Charging up-front (Patreon)

Hello everyone!

I've been thinking about this for quite a while, and I'm going to be making a small change to how payments work. But first, I'd like to make sure it won't affect any of you negatively.

I'd like to have Patreon charge my new patrons up-front for their first payment instead of waiting until the first of the month before they're charged. Theoretically, this shouldn't affect those who are already paying patrons, only those who are just joining.

I'm not overly fond of this change because it means new patrons might feel a little ripped off if they pay in the second half of the month (since they continue to pay on the first of every month afterwards), but there's been a small issue that I've been tracking since I first started up. People do have access to all of my patron-exclusive content even before they've paid with the current system -- I confirmed this when I first released the patron-exclusive Grape Escape 1.2 and nobody had yet paid at the beginning of the next month, yet it already had plays and downloads.

I don't blame the people who are doing this to get free content -- they're simply taking advantage of a system that seems to be fundamentally flawed in the first place. It is, however, rather bad for business, and thus something I need to nip in the bud before it gets out of hand.

TL;DR: Provided nobody has serious issue with it, new patrons will begin being charged up-front. This shouldn't affect those who are already patrons. To new visitors: I'd recommend joining in the first half of the month to get the most bang for your buck.

I plan on making this change in two days, unless an even bigger issue with this new system is brought to my attention.

That's all for now! I'll be making another progress report this Friday, so stay tuned for that!