We are back!
We’ve been off the radar for long enough, so we wanted to let you all know why we were gone and why we are back.
You gave us a lot of enthusiastic moral support as a community, so we think it is fair to explain what made us take a break and how we will move forward.
First off, let’s go back to why we took a break.
We started our Kickstarter campaign in November, 2017, and were trying to raise 100,000€. This sum would have let us continue developing Rotate Network with a larger team. The success of the fundraising campaign was crucial to turning our dream of the network into a working reality.
We did not receive a single cent from the fundraising campaign. But wait, some of our community wanted to donate!
That’s absolutely true.
Our community, many thanks to you all, did promise to donate 10,000€ to the fundraising campaign. But, we used an all-or-nothing fundraising campaign. This type of campaign means that if we meet our goal, then the donations will be made. We did not receive enough pledges, and did not meet the goal of 100,000€, which is why nobody was charged anything and why we did not get any money.
In our eyes the Kickstarter campaign failed because the platform and the service it offers was not user- or campaign-friendly. To make things worse, the Kickstarter platform isn’t commonly used in Europe. At the same time, the image of Kickstarter projects is negative, and because of all of this we will most likely avoid trying to gather funding through a Kickstarter campaign. However, we could have done more.
We could have built up our community more before starting the Kickstarter campaign.
Alright, so what did we do after the fundraising campaign?
We had to gather our wits after the failed Kickstarter campaign. What this meant is what we wrote in our message before “going off the radar”. We took the time to think about changing the development of Rotate and our team.
We did this because we wanted to make Rotate Network a reality despite the huge financial setback. How will we do that now?
We decided to continue development by ourselves. It will basically be our internal company project while we work other jobs in order to finance Rotate Network ourselves. This means that the development process will be funded with our own money. In order to be transparent, the idea of adding a presale to the release or finding potential sponsors is also possible. We would let you know what we decide as we come to these decisions.
Another final word on money: We have a new payment model. There will be a free Beta-development phase. After the Beta, the Lifetime Buy-in Phase begins. Depending on whether this is sustainable we might add a subscription for new accounts later. We think it is important to tell you this so that we are all on the same page.
This time around we are looking for more active support from our community, because we are not planning on hiring additional staff. This means opportunities to become a more important member of the Rotate Network. This could be, for example, building and working with our growing community, helping to educate new members, and adding geographically relevant info. This is very open-ended, and we are open to working with you, the community, to find out how to include interested members in more active roles.
This is a chance for all members to play a bigger part in our community and network. You can build your own network without bureaucracy. We will reach out to you as soon as we need more help/support.
When it comes to release dates, we want one thing to be clearer than the skies under better than perfect conditions. Rotate Network will be released.
As we said above, many features presented during our campaign in 2017 won’t be part of the initial build. This means they will be added at a later date in the form of updates. These updates will be released over time so we can take the time to focus on releasing polished content.
We think that CD Projekt Red has the right idea. Available when it is ready is what we want you to think when you wonder when a feature will be available. The network will be released on Steam.
The whole development team thanks you from the bottom of our hearts. Without you, this project wouldn’t be worth it. Yes, you can pat yourself on the back right about now.
13.05.2019