BackerKit Crowdfunding Rules

We're cultivating a space where creators can build amazing things with their backers, and creativity and innovation thrive. We invite creators to bring forth and share a variety of projects, including games, gadgets, comics, art, crafts, events, and unique experiences.

Our guidelines aren’t meant to cover every possible way you could use BackerKit, but they lay out the ground rules for acceptable behavior and content. We review every project before it launches to ensure it aligns with our standards, and we reserve the right to determine whether a project is suitable for our platform.

By launching a project on BackerKit, you agree to follow these guidelines:

Creating something new

This could be an exclusive item for them or something you plan to release more widely—it’s up to you. Feel free to draw inspiration from past projects, but direct copying isn’t allowed.

Your account must be in good standing. 

If you’ve run crowdfunding projects before, either on BackerKit or another platform, we require evidence that you have either delivered rewards, or made substantial progress toward completing the project. It is in our discretion to disallow projects from creators that have not shipped rewards from past projects or have violated guidelines on another platform.

Honest and transparent project presentation and communications.

Be upfront about your goals, how you’ll achieve them, and any challenges you anticipate. Misleading information, misrepresentation, or attempts to manipulate backers or funding amounts are not allowed. Here are a few additional guidelines:

• Show your product as it exists now, including its capabilities and limitations. Avoid using CGI or special effects to depict features that don’t actually exist yet.
• Ensure all pledge rewards include only items that can be delivered if the base project goal is met. Stretch goal rewards or add-ons should only be offered once those funding levels have been achieved.
• Creators may not donate to their own project to bridge funding gaps, as this violates our Terms of Service and those of our payment processors.

Prohibited items, content, and activities:

• Offensive material (e.g., hate speech, calls to violence) or any content that promotes harm, discrimination, bigotry, or intolerance towards protected or marginalized groups
• Substances or products that are illegal, banned, or regulated (e.g. alcohol, narcotics, tobacco, paraphernalia, pharmaceuticals) and any medical practices, claims, treatment, equipment, or related paraphernalia
• Content that is, in our sole discretion, materially false, inaccurate, or misleading in a way that could deceive or confuse others about important events, topics, or circumstances.
• Weapons (e.g., knives, explosives, firearms), replicas of weapons, and weapon accessories
• Equity offers, returns on investment (ROI), money-processing, annuities, credit services, or cryptocurrencies
• Contests, coupons, gambling, raffles, or any activity with an entry fee
• Animals, livestock, produce, or any regulated food or drink items

These are also listed in our Terms of Service. Due to requirements applied by our payment partners, we are required to prohibit any content not listed here that may violate their Terms of Service.

If your project includes something that might be regulated or falls into a gray area, please reach out to our Trust & Safety team at trustandsafety@backerkit.com, and we’ll help clarify.

Avoid reselling products and duplicate projects

We do not allow creators to launch projects that are duplicates of those previously run or currently running on other crowdfunding platforms, or to repackage a previously-created product without adding anything new or aiming to iterate on the idea in any way. All rewards must have been produced or designed by the project or one of its creators. We do not permit reselling of items acquired elsewhere. 

Products that infringe on intellectual property rights are not permitted.

We do not allow any products or services that directly infringe or facilitate infringement upon the trademark, patent, copyright, trade secrets, proprietary or privacy rights of any third party. This includes the sales or distribution of music, movies, software, or any other licensed materials without appropriate authorization.

Raising funds solely for a political, charity, or nonprofit organization is not allowed.

Only funds that exceed the goal for a project’s budget that are intended for charity or NPOs may be permitted, and must be outlined on the project before launch. This must be clearly presented for backers, and cannot be added once the project has launched. Any intended recipients of funds raised are subject to review.

Your crowdfunding project must not contain content or assets solely created using generative AI tools.

“AI-generated content" refers to images, videos, and text crafted using artificial intelligence tools trained on pre-existing datasets. When uploading content as part of promotion and the final product of your project, we request that you follow these guidelines:

• The content and all of its assets must be originally created by a human
• AI tools are permissible for making adjustments to human-created content
• Adjustments made using AI tools must not significantly transform the final product to the point where the original human-created content is no longer distinguishable

Projects are allowed to include NSFW content.

Creators may include mature or “Not Safe For Work” (“NSFW”) content in their projects, such as text, images, or videos, which may depict violence, nudity, or sexual content. All content is subject to review and may be flagged or removed if it does not meet BackerKit or our payment processor’s guidelines for “prohibited items or activities", such as pornographic content.

You must use BackerKit's pledge manager post-campaign in order to fulfill your rewards.

In order to export your data cleanly for fulfillment, we require that you survey your backers via BackerKit's pledge management tool after the campaign.

Projects are expected to follow these guidelines after they have launched. 

If a project is suspected to be in violation of these guidelines after launching, our team may reach out to the creator and the project may be suspended or removed pending review.

If you are unsure if the content for your project meets these guidelines, please do not hesitate to get in touch with our team at trustandsafety@backerkit.com so that we may assist further. Our aim is to ensure that creators using BackerKit are informed about our guidelines, and, provided they adhere to them, are set up for success.