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Barry Ritholtz

Attention Suckers: Please Send Us Your Money

With Facebook acquiring virtual-reality company Oculus, one of the all time great sucker plays -- the “Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act,” signed by President Barack Obama on April 1, 2012 -- has been revealed as the massive bait-and-switch it is. 
Do they look like a crowd of discerning investors to you? Photographer: Robyn Beck/AFP/Getty Images
Do they look like a crowd of discerning investors to you? Photographer: Robyn Beck/AFP/Getty Images

"Those almost 10,000 early investors on Kickstarter participated in one of history's most lucrative funding rounds from the perspective of the people receiving the funding: a $2.4 million early-stage investment in what would become a $2 billion business in a year and a half, in return for 0.0% equity."

-- WSJ's Corporate Intelligence on Oculus's crowdsourced 2012 fund-raiser.