I wonder why there isn’t money to keep the project alive?
From the description, it looks like a 2.6 x 2.8″ LCD with a high-sensitivity built-in microphone and an analog input output.
From my understanding, they will be manufactured on a production line using some sort of an automated manufacturing system, which may take several years to get off the ground and fully operational. They will have an MSRP of $399. I was given estimates of $300 to $400 for the LCD, which is quite nice given I’m not getting a ton for this build from it (though I’ll be getting a few things for free from the Kickstarter, which is nice).
The $399 is not for the LCD itself, but for the MEGA software. They estimate that we can make $50,000 selling software on the MEGA platform, which to my understanding, is based on using it for free for at least a couple of months. I have to question that figure because I’d be able to easily make that sort of money as a non-profit in no time at all. The MEGA software alone runs $100 every year. The money to purchase the software can be sourced for anywhere from free to hundreds of dollars from someone else or made by donating it. If the cost to me of the software was $100, and I donated $5, then those two donors I had in mind would give me an additional $6,000. That’s probably a good bit of a profit on the MEGA platform.
Since they are only making these devices to sell for the MEGA platform, I’m looking forward to a day when their MEGA software will be open source (as I understand it) so that we can build our own MEGA apps for the MEGA platform. That could be a pretty significant money-maker too, as MEGA is such an emerging computing platform in a way that the likes of ARM or a PC are not.
I have to admit that I like these devices and hope that someone else will get a good deal of interest in it. They might be priced fairly on their own and may even be cheaper than some of the Android devices out there. I’m thinking I’d have more time to use it if it were open source. I was hoping that they offered the software for free, and then made a couple thousand dollars as I developed something with it.
While I’m not excited about them, they certainly sound like devices
federal small business grants, free grant applications, dhhs program requirements, charities that help with mortgage payments, ahr grant