AUGUST 2024 Update #2

Hey Patrons, you might have heard, but Patreon is messing everything up again and bending to Apple's will. They're forcing a new billing method on all creators starting in November 2025. Unfortunately it will affect this page.

So to explain this simply-

• The current model is; You're charged when you sign up, then on the 1st of each new month

• The new model that patreon is forcing is; You're still charged when you sign up, but then you aren't charged again until that same day next month. (Example; if you signed up on the 15th of November, you wouldn't be charged again until the 15th of December)

This is a problem for pages that run on a monthly schedule and offer physical rewards. Initially most people will still be paying on the 1st but over time if people unsub and resub, the money needed for expenses (stickers, postage, etc) and bills, might not be available early enough in the month. And it also makes it possible for someone to kinda skip out on the billing for a 2nd month of posts.

Plus it also means having to monitor the rewards mailing checklist even more to make sure people are paid up before I mail things... It's extra work that I really do not have time for.

So I'm opting to keep the current billing for as long as I can. But next year everyone will be forced to switch over to the new method.

When that happens I'm gonna have to work something else out, like closing the reward tiers after the 1st week of each new month. It's not too different from how things usually work now, since they usually sell out early, but it's still annoying and it sucks.

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Additionally this change also means anyone that signs up through the apple app will be charged an extra 30%. That can add up to a LOT. I think all pages flagged as 18+ are excluded from the Apple app already, so this might not even apply to my page.

But just in case people have signed up through the apple app, I encourage you to cancel at the end of this month and resubscribe through a desktop app. You should avoid the extra charge.

Patreon bending to Apple's demands has me very worried for the future of this platform. From what I understand, Apple is with the credit card companies in pressuring patreon to drop all 18+ content creators. So if they'll let Apple push them around to make a sitewide change and allow them to take a whopping 30% cut of subscriptions, then who knows what they'll give into next...

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There's one (sorta) positive for creators; the new billing model comes with the benefit of creators being able to adjust prices without having to create entire new tiers. (Though I don't see why they couldn't just make that change already. It seems like patreon is taking updates that we've asked for and using them as an incentive to get people to switch over)

I've been trying to rethink the reward bundles to make up for the sharply increasing prices of items and postage. If I could adjust the prices by a few dollars that would help a lot.

But don't worry, nothing is changing right now. I don't plan on making any changes to the reward sets or this page until 2025. I'll figure out what to do closer to then.

Thanks for reading, and thank you for your support!