This is not a Kickstarter competitor if it only serves non-profits. But, it does not mean they will not be a competitor in the future. Look at Paul Graham's tactics section about 'Want to start a startup' [4].
I think this could be abused horribly, the campaign and payment information appearing inline with facebook content may make a fraudulent page appear far more legitimate than they are.
It's Facebook's responsibility to manage that. If it becomes a problem, users will stop trusting Facebook and it will damage their brand. Facebook is assuming the risk and reward of building this.
I'm not entirely sure with the outcome of this possible evolution in crowdfunding, should it be succesfull. The crowdfunding business would get more saturated with 1000's of copycat / flavor of the month crowdfund setups or any random flavor of the month "i need money for XYZ, please fund me" crowdfund page. In addition, as the article states, the possibility of scams would rise as well on such a massive platform.
I do get that facebook is a great platform on which to introduce your product on, but in the long run shifting the crowdfunding platform to facebook would harm the quality of innovation.
I've always thought FB with its massive userbase has a tremendous opportunity to enter most any business it wants with a huge advantage - kicking myself for not buying shares, time will probably show it is even cheap now.
If you've ever paid for an in-game purchase, donated to charity, sent payment to a friend, bought an item through their groups - they'll have your details.
I've never done any of those - but I'd wager several of my friends (and yours) have done so.
Moving forward it could transform into a Patreon competitor, and it would make sense to do that. Since social networks help creative personnel capture a lot of eyeballs, they might aswell help them raise funds.
This. I think this is much more in line with the recurring donation model they have already launched. The next logical step is simply to say "Hey you know all those non-profits there? They will now be accompanied by your favorite personalities, publications, podcasters, apps etc that you're already sharing here."
Facebook being Facebook, it could morph still further to become Kickstarter and even an investment platform (AngelList) eventually, but patronage is the more natural fit.
4. http://www.paulgraham.com/ambitious.html