Maybe that's how people should approach Kickstarted, but that's certainly not how the majority of Kickstarters projects are presented to their backers.

Almost every funding level I've seen for any project on Kickstarter says, "If you give $X and we reach the funding goal, you get Y. If you give $X and we don't reach the funding goal, you get $X back." None of them say, "If you give $X and we reach the funding goal, you might get Y if it turns out we can come up with a business plan that fits the amount of money raised."

I agree that Kickstarter isn't Amazon, but they (and the project creators) do a generally piss poor job of making sure the customers (backers) understand that going into the project.

In fact, Kickstarter is most easily compared to pre-ordering a product that is under development. It's not even similar to investing since you are not getting ownership in the company. In your case, I suppose you could liken it to philanthropy which also sounds incorrect.