Many creators mentioning they lost hundreds of their patrons suddenly and patrons confused as to why their payments are being declined. Patreon is such an old company that hasnt done anything to improve their service for years while the CEO makes youtube videos and seemingly nothing with the company. I hate how much of a monopoly they have in the space, they clearly have no vision for improving their website or app.

      • gamermanh@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Nope, same thing, different words used

        The idea is it’s more personable, instead of subbing to a Patreon or doing a one-time PayPal or what have you, you “buy them a coffee” or “buy them a pencil” or some other low-cost item that most people both understand helps people AND are cheap/something they might get themselves, so they’re more likely to donate

        Also I’m p sure Ko-Fi has a better revenue split with those who use it than Patreon does

        • LetMeEatCake@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Also I’m p sure Ko-Fi has a better revenue split with those who use it than Patreon does

          This line made me curious so I looked. Best I can find is that Ko-fi charges either 0% or 5% on donations, dependent on the type of donation and the type of account the receiver has with them.

          Patreon used to charge 5%, but now has: 5% for grandfathered pro accounts, 5% for lowest tier accounts, 8% for non-grandfathered accounts on a pro plan, and 12% for a higher premium tier.

          So yup, Ko-fi has a better split.

          • mnemonicmonkeys@sh.itjust.works
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            1 year ago

            There’s also Liberapay, which doesn’t take any cut for themselves. The only charges you get are for the payment processors

    • Dark Arc@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Is it actually better? There are things like open collective and GitHub sponsors too… Choices are great, but the choices aren’t clear

      • rah@feddit.uk
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        1 year ago

        Is it actually better?

        No idea, I don’t use either. I don’t even know what you mean by “better” in this context.

        • Dark Arc@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          I mean, does it pay creators better/does it actually do the job of funding someone better? i.e. what’s the advantage? Is it just kind of a meaningless difference or will creators benefit?

    • 3l3s3@feddit.de
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      1 year ago

      I hate their entire policy around what you can and cannot say or do, on their platform or somewhere else.

      • Goronmon@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        When you use Stripe/Paypal as your payment processor you have to be willing to accept whatever demands they (and the banks backing them) decide to make on any given day.

        • SuperSleuth@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          Let’s not even talk about Visa and MasterCard. They could choose to end your business at any time.

  • Hang@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Huh, I was wondering why 10% of our patrons disappeared overnight. It’s normal for a drop-off at the start of the month but not normally such a large one

  • Goronmon@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    I hate how much of a monopoly they have in the space…

    It’s not necessarily Patreon that’s the root problem here. The problem is the foundations of the financial industry (banks, credit card companies, etc) have complete control over the content and products you can exchange for money.

    If Wells Fargo decides that your product or content has offended some random executive, they will call up your payment provider (like Stripe) and tell them to close your account. And the payment provider will do it because they don’t really have a choice.

  • imperator3733@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Mine went through just fine - I’m curious what subset of users this affected.

    Regarding the list of who you supported, Patreon has sent me monthly “Your Patreon receipt is here!” emails that list out each supporter and the tier. I don’t believe I explicitly enabled these emails - they just started coming one month, so presumably one would have needed to specifically turn them off to not get the receipts.

  • chilburn06@lemmy.ml
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    1 year ago

    Had the same thing happen to me. I got texts about fraud from my bank and an email saying I needed to update my payment. I was wondering what prompted this cause I’ve been using patreon for years and never once had an issue like this.

  • pitninja@lemmy.pit.ninja
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    1 year ago

    I know some creators that are moving to Substack and it really seems like a good way forward for certain content. I can’t blame folks for leaving, I’d be pissed if a platform caused me to miss out on income.

    • gamermanh@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      You don’t need it, but its a convenient website to let people save their info and support people financially across multiple professions all from one account

      Many creators use PayPal or similar to let people just one-time pay through said creators site or app, but Patreon/Ko-Fi/etc. Allow a little more without needing to do all the work yourself

      • blazera@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        You gave another corporate middleman as an alternative to needing a corporate middleman.

    • yhvr@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      As a creator, it doesn’t seem like I’ve lost any of my patrons. Someone new even joined last night

      • dualphasesaber@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        The dude tweeting used to run a site called Pointless Waste of Time under the pseudonym “David Wong.” Had a bunch of funny articles and the forums were great. Ended up going away when he became the (I think) chief editor at Cracked (before it was all list based) and they merged the forums.

  • redimk@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    1 year ago

    Patreon always has some lind of problem every now and then. To this day I haven’t been able to even create an account there because they won’t let me.

    Are there no other services that creators/donators can use (apart from Liberapay that I see a bit lower in the comments)?