Patreon's New Fees: (Patreon)

Update Dec. 13 2017: Patreon has issued an apology and the proposed fee structure will NOT be taking place. There are no new fees associated with being a supporter on Patreon. You can read the mea culpa post here. I’m keeping this blog post up for posterity and as a reminder that when voices are raised in unison, change happens. – Tim 

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My dear Patrons,

Apologies in advance for the long post. 

A chart of additional monthly fees per tier is included at the end if you just want to skip to that.

When I started this project, I did so with the goal that it would be community supported. I refused to put advertising on my page, or create a multi-tiered system where you had to pay to get better or higher-level service. I wanted to create a single offering that would be there for everyone, regardless of their ability to contribute.

If all this sounds a bit Socialist, that’s because it totally is.

I’m an artist, a father and a husband. As a parent, I try to instill in my children a sense of fairness, a sense of community, and a sense of shared stewardship of the arts. When we pass street or subway musicians who we enjoy, I give the kids a few bucks to put into their cases and make sure they say thank you to the performers. When I see an artist doing something interesting or unique, I find a way to support them, even if it’s just an email telling them that I appreciate what they’re doing.

Whenever a new pledge comes through, I have a small internal celebration. It’s truly wind in my sails. And it’s not just the dollar amount, but the fact that someone has raised their hand and said, “I like what you’re doing, count me in”.

Patreon’s new fee structure has a lot of people panicking, and rightly so. It moves the burden from the creator (where I was fine with this) to the supporter. The immediate result of this is that I’ve already lost a few hundred dollars in monthly fees in the past 24 hours. This is painful of course from a financial perspective, but more painful is seeing an exodus of people who wanted to support, but now find it more difficult, or more confusing. In the same way I celebrate new pledges, I always mourn lost pledges. Am I doing something wrong? Is there something I could be doing better? 

The good news is that I have, from the beginning, chosen to go the monthly route, and not the per-item route. The upshot of this is, that the increase in fees to you as a patron are not terrible. For a $5.00 pledge you pay 2.9% + 35 cents.  That’s an extra 50 cents a month.  I even asked Patreon if I could continue to pay this fee in lieu of offloading it to my supporters, but they said that was not possible. 

I totally understand that this extra few cents is then multiplied by the number of creators you support and can add up.  

If you are forced to depart Patreon, or cancel your support to me over this, I fully support you and I totally understand. Of course I hope that you do not, as my monthly bills only ever go up. I will continue to use Patreon and I will continue supporting the artists that I support but that is my decision alone. If a new platform comes along (Kickstarter’s Drip seems primed to do this) I will most likely use that in addition.

My goal is to keep making content, and to make it as easy as possible for the community to support the work.

If you do leave Patreon, please follow me on Twitter (@tabletopaudio) or Facebook (facebook.com/tabletopaudio). There is lot's of new content to come.

best,

Tim

Here's a brief overview of the additional fees you'll incur monthly per standard tier based on the service fee of 2.9% + $0.35

$1/month  + $0.37

$3/month + $0.44

$5/month + $0.50

$10/month + $0.64

$20/month + $0.93