Just passing on the info as I have heard it. I do not have insider information as I don't have equity in any of the registered companies being built around Tao like AltMarket and Fanmix.
Fanmix did a soft launch late last year with their first artist, SMANTX (pronounced like "Semantics")
http://fanmix.biz/first-fanmix-band-revealed-smantx/
(note this link is to fanmix.biz my own site where I've compiled some info about the Tao related projects, fanmix.com is the official site).
I haven't checked in a while to see if they've raised more, but the band raised about $3,800 in the first 12 hours on the site despite zero promotion or marketing. I believe their crowdsale finishes up in May, and once they hit $10,000 raised that's when they are eligible to be issued their artist token.
Their campaign has had less than 200 views since then, and unless I'm mistaken the amount of pledges has actually gone down, with now a grand total of 18 "fans" willing to put up money. The total seems reasonably close to your total though, so it might just be that they had some pledges from the five people in the "TAO community" in the first 12 hours, and then literally nothing since then.
This seems to be pretty much the same deal as ODBCoin, but with a far smaller and weaker target for the scam.
So in other words, the campaign raised thousands of dollars for a band despite the lack of any hype or promotion.
Right, I'm sure Bryce was upfront to the band with "no of course we won't do any hype of promotion, you'll have to do all the work yourself".
Not anything like "of course you'll get lots of fans and interested people looking you up through network effects once we get the A-listers we're totally in talks with on board (which is super soon just you wait)".
Like I said, I'm sure the five people in the TAO community kept pouring their own sweat and blood into the scam - that's what usually happens when you're in too deep to admit to yourself that you've fallen for a scam. You just keep digging and pouring money and resources into the hole hoping that eventually it's all going to pay off.
I don't think it will, unfortunately.
And yeah, if you want to call 150 visitors over three months a "success story", then sure, go ahead chief.