The 17 most successful Kickstarter projects of all time and where they are today

Kristen Bell Veronica Mars

For many entrepreneurs, Kickstarter represents a level playing field where good ideas can find people with the cash to help make their dream a reality.

Just look at the success of the legendary Potato Salad, where a guy tried to raise the funds to make, well, potato salad — and ended up raising over $55,000, throwing a potato party for charity and even publishing a cookbook loaded with 24 potato salad recipes.

Indeed, without Kickstarter, we'd never have the Pebble smartwatch, highly anticipated games like "Shenmue 3," or the "Veronica Mars" movie.

But not every good idea survives contact with the real world, and we've seen a lot of high-profile flameouts from ambitious Kickstarter projects that just couldn't deliver, like the "world's thinnest watch."

And then there are weird, bad crowdfunding projects like the case of the Indiegogo campaign that promised it could build gills for humans, but that's a whole different issue.

Here's a look at the most successful Kickstarter projects of all time, and where they are today. Spoiler alert: Despite being acquired by Fitbit in late 2016, and the forthcoming shutdown of a lot of its best features on June 30th, Pebble shows up a bunch.