IMPORTANT - PLEASE READ: Turning Project L into a monthly payment instead of per creation?

It is time to get serious. And I don’t like being serious.

But.

It has come to my attention, that the current Patreon payment plan of “per creation” has been exploited. A lot.

I always knew that it was a kind of a risk, and I was willing to take it, because, well, it was the fair thing to do to you, my dearest Patrons. One project, one charge. If I didn’t create a project, I did not get paid—and you would not have to pay for “nothing”.

Now, of course, this came with some strong limitations on how I had to work; projects were often very rushed and not well-polished (pun not intended), because I had to hurry the publication date to be on the exact month and any extra work I did was not rewarded directly, nor did it create really any measurable value for me nor the Patrons.

Example 1: This is all one Patron, who subscribed with fake credit card details, was declined, and created a new e-mail account—or withdrew his patronage before the project was published.

Conclusion: Knowingly doing a very shitty thing.

Example 2: Continued amount of payment declines from just the few recent months. All of these people get to enjoy the spoils, but don’t have to pay. It’s unfair not only to me, but to you, my dear Patrons, who actually pay for the content.

Conclusion: Okay, I understand—sometimes the payments don’t go through. For example, you bought something and forgot to move funds to your debit card. Or you’ve overdrafted your account. Even within the six times Patreon tries to charge the chard during the early month. But many of these are, unfortunately, fraudulent charges.

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The problem lies within the payment system of a per-creation basis; Patreon does not allow to charge before the said creation has been done.

But, if I would charge on a monthly basis, this would not be an issue at all, for any new Patron would be charged at the very start of their patronage, not letting them access any Patreon-only content before they would have actually made the payment.

So, what now?

As of writing this, there is only way to fully counter this: to turn Project L into a monthly payment subscription.

This would mean things. Many things.

Let’s start with the negatives, because us Finns are pessimists—because it’s very hard to disappoint a pessimist.

Con #1: There might not be a Project L every month, but you would be charged.

Real life is busy. There have been months where I have been unable to push out a Project L, should it be due to conflicting schedules with the models, me or the models falling ill or anything else, such as having a child.

With the previous model we would just not charge y’all. But with the new model, there would be a necessary monthly charge.

Con #2: No possible extra earnings for publishing more Project Ls per month

Let’s face it. I haven’t published two whole Project Ls in a month in years. But with per creation pledge, it could be worth more.

Well. Negatives. Are there any more? Maybe? I’m not sure. Let me know in the comments—please, do! I want to hear your opinion.

But the positives.

Pro #1: Projects don’t have to be rushed out

It’s been a real pet peeve of mine to push a project out at the very end of a month. There’s not much polishing to do, and any attempts to make the project’s appearance, editing or anything even a bit better would yield worse results.

A monthly payment plan would assure that there was not a set deadline, but a shot project can be finished with thought, and a lot more effort can be put into it, and it can yield more results by seeing the subscriber count rise.

Pro #2: Projects don’t have to be “big” to be published

I have this constant mental battle within my mind whether a published project is “good enough”, “big enough” or has “enough content”. With freeing the projects to a monthly basis, there could as well be much shorter projects, or those surrounding a very niche thing—something that shoots only a few images within a certain place, but provides a bit more behind the scenes content.

This would be a huge thing to me. No need to justify things. I could just do them, because anything related to Project L creates value.

We could go for a very quick walk. Or just do some latex try-on-wardrobe thingies. Everything doesn’t have to be a spectacle. Just more content. Hopefully.

Also, I could provide so much more remastered versions without thinking that I’m just reinventing the wheel by adding corners to it.

Pro #3: A reason to have latex streams

I LIKE STREAMING IN LATEX. It’s one of the best things you can do while wearing latex. The best being, of course, drinking beer. Which can be done simultaneously.

Now that we’ve moved, we even have a lockable streaming room that can have a static setup, so it doesn’t need to be set up every time. We even have air conditioning here!

All I’m waiting for is my neighbour to be able to get the fiber set up here, which should arrive hopefully within a week or two.

Hopefully.

Pro #4: An incentive to put the Project L’s full videos behind a paywall

YouTube is being a bitch, and I mean this by the worst possible way. Every single one of my recent videos have been demonetised, no matter how much I censor them.

This could be a good leverage to create more video content without worrying about its content. In the near future, I could push videos into Patreon-linked Vimeo, which has a way better quality.

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But.

These are my idealistic views on the matter.

And I won’t do this if you, my dear Patrons, oppose the change.

This is a huge change, and I really, truly want to hear your opinions about it. Is it alright? Is it fair?  Please, please let me know in the comments—no matter how strong your opinion, let me know.

If you would not like to comment here, you can also send me an e-mail to tuomas@npn.fi.