They had a big dream... hoping to get tons of pre-orders, use that money to hire people and create a company. Then they decided that wouldn't work, so they decided to go the escrow route. Maybe they thought with enough orders placed when they launched their website, someone would fund them. (...)
Escrow is either part of the scam or a way to get funding from VC's or a loan from a bank, to hire the necessary personnel to actually start making a product.