Maybe its cruel, but its the only way to advance. The projects weren't designed to fail, were designed to success, but they blew up in pieces. The cosmonauts were very concious that their job was a very dangerous one, and accepted the risks. In these endeavours, we put way too much value to human life and safety, this is about exploring and pushing frontiers, both physical and of knowledge, of course there are going to be fatalities among the way, thats why whe say "it's rocket science" for stuff that is hard to do. But as long as the people involved knows the risks involved and accept them, it's ok. Every death advances knowledge and make the next try safer for the next cosmonaut, and both the cosmonauts, and the scientist working with them, deserve my greatest respect.

Quick to judge, slow to read....

If you actually read something on their fundraising page, you'll see:

Fixed Funding means is all or nothing, if you don't reach the goal, you see nothing.
The hardware IS ALREADY COMPLETE, they didn't make it, in fact yes, it's a somewhat cheap chinese tablet. (They are chinese hadware importers).
They cannot ship by Xmas because the linux support is not complete, they just finished they fundraising, with only 23 days left for xmas, just the logistics
to deliver all tablets can take a couple weeks, even if shipped as they are, with incomplete linux support. Complete such support will take several weeks for
a team of engineers/developers, that are being paid with the funds raised.
Yes, he is developing some software, and using and modyfing other already-created-software. Such use is permited by the license, as long as he provides the
source for the modifications. It's great that some people can contribute code for free, but sometimes changes requires money. And he is telling you for what
is going to be used, completing the featureset (auto-rotation, hardware button support, camera support)
You are paying for a chinese tablet, with linux that has been tweaked to the hardware, and the code developed would be shared so others can benefit from it.
Where is the bait and switch?

I beg to differ,

It'ts not the tablet form factor that is the problem. It's the OS and envitornment that limit yourself. You cannot develop for IOS on the ipad or iphone, you cannot easily develop for android in an android device. Those environment are pretty limited, because they are mean to work as appliances, not computers, however, the underlying hardware is a computer, and quite powerfull for what is worth.

You really don't need several gigaherz of processing power but for a couple of task, gaming and hardocore calculations, that you won't be making in a tablet, however it doesn't mean that the tablet is worthless. It has other uses, and touch interfaces are sometimes far more efficient than using a command line (Yeah, label me and heretic, burn me for my blasphemy!) This is about freedom, having new tools, trying new ways, I'm a proud linuxer and I can tell you, not everything is the command line, servers and desktop computers. I have pride in my CLI, programming and admin skills, it's good to have pride, but too much pride is a defect, if you are too prideful to try new things.

You say tablets are incompatible with linux, NOTHING is incompatible with linux, as linux is mean to be free, you can adapt it to anything if you put effort in it, thats why the joke "But, does it run linux?" will never die, people run linux on the weirdest things, toasters, fridges, embeded systems, mainframes, clocks, routers, etc.
Some of those implementations may not be appear very useful to you, but others are things that we cannot live without. And even those that are "not useful", advance the knowledge, make people think out of the box, and sometimes, just sometimes, people thinking different, doing useless things, different things, have changed the world. Yes its just a tablet, yes the current ecosystems may be closed, yes, it may not change the world, but it's a start, a step in a less transited road. Linux is not something sacred, reserved to the realm of high-computers, it a frigging OS, that is mean to be used, shared, modified, and its precisely that freedom that you preach about what gives everyone the posibility of using it as he or she wants, from toasters to mainframes.

I see a lot of hate aimed at this little tablet/project, "its not powerful enough", "lame screen resolution", "closed source gpu drivers", "a tablet is a consumer device, not a creation device", etc.

  To all people who hates, you want a powerful tablet, buy an Ipad, or a Nexus. Those are closed ecosystems you say, then create a new ecosystem, be a creator, not a consumer. You don't have the skills, time, resources?, Then shut up and stop criticizing those that are trying to make a change. You will say that is not open enough?, You mean, like, current computers, with those firmwares, drm, and secure boot?

You remind me of Sheldon Copper, "They are having fun the wrong way"

Exactly, Android is-no-quite-linux(TM), libraries, runtimes, etc. Surely, with effort you could theorically port any software, but why port if it works at is?.

It's important because it's target as you say it's not for consumers, but for geeks. The differences are significant if you want to develop for one or the other, specially if you want to use X vs whatever android uses. You can easily port thousands of apps that use X, but those same apps are a pain to port to android. I, as profesional could use a tablet with full linux, where I can use some software does the work I need, with a simple recompile, instead of having to port it to android with several different libraries and subsystems.