Is it fair to characterize a founder of a failed startup as a con man? I.e. did he make claims that were factually untrue, and intentionally deceived investors?
It’s as fair as characterizing an athlete saying he’s competing to win.
A common logical/semantic mistake is that claims about future facts are lies. They can be exaggerations, and we do see this often and I’m personally annoyed when I see it. These claims can be genuine or not. I often think it’s easier for a founder to be naive (or crazy) than not, because they can believe (sometimes strongly) the things they say.
But neither are lies. A lie is when you misrepresent a fact, something that already happened. That’s a big causal difference.
The large gray area is when someone misrepresents intent (as with most cases for cons). This, I suspect, is the main questions you should be asking, but I suspect it falls into the ethics rather than legal debates.
There absolutely is a promise. Even if you manage to legally find a way to not get sued, taking advantage of the fact that everyone who gave you money believed it was a promise is still scamming them.
* Promised an alarm clock that would do a bunch of things
* Took $2.5M in funding from Kickstarter
* Took another $50M in funding from elsewhere
* Delivered a piece of hardware that did essentially none of what was promised.
It's all detailed in OP and the linked Verge article. That's a scam and I'm not interested in your legalese arguing whether they can be sued or not.
What... You know, it doesn't matter. Thanks for the summary anyways!