2020.07.19 General Question for the Animation Tier and NEW IDEA

Quick update: Just a quick reminder that this is NOT a post about "what is good/bad or terrific about Patreon or Paypal policies" I totally understand that is a valuable discussion but this is not a post focused on it. If you have any particular question though - please message me directly!

**ANIMATION TIER ONLY! You guys get it first!**

• 1. Read everything before voting or commenting! 
• 2. We are just spit balling here and talking about ideas. There are no current plans to alter the Patreon in any major way!
• 3. Read #1

As most or all of you know I've had a main site for some time. That's where we store all the comics, comic downloads and a few other Patreon related rewards for the simple reason it is WAY easier to get them to you via my site than trying to use Patreon's message boards here to distribute the goodies. (movies aside of course)

Something I have LONG wanted (and I have requested from the fantastic Patreon team) is the ability to grant people free month memberships on the Patreon or discounts for purchasing a block of months at a time. An example would be "Hey, get six months for the price of five!" or "Hey, all longtime patrons get a free month!". The ideas go on and on. 

Thing is, Patreon isn't really set up for this and I don't expect them to be anytime soon. That's TOTALLY FINE too! They are what they are and have been very good to me so I have no complaints. I also don't plan on changing the Patreon any time soon unless it's to give you MORE REWARDS! 

The Patreon Team is top notch from my personal experience

I LOVE PATREON! I am not leaving it. A quick note on any of the recent "Artists leaving Patreon!" alerts you might be hearing about. I can tell you right now about every 6-8 months there is a "Patreon is driving people away" frenzy and every single time it's mostly a rumor filled moment with a few bits of truth sprinkled in. I'm on the Patreon Creator's Discord and I can tell you Patreon is VERY active there and answers all the questions from ALL the creators quickly and kindly. There are a TON of adult creators on there too so it's not like there is no representation of the 18+ creator group. Short story, unless you are seriously breaching laws you are most likely fine. 

The question!

That said (and you knew this was coming!) I was wondering if I did shift over to a dual signup with basically the same offerings from Patreon and the Main site. AGAIN, there are NO PLANS FOR THIS. I'm mostly seeing what you folk might think. So, what if you could sign up from the main site as well as Patreon. BUT if you signed up from the main site there WERE discounts and bonuses? Like buying a few months or a year at a discounted rate? Sound interesting? Read on!

I don't see this Patreon account going anywhere but I also don't expect them to make Patreon.com customized just for my adult service needs. That's not a reasonable expectation.

Paypal v Credit Card

OK. the elephant in the room is PayPal. I will tell you right now there is ZERO chance if I opened my personal site for membership that PayPal would be used. That is one of the big niceities about Patreon is the ability to use PayPal as a service. Patreon is a relatively HUGE company taking in lots of money from lots of sources and regulated (for the most part). Small adult sites simply can't offer PayPal since running a specifically adult site and specifically offering PayPal is likely going to skirt or break their terms of service (ToS). I am not here to argue that being good or bad or ANYTHING. That is not the point. The point is PayPal can do what they want with their service. I just can't use it to take payments on an adult membership site. Selling a few comics is one thing but if I am selling yearly memberships all it takes is one take down notice and bye-bye membership site. 

What I see happening is a main site that can take your credit cards securely and all transactions would be handled off-site. Much like Patreon handles the logins on my main site and I don't access your private info this would be something you could sign up for knowing you get basically the same protection you do anywhere you use your VISA or Mastercard. I would also, OF COURSE, use a rather innocuous business name (ie "House of Motion Graphics) so your bank charges would seem tame.

Mirrors of each other

If anything like this would happen the main site and the Patreon would be effectively mirrors of each other in every aspect except perhaps things like discounts for long term purchases which I can't offer here. There might be some other perks but overall that is the intent. 

No commitment asked but one of the poll options is if you would be interested in this and POSSIBLY being part of a limited crew to help me shake something like this down?Again - no commitment since I have NOTHING setup or planned at the moment but if a lot of people were into it I'd love to know. If not, fair enough!

So vote as much as you like and if you have any comments - drop 'em in. I'm curious if you know of other people running their own membership or Patreon-like sites?

Thank you!

-Ready

Summary (but still read the post! haha)

• THIS IS ONLY A THOUGHT EXPERIMENT! Nothing is planned at the moment!
• Would do you think of my main site MIRRORING Patreon's offerings? The main benefit is I can offer YOU subscription discounts that are not possible here.
• PayPal is not an option for my main site as a subscription payment (sorry but that is beyond my reach and controlled by PayPal)
• Vote as much as you like
• Comments or ideas welcome. 
• Side Note, I am not here to defend or argue about PayPal or Patreon. They are BOTH fine and allowed to manage their services as they see fit. I only want to bring YOU the best service possible and the MOST ART!