I like the idea, however Kickstarter may not be the best platform for this. Kickstarter is mainly for starting new products. Composr has already started. Maybe consider a Patreon instead. To elaborate:

Donations for every new minor version branch of Composr perhaps (eg. 10.X) as an option. Or, just go with the basic every month.

Patreon may be a good idea.

My main worries with Kickstarter are:
1) I don't want to create a situation where most of the incoming funds are going back out again in individual perks rather than product development.
2) We need to do ongoing work, but I don't want to have to spend a significant effort creating buzz for a kickstarter every 6 months. Again, it would seriously distract from product development.

I've seen Patreon doing really well lately, and I like how people are doing perks that are personal and exclusive, but sustainable.

For example, we could do:
1) Monthly hang out sessions
2) Advance access to new video tutorials
3) The ability to make tutorial requests and have them prioritised
4) The ability to mirror your patreon spend as sponsorship on the tracker (i.e. it's a regular sponsorship)
5) Or a combination of the above - live coding sessions, where elite funders could ask questions or make coding requests, as the coding happens - and then we put it all up on Youtube afterward.
6) Credits screen with the names of all patreons who were active during the development of that version
7) Having your website given free advertising
8) Having bug fixes and upgrades manually applied to your website (or automatically but with manual testing and monitoring of logs)
9) T-shirts (for example)
10) Direct video chat access to Chris for an hour a month
11) Some kind of uber-fame, where every time the website loads your name goes over the wire (maybe we name a variable in JS after you or something, lol)

We'd also need to define goals. Creating video tutorials. Being able to properly budget for doing marketing, e.g. switch campaigns to support people switching from other software. Being able to create a new version every x months.

FAQ would need updating as it says we don't take donations currently.

Levels...

$150/month
We put out a new tutorial every month, voted on by the community

$500/month
We have someone working half time building support material for Composr and doing promotion

$1000/month
We have someone working full time building support material for Composr and doing promotion

$2000/month
We have someone working full time building support material for Composr and doing promotion, plus every 3 months we will create an import solution for another CMS and do a "switch campaign" to Composr

$3000/month
A day a week spent implementing new functionality. We have someone working full time building support material for Composr and doing promotion

$6000/month
Chris Graham dedicates half his time working on Composr directly for the community. We have someone working full time building support material for Composr and doing promotion

$11000/month
Chris Graham works full time on Composr directly for the community. We have someone working full time building support material for Composr and doing promotion. Chris promises to average at least 8 hours per week day in IRC

$25000/month
We set up a foundation (a registered charity) that decides on all fund allocation democratically. Control of the compo.sr website will be handed over to the foundation also.

All funds go to Chris Graham directly rather than ocProducts Ltd, as this is charitable donation for the direct support of Composr CMS via Chris, not funding a for-profit company - Chris will administer the funds, paying other people as required. That is unless we hit the $25000/month mark, when we'll set up all the administration for a foundation to manage the money in a formal way.

Work done would be Open Source under the current licensing. Copyright would still be held by ocProducts Ltd (using copyright assignments) so that ocProducts is still able to sponsor the overall project and do commercial licensing arrangements.


Perks...

$10/month - your votes will count 10x on the tracker
(unlimited slots)

$20/month - you'll get an exclusive Composr CMS T-shirt (*)
(unlimited slots)

$30/month - you'll be listed on a sponsorship page on the compo.sr website. Link us to a tweet and we'll use this for you.
(100 slots only)

$50/month - you'll be listed as a sponsor within Composr itself. Link us to a tweet and we'll use this for you.
(100 slots only)

$100/month - participate in live coding sessions done as a Google Hangout, which will be turned into video tutorials for everyone to see. Ask questions as things go, or make suggestions.
(5 slots only)

$175/month - Uber-fame. Every cache-clean default Composr page load will have your name included somehow. Your name will be transmitting around the world constantly. For example, we'll use your name within the JavaScript within variable names.
(30 slots only)

$250/month - 4 tutorials will be clearly sponsored by you (you get to pick 1, the rest are assigned randomly)
(30 slots only)

$500/month - prime advertisement on a top level compo.sr page (excluding the front page). Ideal to give your business a prime spot in a relevant part of the compo.sr website.
(10 slots only)

$1000/month - front page advertisement on compo.sr. Ideal to show off your business as supporting Composr. We'll also send you a special cake to thank you, and promote it on our social networks.
(4 slots only)

* T-shirts will be shipped out in batches, every 3 months. You must be a patron for at least 3 months to qualify

All perks include ones on earlier levels, except:
a) the front page advertisement perk which doesn't include advertising on another page.
b) live coding sessions will only be available to those who directly went for that level or as per availability.

Perks only continue for as long as the Patreon sponsorship continues.

In the spirit of Open Source (openness and collaboration) we're not having content held back just to increase sponsorship. We also aren't passing out Chris's direct time to Patreons, as professional work needs dedicated attention and he's available for commercial work as required anyway - we want the time Patreon makes possible to go direct into Composr development.

There's no guarantee top voted stuff on the tracker will be implemented, but we will make a reasonable effort to prioritise this stuff.

We do have the right to change things around as we feel the need. Perks are to thank donators rather than being contractual on a permanent basis.


Checking perks add up:
1000*4+500*10+250*30+175*30+100*5+50*100+30*100 = $30250
This is comfortably covering our target just from large donations. If we got $50k per month we'd be able to fund almost anything the community would want.

I'm closing this issue, and opening new separate cleaner issues.