Wanna talk about Patreon? I wanna talk about Patreon. Let's talk about Patreon.

[Queen Michael]

Notice how every single Internet entertainer you like has a Patreon nowadays? Okay, not every single one -- Yahtzee doesn't, and Moviebob doesn't (and ix-nay on the jokes about how you don't like Moviebob 'cause that ish ain't humorous).

Now, I don't know about you, but this seems a little too much for my taste. I get that making Internet content isn't all that lucrative, and of course nobody needs to give if they don't want to, but still.

ANd yeah, I know that it's really whiney of me to complain about somebody else needing money, it's just that I can't help but feel bad when I can't give to all the people whose stuff I dig, and I don't like feeling bad. I don't like having to spend a millisecond deciding whether I'll sponsor their Patreon, and decide not to, every time I watch something.

What's your feelings about this?

 

[Dr. Cakey]

My feelings are that Blip ain't paying out shit in ad revenue anymore (based on tweets, we're talking something like 50% revenue drops for producers) and is tossing away producers left and right, and Youtube has never been a good money source and flags videos like a United Nations dating sim (you like that? I came up with it myself).

When you put it that way, you either do Patreon or you quit.

 

[leberkaese]

I always thought of Patreon being a protection against
a) sites like Youtube suddenly changing advertising/partner contracts
b) too many people using adblock.

If I would start to give $1 for every video of every channel I'm subscribed to I would probably be broke by the end of the month.
You're not expected to give money to all of them. As long as you spend at least a small amount for some of them, I wouldn't feel too bad. They have a few backers and get a few extra bucks for every video additional to their ad revenue, so that's enough, I guess.
I only would feel bad if I would start using adblock on sites like Youtube.

 

[Bertylicious]

What's a Patreon? Is it something to do with magic deer? Is it something to do with patronage?

If it's the latter then I'll probably be suspicious of it, patronage tends to equal the most publicised stuff getting ahead rather than the best, but I'd want to know more about it.

 

[Eamar]

I don't mind it, but to be fair only a couple of people whose stuff I follow are using it at the moment, so it's not like I'm suffering from overexposure just yet.

I can imagine it might become a nuisance if it was overused or misused, but I can also see why it's an attractive option. It kind of reminds me of Kickstarter, which can be awesome, can be a complete waste of time.

Jury's still out for me.

 

[GiantRaven]

Patreon is pretty great I feel. There's no real obligation to fork over, but if you really like someone's content then the option to have a nice way of giving back is there.

 

[hazabaza1]

I kind of like it from what I've seen.
Hasn't got the kickstarter problem of "we need to make X amounts of money or else we don't get anything, even if we get X-1 monies"
There's also the element of it being a continual process so you can back out any time you want, if the quality starts declining you can just back out without having to dump a whole bunch of money in at once.

 

[Fappy]

Patreon is pretty great I feel. There's no real obligation to fork over, but if you really like someone's content then the option to have a nice way of giving back is there.

Yeah, I really think it is as simple as that. I've been supporting Smooth McGroove ever since he started on Patreon and he's been consistently thankful and very open about how he operates financially. It has the potential to be abused, just like Kickstarter, but no one is forcing you to support these people.

 

[Weaver]

IMO Patreon makes sense. Like Dr. Cakey said, blip revenue is awful. Youtube doesn't pay content creators unless someone watches 30 seconds of an ad or clicks on it and unless you're getting hundreds of thousands of views a day it's just not possible to live off doing it.

Youtube's current revenue system is great for popular LPers or vlogers who can easily make 2 videos a day; but what about Smooth McGroove? What about Angry Joe? These guys put like 50 - 60 hours a week into making a single video yet are monetarily discouraged from the format of making a few high quality, planned, scripted and edited videos a month over shitting out LP where you play Minecraft for three thousand episodes.

IMO, this is where Patreon just makes sense. These people can put in full time work to making good content.

My only concern with it is what happens if Patreon takes over? Youtube makes money off ad revenue. If everyone (unlikely) decided to just shut off ads on their channel in order to skip the youtube middle man and just have people pay them via patreon, what is Youtube's incentive to keeping the service going?

Now, likely this won't happen. Youtube would probably change their ad payment system for content creators before things got that out of hand.

Anyways, patreon is interesting and so far seems to be doing more good than harm (though Kickstarter makes me suspicious of the long term fate of the service).

 

[DANEgerous]

I rather like it I mean patronage is a very cool concept in with the ability for a collective of people to be a single force to promote artists is quite welcome. The thing is the artist taking money need to understand what patronage is and shockingly most feel as if they do. Patronage is very much one person (or in this case a small group)to pay for the entertainment of a much larger group and that is what is happening. The problem that hopefully will not arise is holding massive amount of content from backers rather than just perks.

 

[Olas]

I think Campster of Errant Signal made a pretty decent case for why Patreon is the most sensible business model for content creators like himself.

As someone who adamantly opposes the concept of advertising on conceptual grounds, I think it's great that there's now another way to support people who produce quality content.

Patreon is pretty great I feel. There's no real obligation to fork over, but if you really like someone's content then the option to have a nice way of giving back is there.

Yeah, I really think it is as simple as that. I've been supporting Smooth McGroove ever since he started on Patreon and he's been consistently thankful and very open about how he operates financially. It has the potential to be abused, just like Kickstarter, but no one is forcing you to support these people.

I don't think it does have that potential, unlike kickstarter, Patreon doesn't rely on promises. You (presumably) donate to a creator based on what they've already created and if they stop making new content or the quality goes to hell then you can stop immediately.

My only concern with it is what happens if Patreon takes over? Youtube makes money off ad revenue. If everyone (unlikely) decided to just shut off ads on their channel in order to skip the youtube middle man and just have people pay them via patreon, what is Youtube's incentive to keeping the service going?

I don't think we need to worry about Youtube's profit margin, in fact a part of me relishes the idea of depriving them of money after all the bullshit they've put people through. Besides, if youtube get's too desperate they'll just acquire Patreon like they did with Twitch.

 

[Someone Depressing]

I read this webcomic, Bug Martini. It's a daily thing, and both the writing and art are adequate quality.

It's not particularly monotised, excluding original art, available for an extortionate price. Considering it's daily, I'd buy some strips, if not for the fact that they were $100 a pop.

Still, I'd like to support the creator, so I've been considering just donating 1, maybe 5 dollars a week to the creator. It is free afterall, so I feel like I owe him for some weird reason in some weird way.

But, considering how ad revenue has been slowly dropping recently, I'd certainly consider help to support several producers I like who make free content.

..So, really, Patreon is a good thing.

 

[LetalisK]

I'm disappointed. I thought this thread was a out a newly announced eevee evolution that's a misogynist.

OT: Seems like the logical next step in crowd sourcing to me.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

I can imagine that some creators might get obnoxious about promoting themselves on this service, but the only people I can foresee objecting to it on principle are the ones who think others don't deserve to make money off of creating things like videos or music.

 

[FPLOON]

I'm disappointed. I thought this thread was a out a newly announced eevee evolution that's a misogynist.

...Does that mean you can only have a male Patreon? /sarcasm

OT: I mostly see Patreon as a way to help out artist without having to ask for commissions in order to support them... but, I was too slow to put 2 and 2 together, in terms of content creators on YouTube and Blip... All of the support without any third-party BS getting in the way...

Also, I really hope this method doesn't get abused to the point of negative backlash... But, then again, I'm having a hard time thinking of a possible worse-case scenario for Patreon... outside of a YouTube/Google/Blip buyout?

 

[Scarim Coral]

I'm not too bother about it, it's just like kickstarters for the webcomic artists and musicans but I do got to agreed that almost everyone of them are using it now.

 

[mitchell271]

I think it's pretty cool. You don't have to contribute to it, there's no obligation to give anything. Sure, if you do, you could get access to Q&A streams or something like that but if you don't want to, just keep enjoying the content as you already are, completely free./

I really don't see any downside to this or why people are bitching about it. Someone please explain why!