Update // It’s raining glitches (Patreon)

Looking back on these updates I realise I always start them with either a reference to the weather, the time of year or both, and if that’s not an indication of how culturally embedded I’ve become into the United Kingdom, then I don’t know what in the jolly crumpets is.

If only I had some sun to remind me of what a normal August is supposed to feel like…

Oh. Well.

Pip-pip tally-ho I guess.

—

Patreon glitch

If you pledge to any other creators, you may have already received some information about what went down at the start of the month and what it entailed for creators and patrons alike.

If not, here’s as brief of a recap as I can make:

Patreon decided to pay less taxes in the US and moved their operations to Ireland, which triggered a bunch of card providers to see the sudden change as “potentially fraud” and thus block payments through the platform. Additionally, because their whole backend is built with twine and spit, when people realised this and tried to fix their pledges it gave them a host of errors - from simply not allowing them to retry their payment, to wiping out any history of who they were pledged to, to outright changing their pledge amount.

For some creators, this has meant losing 10-20% of their income and as usual, Patreon’s solution has been to defer the problem to us by telling us to “reach out and fix it” while shrugging into their pockets.

What this meant for me was - albeit probably not as catastrophic as it was for others - a solid day of extra work having to reach out to everyone (which was a project, as their dashboard also didn’t show you everyone that had been declined) and walk them through troubleshooting they couldn’t find on Patreon’s broken FAQ pages.

Despite that, there are quite a lot of patrons who are still declined and who I have either not heard from or not been able to contact, which does complicate things given that all my tiers are locked and declined pledges take up slots even without paying.

At that point, all I can do is to request that if you’ve been declined - or believe you might be - please check your pledges and delete them and remake them if necessary - which is the one fail-proof way I’ve found to restore things.

Meanwhile I’ll be over here, dreaming of a day in which I don’t have to be resolving a multi-million corporation’s problems for free.

StarStickers

Illustrated rewards: After allocating a bigger batch than I said I would in July (as is apparently with my inability to say no), I’ve decided that illustrated rewards shall remain closed for both August and September. However, before anyone panics, please keep on reading for some relevant news.

New rewards coming soon (+reward overhaul): After observing the trajectory of bookings in recent months, as well as checking in with popular requests, I’ve decided to make some additions and changes to the system as follows:

Additions:

• New illustrated reward: Lineart half body (lineart piece down to the waist, may include hands) - 450 pts
• New illustrated reward: Couple lineart half body (lineart piece down to the waist, may include hands) - 850 pts
• New token: Outfit Design Token (guarantees an original outfit drawn into a reward or commission) - 350 pts
• New token: Hair Design Token (guarantees an original outfit drawn into a reward or commission) - 200 pts
• New token: Ony takes a nap (because people have asked for this for 3 consecutive years. Got nothing else to pound points into? Buy me some nap time!) - 50 pts

Changes:

• Outfit Mystery box and Traditional Artwork to be removed (will still remain as possibilities of the Ultimate Mystery Box)
• Fanart Bust to be renamed Fanart Illustration (given that all the pieces I’ve done through it have been more than just busts)
• Mystery box cost to increase from 350 pts to 400 pts

These changes will be implemented in September and, if all goes well, will be available to book from October.

Please note: If you currently have a reward booked but wish to change it to one of the new ones, you will have to cancel the existing reward and re-apply. No upgrades can be applied at this time. This does not apply to tokens, which can be booked and applied at any point.

Artbook: After some challenges trying to get the new merch sorted, 25 boxes painstakingly put together and a last minute decision to poke a bunch of tassels through 250 bookmarks to make them fancy - I’m pleased to confirm that the first batch of artbooks have been shipped out!

I’m also excited to announce that two more sets of artbooks will be available in August and September to make up for the closure of illustrated rewards. Each batch will consist of 10 books each and will be allocated on a first come, first serve basis until supplies run out.

Once these run out, there won’t be another batch until at least next year (as they’re pretty expensive to make and ship) so if you’re interested please make sure you set an alarm for tomorrow, Sunday 6th, as that’s when the August batch will be released.

For whoever hasn't caught a glimpse of it in the discord, these are some of the contents in each bundle.

Prints: New prints have been added to the shop! You can check all the available prints here.

Other

With my usual reminder that all tiers remain limited and are constantly reviewed and trimmed down, I also want to add a note for existing patrons:

I appreciate that sometimes people might want to increase or decrease their tier and that this might not be possible if all tiers are taken up at the time. This is especially relevant for those who might not wish to leave the patreon but can’t afford to be on a higher tier, but of course for those too who may wish to get more points for lessons or merch than what they can get on a lower tier.

The point of this being: while the patreon is capped to prevent further growth, I am happy to take notes on these wishes from existing patrons and see what I can do to help - whether that be to create a tier spot that suits them better or let them know when one comes up if I can't.

So should you wish to be told when any tier is available, please feel free to DM me and I’ll be more than happy to add you to a list and see what I can do to help.

With that, please remember that if you delete your pledge your points will remain on StarStickers for 6 months before they expire.

At the time of this post, the available tiers are:

• Intermediate tier: 1 slot
• Advanced tier: 2 slots

Personal

Finally - and blessed be - not much to report on this end, other than my hand continues to slowly recover (some days are harder than others, particularly in this soggy mess of a summer) and I’ve been doing my best to catch up, albeit prioritising recovering above punishing myself.

Hence, although I’ve been dialing up my work and trying to put out more pieces, there’s still a ways to go before I’m up to speed. That said, please look forward to more shiny pieces coming up as I got some good stuff to look forward to!

Assuming people don’t send me into an eternal coma via the new nap token…

—-

With much love from under my umbrella, ella, ella…

Ony