since this project was funding the communication has been haphazard at best and incredibly delayed (even by their own promises) / misleading at worst. Sure ending up with a product is at best an educated gamble, but the lack of transparency and communication by the campaign owners is appalling and I'm quite sure in conflict with Kickstarters own terms of service.
KICKSTARTER needs to take some responsibility. So far all they have done with this project is temporarily ban a few people from commenting.
Here are some contact details for kickstarter:
https://www.kickstarter.com/contact… Then - My Pledges > Choose CST01 > Reward > Creator Accountability
Template Response
Subject:
Unsatisfactory Resolution to project
Details:
6 Months ago was the last communication from Dave & Jerry the campaign owners of CST-01. They suggested resolutions to the project. There has been no follow up as to which resolution was chosen and if any progress has been made.
Since launch the communication of this project, whether in comments or updates, has been haphazard at best and misleading at worst. There have been inconsistencies in their updates notably 'Shipping' was said to have started in January last year and yet there is only one reported delivery that I've heard of.
Please investigate this project as there are many more then myself who are looking for closure and disappointed with Kickstarter's lack of intervention in this matter.
Please people, the squeaky wheel gets the grease - contact the Illinois AG now. The more of us that do, the more likely they are to take this seriously.
I also received a letter from the Illinois AG stating that they are investigating now. Sorry, I haven't been around for the past few months, had some personal things to take care of. Let's keep this thing going!
Everyone, if you haven't already done so please fill out complaints to the Illinois Attorney General and FTC.
Illinois Attorney General Consumer Complaint On-Line Submission Form: https://ccformsubmission.ilattorneygeneral.net/
CST, I would like to get my product or a refund on my money. Alternatively, I've noticed there's an opportunity to take you to small claims. If you do not send me the finished product or a refund by January 31st, 2016. I will be looking into going to small claims and will encourage everyone else to do the same. You have my information on file. Get to it. Renata
@Clint, Kickstarter walked away with their sizeable chunk of change, they don't care. They profit off of all of the fraud on here and then throw their hands up they can't do anything about it.
Honestly, I've come to terms with not receiving my product but if I were these guys I'd make some kind of effort and good faith gesture in printed/video form. Literally anything. I have the van pic burned into my head instead.
So Kickstarter, any chance of running a similar investigation into CST?
There's 7,000 backers here who know that we are 99.99% unlikely to receive our "rewards" and who have also seen an abject lack of transparency, particularly in 2015 starting with the "We are Shipping" update, continuing with the farce that was the "Finances" update (we all remember that pie chart don't we) and culminating with the promise to, at the very least, make all details of the product available to the backers in the "Parting with Flextronics" update in June - which coincidentally was the last time we heard from the creators.
So Kickstarter, how about it?
Or was the $1m raised for this project not sizeable enough to warrant the same attention as the Zano project?
@Johannes, thanks for posting that story. The person quoted about lawsuits seems to forget about the concept of small claims court. The company still has physical assets, they can be liquidated and some money recouped.
I plan on filing my lawsuit in January for the amount pledged plus court costs.
That being said, if someone knows a lawyer who wants to make some easy money. This would be a good class action lawsuit. This is a pretty open and shut case to win since their embellishments/lies are well documented.
Actually, you probably have a good chance in small claims court. The likelihood these jokers would show up would be small, so there'll be a default judgement for you. It'd all be compounded too, time, energy, your pledge. The court will go after them personally at that point, no hiding from that.
In the stock market people are accountable and have to show you some data. They can be sued for lying to their investors.
Saying the product is almost ready to go when it isn't might qualify for lying. Not showing where the funds went could make one assume they pocketed it. Both not acceptable in the stock market or any other market for that matter.
Funded 3 Kickstarters 3 years ago was it? 1 has delivered. I suppose this the reality of this type of thing. If you are not doing another hipster pen, moneyclip, water bottle, etc. this is the most likely result.
Not really blaming you guys. Accepted the risk when funded this. People think this place is like a store, in fact it is more like investing in stock marker. May come up top or just loose the cash.
Close the company declare bankruptcy and take the experience and develop something new.
Nope another KS that pulled similar shit just had the AG bring a case up against them last week. All is takes is everyone to file a complaint, people were calling weekly trying to make it happen.The KS is Radiate athletics and like this campaign i dont expect to get my money back however i do expect these two the pay for their fraud and show where the money went.
As for those asking about the AG, I believe their hands are tied because CST used Kickstarter, which as we know is a crowd sourcing service with absolutely no protections for backers and incredible protections for creators (including scammers like these two failures). The AG did write back to me to say they tried repeatedly to contact CST to no avail. Those dudes are in full-on hiding mode. The AG encouraged a class-action, and noted that their failure to respond could help the lawsuit.
Wow. As others have posted, this is very similar, but far more immersive. They've asked for/received a quarter of the money CST did. Their design is not predicated on the "worlds thinnest" gimmick, which, supposedly, if CST ever really was making this, is where most of their issues arose.
The CST project was such a joke looking back. These guys should be in jail for fraud.
At this stage, I would be happy with just an honest, detailed account of everything that lead to the failure of this project. It is extremely disappointing to see the creators continually pussy foot around the issue of this project failing to come to fruition. Just own up to it and tell us the truth.
How you manage to burn through a million is beyond me.... Granted KS walked away with 102,000 of it.
Sadly this isn't the only product that has failed - I will NEVER back a KS project again (at least one that hasn't secured everything down to production)
I would like to think that these guys feel remorseful.
Gents - we need to be louder complaining to KS - from yet another failed campaign that made the news...
..
Dear Zano backers:
We've heard from many of you in the wake of the Zano project's failure, and we've been reading your comments. Like you, we’re extremely frustrated by what’s happened with this project.
We learned the news of the Zano bankruptcy the same way that you did — through a bare-bones project update. We emailed the creators as recently as two weeks ago to encourage them to be more communicative with their backers, but received only a cursory response.
You deserve more than that, and we are committed to helping backers get to the bottom of what happened here.
Finding out what happened
Today we sent an email to the Zano team informing them of their obligations to backers, and asking them to share an open and transparent update on what happened with the project. We have asked them to post this update by Monday, November 30th.
If they do not adequately brief backers by that time, Kickstarter will independently pursue an inquiry into the Zano project. Should this occur, we will share those findings with you, the backers, once completed.
Kickstarter’s terms
Kickstarter’s Terms of Use set up an agreement between creators and backers that outlines what is supposed to happen if a creator is unable to complete their project. This agreement requires the creator to come forward and explain what happened and how funds were used, and to offer any remaining funds to backers. (Kickstarter does not issue refunds — the creator does so if there’s money left.) You can read this agreement in full here.
As of now, the Zano creators have failed to meet these obligations. And as our terms state, this failure can subject them to legal action by backers. In addition, creators who fail to fulfill, and who fail to meet Kickstarter’s expectations of transparency, are not permitted to launch further projects. The creators of Zano will not be allowed to launch another project on Kickstarter.
Failure is a possibility whenever someone tries to create something new. With open communication, this can be an unfortunate but acceptable outcome. But failure without honesty and transparency for backers is unacceptable. We are determined to help backers get the full account that they're entitled to and deserve.
Thank you for your time, and for being a member of the Kickstarter community.
CST- we all learned valuable lessons...so be it. Now it's time for resolution. You havea a lot of money, patience and good will from this crew. It's hard to be respectful when there are no updates for some time.
[Watches tumbleweed drift past – gives a sigh and moves on]. And I funded two of the things – my only error of judgement on Kickstarter so far, but a doozy.
I'd like to remind everyone asking why the Illinois Attorney General isn't doing anything to help, Illinois is having some budget issues at the moment, the state is a little short on money. At the end of the day the AG looked at how much money they could possibly recover, and how much it would cost them to pursue the claim, chances are it is a negative number, as in it would cost the AG more than they would get from any outcome.
It's over people, move on.
They are having a great time - traveled all over the world, collect 1 million plus, get away with fraud by ignoring the AG and continue their lives like nothing happened so whats the problem.
These guys are not concerned about this, they have moved on with new jobs and full bank accounts.
Surprise surprise, no update yet. These guys are scum and I hope they are living miserable lives right now. Hopefully they aren't enjoying our money and are truly broke. I would love to see them living under a bridge begging for money.
I can't believe people aren't posting here more angrily! How could two guys possibly spend $1,000,000 + investments and not provide proof of anything close to that kind of cost.
@Morgan Shieh I really wouldn't put any faith in that, that's EXACTLY like an e-ink wrist band project I've seen before, I wouldn't even consider investing in that.
The Tago braclet, $105,000 raised for a $40,000 project.
Closed March 2015, still taken "pre-orders", check the comments, surprise surprise, not a word and everyone has been let down
Creator Brett Schenker 5 days ago
I too got a letter from the Illinois AG saying they're looking in to it. I'm talking to a lawyer myself to file in small claims and plan on having it filed in February. Hopefully the Illinois AG will have some action at that time. I think I'm going to update the VA AG whom I contacted to let them know Illinois is investigating and seeing what they can do now.
Creator Jamie O'Rourke 6 days ago
"I also received a letter from the Illinois AG stating that they are investigating now."
Excellent, about time. A failed project is one thing, but showing no evidence of a product - that was marketed to us as complete and only in need of funds for mass production - no evidence of more than a handful of parts and no third party investigation into their accounts. That's not only against KS TOS but just outright criminal
Creator Erik Verbeek on January 4
It's a New Year...how about you start it out right by sending us an update? Like many on this thread, I doubt I am getting any money back, but that doesn't mean you don't owe all of us some level of transparency as to what is gonig on. Just be a human for a second and own up to your responsibilities to the people who believed in you. We all signed up for the risk with you, but you are leaving us hanging on some closure.
Creator David P. Polce on January 2
This is becoming comical. It is because of these pathetic crooks that I will never back another project anywhere. It is refreshing to see how easy it is to steal money from people using the internet. As far as I am concerned, KickStarter themselves are to blame as well for this. They have to know how angry people are but yet they do nothing.
Creator Thurstan Hethorn on January 2
It doesn't surprise me that there have been no updates or communication for 6 months. Ever since this project was funding the communication has been haphazard at best and incredibly delayed (even by their own promises) / misleading at worst. Sure ending up with a product is at best an educated gamble, but the lack of transparency and communication by the campaign owners is appalling and I'm quite sure in conflict with Kickstarters own terms of service.
KICKSTARTER needs to take some responsibility. So far all they have done with this project is temporarily ban a few people from commenting.
Here are some contact details for kickstarter:
https://www.kickstarter.com/contact…
Then - My Pledges > Choose CST01 > Reward > Creator Accountability
Template Response
Subject:
Unsatisfactory Resolution to project
Details:
6 Months ago was the last communication from Dave & Jerry the campaign owners of CST-01. They suggested resolutions to the project. There has been no follow up as to which resolution was chosen and if any progress has been made.
Since launch the communication of this project, whether in comments or updates, has been haphazard at best and misleading at worst. There have been inconsistencies in their updates notably 'Shipping' was said to have started in January last year and yet there is only one reported delivery that I've heard of.
Please investigate this project as there are many more then myself who are looking for closure and disappointed with Kickstarter's lack of intervention in this matter.
Creator Kelvin Kam on December 31
We have funded for 3 years already, please refund or send us the watch quickly!!!
Creator Patricia B on December 29
Please people, the squeaky wheel gets the grease - contact the Illinois AG now. The more of us that do, the more likely they are to take this seriously.
Creator Jordan on December 28
I also received a letter from the Illinois AG stating that they are investigating now. Sorry, I haven't been around for the past few months, had some personal things to take care of. Let's keep this thing going!
Everyone, if you haven't already done so please fill out complaints to the Illinois Attorney General and FTC.
Illinois Attorney General Consumer Complaint On-Line Submission Form: https://ccformsubmission.ilattorneygeneral.net/
FTC Complaint: https://www.ftccomplaintassistant.gov Select "Internet services, online shopping, or computers" then "Online shopping"
Seller/Provider: Dave Vondle and Jerry O'Leary doing business as Central Standard Timing
Address: 3039 W Fullerton Ave # 2
Chicago, IL 60647-2807
Creator Patricia B on December 28
Just got a response from the Attorney General of Illinois saying "Currently, we are checking into the activities you described."
Creator Maikel Lodewijk on December 21
LoL @Renata
Creator Renata Phillippi on December 20
CST, I would like to get my product or a refund on my money. Alternatively, I've noticed there's an opportunity to take you to small claims. If you do not send me the finished product or a refund by January 31st, 2016. I will be looking into going to small claims and will encourage everyone else to do the same. You have my information on file. Get to it. Renata
Creator Renata Phillippi on December 20
You guys may want to add comments to this site: http://kickscammed.com/project/cst-01-worlds-thinnest-watch
Creator Brett Schenker on December 15
@Clint, Kickstarter walked away with their sizeable chunk of change, they don't care. They profit off of all of the fraud on here and then throw their hands up they can't do anything about it.
Creator Martin Buber on December 14
i still want one cst!! any chance to get hands on?
Creator Juan Sanchez on December 14
Honestly, I've come to terms with not receiving my product but if I were these guys I'd make some kind of effort and good faith gesture in printed/video form. Literally anything. I have the van pic burned into my head instead.
Creator Clint Bridges on December 12
“It's okay for Kickstarter creators to take on big ideas and fail, but we expect transparency and honesty along the way,” - Kickstarter spokesperson David Gallagher.
http://motherboard.vice.com/read/kickstarter-is-funding-investigative-journalism-about-a-failed-kickstarter…
So Kickstarter, any chance of running a similar investigation into CST?
There's 7,000 backers here who know that we are 99.99% unlikely to receive our "rewards" and who have also seen an abject lack of transparency, particularly in 2015 starting with the "We are Shipping" update, continuing with the farce that was the "Finances" update (we all remember that pie chart don't we) and culminating with the promise to, at the very least, make all details of the product available to the backers in the "Parting with Flextronics" update in June - which coincidentally was the last time we heard from the creators.
So Kickstarter, how about it?
Or was the $1m raised for this project not sizeable enough to warrant the same attention as the Zano project?
Creator Brett Schenker on December 10
@Johannes, thanks for posting that story. The person quoted about lawsuits seems to forget about the concept of small claims court. The company still has physical assets, they can be liquidated and some money recouped.
I plan on filing my lawsuit in January for the amount pledged plus court costs.
Creator Johannes on December 10
Was this story posted yet?
http://www.chicagotribune.com/bluesky/originals/ct-central-standard-timing-kickstarter-legal-bsi-20150717-story.html
Creator Brett Schenker on December 7
That being said, if someone knows a lawyer who wants to make some easy money. This would be a good class action lawsuit. This is a pretty open and shut case to win since their embellishments/lies are well documented.
Creator Brett Schenker on December 7
Actually, you probably have a good chance in small claims court. The likelihood these jokers would show up would be small, so there'll be a default judgement for you. It'd all be compounded too, time, energy, your pledge. The court will go after them personally at that point, no hiding from that.
Creator Erlend Eelmets on December 7
You are right. It was a poor comparison on my part.
Creator J S on December 6
In the stock market people are accountable and have to show you some data. They can be sued for lying to their investors.
Saying the product is almost ready to go when it isn't might qualify for lying. Not showing where the funds went could make one assume they pocketed it. Both not acceptable in the stock market or any other market for that matter.
Creator Erlend Eelmets on December 5
Funded 3 Kickstarters 3 years ago was it? 1 has delivered. I suppose this the reality of this type of thing. If you are not doing another hipster pen, moneyclip, water bottle, etc. this is the most likely result.
Not really blaming you guys. Accepted the risk when funded this. People think this place is like a store, in fact it is more like investing in stock marker. May come up top or just loose the cash.
Close the company declare bankruptcy and take the experience and develop something new.
Creator Russell Johnson on December 4
still waiting for plan C - send my parts!!
Creator Alex on December 1
and on top of that it was also on the TV show american makers
Creator Alex on December 1
Nope another KS that pulled similar shit just had the AG bring a case up against them last week. All is takes is everyone to file a complaint, people were calling weekly trying to make it happen.The KS is Radiate athletics and like this campaign i dont expect to get my money back however i do expect these two the pay for their fraud and show where the money went.
Creator SC on November 30
As for those asking about the AG, I believe their hands are tied because CST used Kickstarter, which as we know is a crowd sourcing service with absolutely no protections for backers and incredible protections for creators (including scammers like these two failures). The AG did write back to me to say they tried repeatedly to contact CST to no avail. Those dudes are in full-on hiding mode. The AG encouraged a class-action, and noted that their failure to respond could help the lawsuit.
Creator SC on November 30
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/eyecatcher-smartband/eyecatcher-the-smart-large-display-super-charged-w/comments
Wow. As others have posted, this is very similar, but far more immersive. They've asked for/received a quarter of the money CST did. Their design is not predicated on the "worlds thinnest" gimmick, which, supposedly, if CST ever really was making this, is where most of their issues arose.
The CST project was such a joke looking back. These guys should be in jail for fraud.
Creator Darcy Yarrow on November 26
At this stage, I would be happy with just an honest, detailed account of everything that lead to the failure of this project. It is extremely disappointing to see the creators continually pussy foot around the issue of this project failing to come to fruition. Just own up to it and tell us the truth.
Creator JayMichael on November 25
I'd sign up for a class action lawsuit, or something or rather...
Creator Zach Hartpence on November 24
How you manage to burn through a million is beyond me.... Granted KS walked away with 102,000 of it.
Sadly this isn't the only product that has failed - I will NEVER back a KS project again (at least one that hasn't secured everything down to production)
I would like to think that these guys feel remorseful.
Creator John on November 23
Gents - we need to be louder complaining to KS - from yet another failed campaign that made the news...
..
Dear Zano backers:
We've heard from many of you in the wake of the Zano project's failure, and we've been reading your comments. Like you, we’re extremely frustrated by what’s happened with this project.
We learned the news of the Zano bankruptcy the same way that you did — through a bare-bones project update. We emailed the creators as recently as two weeks ago to encourage them to be more communicative with their backers, but received only a cursory response.
You deserve more than that, and we are committed to helping backers get to the bottom of what happened here.
Finding out what happened
Today we sent an email to the Zano team informing them of their obligations to backers, and asking them to share an open and transparent update on what happened with the project. We have asked them to post this update by Monday, November 30th.
If they do not adequately brief backers by that time, Kickstarter will independently pursue an inquiry into the Zano project. Should this occur, we will share those findings with you, the backers, once completed.
Kickstarter’s terms
Kickstarter’s Terms of Use set up an agreement between creators and backers that outlines what is supposed to happen if a creator is unable to complete their project. This agreement requires the creator to come forward and explain what happened and how funds were used, and to offer any remaining funds to backers. (Kickstarter does not issue refunds — the creator does so if there’s money left.) You can read this agreement in full here.
As of now, the Zano creators have failed to meet these obligations. And as our terms state, this failure can subject them to legal action by backers. In addition, creators who fail to fulfill, and who fail to meet Kickstarter’s expectations of transparency, are not permitted to launch further projects. The creators of Zano will not be allowed to launch another project on Kickstarter.
Failure is a possibility whenever someone tries to create something new. With open communication, this can be an unfortunate but acceptable outcome. But failure without honesty and transparency for backers is unacceptable. We are determined to help backers get the full account that they're entitled to and deserve.
Thank you for your time, and for being a member of the Kickstarter community.
Sincerely,
Kickstarter
Creator Brett Schenker on November 23
I'm looking in to small claims court. This is ridiculous.
Creator paul warren on November 22
me too wtf!!! this is bullshit!!
Creator Adnan Raja on November 18
What the hell ! ! ! !
I want my money back ! ! ! !
All 144$ of it, with interest ! ! ! !
Creator Alex on November 17
HEY CST YOU LOGGED IN YESTERDAY, how about you just being fucktards and tell us whats going on.
Creator paul120987 on November 15
Well, looks like they won since no one in the US is going to do anything about it.
Creator Iwona Krajewska-Kranas on November 15
I still want my money or my watch!
Creator John on November 11
@Erik - they gave up on us a long time ago - we funded a two year long party for them, and they have moved on.
Creator Erik Verbeek on November 3
CST- we all learned valuable lessons...so be it. Now it's time for resolution. You havea a lot of money, patience and good will from this crew. It's hard to be respectful when there are no updates for some time.
Creator Mark Wheadon on November 3
[Watches tumbleweed drift past – gives a sigh and moves on]. And I funded two of the things – my only error of judgement on Kickstarter so far, but a doozy.
Creator Brown Dog Gadgets on November 2
Well, their website is down. (Its was up earlier this summer, taking orders still.) Looks like their running for the hills.
Creator Rubén Barbero on October 31
Hey, I still want my money or my watch parts!
He didn't prove where the money was spent, that graph doesn't mean anything to me...
Creator W on October 27
I'd like to remind everyone asking why the Illinois Attorney General isn't doing anything to help, Illinois is having some budget issues at the moment, the state is a little short on money. At the end of the day the AG looked at how much money they could possibly recover, and how much it would cost them to pursue the claim, chances are it is a negative number, as in it would cost the AG more than they would get from any outcome.
It's over people, move on.
Creator Jamie O'Rourke on October 27
I'm baffled how people can ignore an Attorny General and it just goes away - what's the point of an AG if they can't enforce something?
Creator GWE on October 25
David:
They are having a great time - traveled all over the world, collect 1 million plus, get away with fraud by ignoring the AG and continue their lives like nothing happened so whats the problem.
These guys are not concerned about this, they have moved on with new jobs and full bank accounts.
Creator David P. Polce on October 25
Surprise surprise, no update yet. These guys are scum and I hope they are living miserable lives right now. Hopefully they aren't enjoying our money and are truly broke. I would love to see them living under a bridge begging for money.
Creator paul120987 on October 25
I can't believe people aren't posting here more angrily! How could two guys possibly spend $1,000,000 + investments and not provide proof of anything close to that kind of cost.
Creator Bert on October 24
same pledge than paul120987 ($100).
Creator Jamie O'Rourke on October 20
@Morgan Shieh I really wouldn't put any faith in that, that's EXACTLY like an e-ink wrist band project I've seen before, I wouldn't even consider investing in that.
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/tago-arc-one-e-ink-bracelet-with-endless-designs#/
The Tago braclet, $105,000 raised for a $40,000 project.
Closed March 2015, still taken "pre-orders", check the comments, surprise surprise, not a word and everyone has been let down