Plenty of Amigans have got burnt hands from things like "vouchers", so I agree with Darrin. It's a pretty big thing to ask cash in advance. That requires trust.
Yep, I still have my Amiga $50 coupon (well, I don't actually have the physical coupon, but I did eventually get the t-shirt), so paying in advance (especially when you have a company noted for posting fake manufacturing photographs) doesn't really appeal to me.
The last couple of "large" Amiga hardware purchases I made were the Chameleon64 and the FPGA Arcade, both of which were paid for when the product was ready to ship. I've pre-ordered a X1000, but I haven't even had to pay a deposit on that even though it is several grand. It seems to me that certain people in the Amiga community are resourceful enough to design and manufacture hardware on limited resources without having to put their hands in other people's pockets. However, we have another company which is supposed to have millions in advertising budgets alone than seems to have to vision, no focus (no manufacturing of its own?) and wants us to raid the piggy-bank before it even heads to the drawing board? Something just doesn't seem right.
Plus, assuming I stood up and said that I'd collect the down payments for the agreed hardware then how exactly would that work? Due to fluctuating exchange rates we would need to collect the agreed amount in a single currency (say Dollars) so everyone outside of the US would also need to pay an exchange fee. Then, what happens if the project is cancelled or people ask for refunds? Who pays the additional reverse exchange fee to send the money back? I bet it won't be C-USA. What if you get 500 orders, but by the time of delivery 100 people drop out. Do the remaining 400 have to pay the additional amount owed by the 100 who left, or will the person holding the money be responsible? Considering the timeline for designing and building new hardware (and not just taking a x86 mobo off the shelf or rebadging someone else's PC and putting a C-USA sticker on it) I can easily 10 of the 500 pre-payers dying of old age before they receive anything!
