Announcement: If you haven't seen, Patreon is going to be adding a fee to every pledge moving forward. You'll pay 2.9% + 35 cents. So, on a $1 pledge, you'll pay $1.38. On a $10 pledge you'll pay $10.60.
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I have deleted like four tweets about this today. It's hard and complicated and I know that Patreon is attempting to solve a problem right now, I just don't know which problem is worse...the one they have, or the one they're creating.
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The problem they have:
Patreon charges everyone at the same time, so you don't get charged right when you sign up. So some people have signed up, gotten their perks, and then cancelled without paying.
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It also means that tons of people call them saying their charges didn't go through, or being confused when they get charged two weeks after pledging.
Any normal subscription service charges you the day you sign up and then every month after that on that day.
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Which leads to the problem they're creating:
They need to charge a service fee to offset that new cost to creators (which would be huge) which has led to some patrons freaking out and leaving the platform, and also strongly discourages low-dollar pledges.
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Either you keep it as is, with the frustrations and difficulties and BS that they deal with now, or you set it to be a normal subscription service and need to add a fee.
Patreon has opted for the second thing, and I have no idea if that's the right call.
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Internally at Patreon, I'm sure they know how annoying and difficult their current problem is, but there's no way to know how hard this new problem will be.
I don't like the change, but it is not motivated by greed, it's motivated by a desire to solve a problem.
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I'm worried to hear people have lost a lot of patrons. I'm worried that an added fee will slow on boarding of new patrons. I'm worried that this whole process is more annoying for my community. And I'm worried that this discourages spreading patronage around.
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Anyway....I've come out with a new policy of not tweeting about something until I actually know wtf I'm talking about so I don't accidentally spread misinformation. I'm sorry I did that earlier today.
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Disclosures: I got a small amount of equity in Patreon when they acquired Subbable. I'm also on their advisory board. Also, Jack Conte is one of my heroes because I've literally never seen anyone work harder to help people achieve their dreams.
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Oh, that! Easy solution: charge for a new pledge immediately, but then include it in the charge for the next month
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I had no idea that was happening, it's totally wrong, on the pledgers part but also if so many other platforms can do it in the day of purchase why can't patreon, it seems they are making more work for themselves
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