What are my best options to raise capital and take on investors for my product? I have investors willing to give me varying amounts of money ($2k - 20k). I am unsure what my best options are (convertible debt, etc.) for taking on investors and keeping everything fair and simple.

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tynamite

How much shares do you have, and how easy will it be for the board to outvote you?
Do your investors see you as a lackey person of ideas, or do they trust you to run a company from the ground up?
Are you required to give all confidential, trade secrets and blueprints to your board?
Are you allowed to keep your intellectual property so you can try again with another investor if things go wrong the first time?
If your funding runs out and your investors are out of cash, do they have the right to take over your company because you failed as a capitalist?
Are the investors looking for an exit after 3-5 years so you'll be answering to different masters later on?
Are the investors only interested in a seed round of which you'll need B round funding later on?
Are you good at reading contracts without spending $600 on a lawyer to go over it for you?
Can you negotitate parts of the contract you don't like, or is it an all or nothing deal?
How can you make sure you have as little or as much investors as possible, to even out the power balance?
What is the track record of the investors funding? How much leeway and control do they give the previous companies, and did it go sour before?
Are they into high priced markets like Starbucks, emerging markets, or visionaries that do things one step better?
Are you selling your soul?
Are these investors public figures, or do they prefer to stay in the shadows and not give press interviews?
Will you be given an advance that you have to earn back, or do they expect some of their investments to fail?

I can't think of any more questions.