Wow. Good job Lexel. Some of us have long ago made an offer to help pay for prototype building if needed. As far as myself, the offer still stands. I know you already built the first prototype, and I’m assuming you will build this one too. Let me know where to donate funds when the time comes.
So far i have taken donations towards the costs of the development & have some to send to Lexel to cover his costs too. Maybe i should start a list somewhere?
Why don’t you use kickstarter? there is a lot of successful shitty lantern projects (like here, here and here) i don’t see why a good lantern like this would fail
you just need a cool looking video presentation with nice a music and you’re done :cowboy_hat_face:
Maybe for the second version of the lantern, but not the first.
The 1st one is the basis for a beast of a lantern.
We may plan to incorporate boost drivers for the 2nd lantern, USB charging/outputs, etc.
Now that would require a large investment, but would work on Kickstarter since we would only need the funds, but we already have acquired the full knowledge to make a good lantern.
Very true, for the first version i would like to keep this a project of BLF for the members of BLF to get it started, then one the first production run is done and sales are rolling for the V1, then we can look at that for a more deluxe model.
If you are not totally naive, there could be good funding available from V1, to put towards V2.
E.g. the Q8 generated quite a lot of funds, simply from the affiliate link used to buy it from BG at the BLF price. Which was entirely reasonable, and Wim shared it out amongst the extended team.
Get V1 built first though, it’s looking good, I may even have to express an interest soon. And forget about Kickstarter, ugh.
Thorfire / Sofirn / misc retailers sell and ship the light.
BLF members get a special discount.
Thorfire / Sofirn continue to sell the light indefinitely at regular retail price.
The Kickstarter model is typically a bit different:
BLF designs the light.
The lantern project team (LPT) sells the light and collects money. Early backers get a special discount.
LPT pays Thorfire / Sofirn to manufacture the light, and then LPT buys the entire production run.
LPT ships the light to people, or pays Thorfire / Sofirn to do so.
Basically, we’re not using Kickstarter because we’re not personally trying to make a profit on it. We’re just trying to make something nice for people, and to encourage flashlight companies to be more involved in the community in the future.
Just bought Sofirm AAA twisties but Sofirm/AliExpress would not give me the discount.
If I can get a discounted price on these lanterns, I will buy two. If not, I won’t.
I truly appreciate the work folks are putting on here to bring out a good lantern, but to jump through hoops to pay full price doesn’t seem right. Just my opinion.
You have already done what you need to do by asking to be put on the list…. sbslider will confirm when he sees your post. Welcome to BLF and as Dale says…. hide your wallet.
Hello. I just joined the forum, but I have been stalking here quite a bit before buying my current stable of two S2+, and pretty much everything made by Emisar Anyway, this project sounds really great, and useful for me, so I was wondering if I could be placed on the ” I’m interested” list!
Thanks all
miniUSB is dead since 2014. It’s hard to find an cable for it in local stores.
It will be the next thing for sure, all smartphone brands will switch to USB-C in the next years.
I guess everyone want’s to have a long lasting lantern which will be compatible to the standards used in 5 and even ten years. This doesn’t include microUSB.
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