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The creator economy can't rely on Patreon

joanwestenberg.com

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Re: The creator economy can't rely on Patreon

#41

Post by mathieuh »

mvdtnz wrote: post #13
rainbowzootsuit wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are one of today's 10,000. https://sponsor.ajay.app/ And if you have android: https://github.com/polymorphicshade/Tubular

Extensions like sponsor block don't help when entire videos are centered around promoting a product. A very popular mountain bike channel I used to follow, GMBN, for example, pretty much only makes videos in order to promote sponsors. The sponsors drive the very content we're here for, it's not just 30 second spots.

I do notice that the GMBN and GCN videos that are just advertorials do have "AD" in the top corner when you look at the video thumbnail. I'm assuming this is an EU or UK thing, because there are a lot of other channels that do exactly the same thing but there's no such "AD" callout.

https://imgur.com/iorhrD7

These videos take away from the channel's integrity for me but at least they're clearly marked as ads

Re: The creator economy can't rely on Patreon

#42

Post by nitwit005 »

I saw a streamer on Twitch say "This is my favorite hobby. It pays for itself".

I don't think most of these people expect to live off of the income. Most people seem well aware the odds of that happening is low.

Remember that tons of content was created before YouTube was paying anyone anything. They just wanted to share it.

Re: The creator economy can't rely on Patreon

#43

Post by _v7gu »

lewismenelaws wrote: post #2

I’m a full-time content creator. I feel like patreon/newsletters/paid communities are more hassle than anything. When I look at the pros and cons of every single revenue strategy, sponsorships has the highest gain and least cons (for me). Sponsors pay at least 10x what ad revenue pays, I don’t have to ask my community for money and the audience are likely to skip the ad anyway if they didn’t want to watch it. Patreon…

How much extra work is Patreon if you don't offer any extras to people who sponsor on there?

Most sponsored content is either completely orthogonal to the channel and its contents which is quite iffy if the creator is positioning themselves a someone with judgement their audience can trust (non-gaming channels advertising Raid: Shadow Legends, or non-tech channels advertising NordVPN), or actively make me lose respect for the creator (gaming channels advertising Raid: Shadow Legends, tech channels advertising NordVPN, or anyone with BetterHelp after all the shit they pulled).

Of course there are exceptions, like content creators posting on Nebula being sponsored by them or anything Josh Strife Hayes does.

Re: The creator economy can't rely on Patreon

#44

Post by johnnyanmac »

Roark66 wrote: post #4

What creators need is a better youtube algorithm. Is it just me, or has youtube recommendations become almost unusable by now? Some years ago when I spent "an hour watching YouTube" I'd watch a huge majority of videos recommended by the algorithm based on my current subs. Today it is 1%. Why? I'll give you an example. I have varied interests, I sub and regularly watch a number if channels in each of my hobbies, but f…

> Is it just me, or has youtube recommendations become almost unusable by now?

It's honestly the opposite for me. It's scary good at finding content related to my recent history, and it's even gotten better at directing me towards even toward very small (But yes, if you take even a step towards some semblance of clickbait, or even hover over some random video too long, your feed will suddenly transform into a flood of crypto, cat videos, culture wars, or just general low quality content. You need to aggressively cull your history and make use of "don't recommend this channel" to stop that. Maybe even clear your entire history if it feels too lost Also, YT is aggressively promoting shorts no matter what you do, in my experience.

As a discaimer, I have Premium, so I don't know if I get a better algorithm as a result of that.

Re: The creator economy can't rely on Patreon

#45

Post by rjmunro »

blitzar wrote: post #25
bruceb wrote: post #6

The TL;DR of this is basically there are too many people creating content. Best thing that creators could do is tell other creators to quit. The author doesn't say this part but really that is what it comes down to. Instead she offers a generic advice about diversifying the medium of delivery.

The irony is that the "creator economy" was meant to democratise content and make everyone able to make a living from being a "creator". In reality the maximum number that can be sustained in this manner is less than the number of salaried listicle writers at media outlets.

> In reality the maximum number that can be sustained in this manner is less than the number of salaried listicle writers at media outlets.

I think the maximum is probably quite lot more than there are salaried writers. But it's certainly a lot less then "everyone".

Re: The creator economy can't rely on Patreon

#46

Post by DoreenMichele »

bell-cot wrote: post #15

Sorry, but the "creator economy" is a mostly-malicious delusion. Sure, it can sound great. And for a very lucky few it probably is great. But the 99% reality is that it's just hype from techo-utopians, wanna-be's, get-rich-quick salesmen, and a bunch of mega-corporate platforms - whose profits are built on the backs of virtual-slave "creator" labor. (Yes, maybe this is a bit too cynical. Maybe. A bit.)

Some people want to do something they believe in or can do which they have reason to believe other people get value out of and they reasonably think that they should be able to support themselves. If they add value, people should tip or whatever so they get something back for making your life better.

Monetization has been a hot button topic on HN for a long time. The HN crowd more or less hates any means to monetize content while also decrying the decline in quality writing.

And it's not just HN. Journalism is dying. Small town newspapers are going extinct. And then people complain about the poor quality of reporting when the people doing the reporting are typically paid a pittance.

I don't know the solution. I took HN's advice and "tried to get a real job" at some point and that didn't solve my problems either. I didn't get the job is the short version of stupid levels of drama.

Re: The creator economy can't rely on Patreon

#47

Post by pjc50 »

blitzar wrote: post #25
bruceb wrote: post #6

The TL;DR of this is basically there are too many people creating content. Best thing that creators could do is tell other creators to quit. The author doesn't say this part but really that is what it comes down to. Instead she offers a generic advice about diversifying the medium of delivery.

The irony is that the "creator economy" was meant to democratise content and make everyone able to make a living from being a "creator". In reality the maximum number that can be sustained in this manner is less than the number of salaried listicle writers at media outlets.

> make everyone able to make a living from being a "creator".

Never "everyone". A brief pause to think about how the world works and how all those physical artefacts around you get there imply that it could never be more than a few percent.

Re: The creator economy can't rely on Patreon

#48

Post by chgs »

electroly wrote: post #7
lewismenelaws wrote: post #2

I’m a full-time content creator. I feel like patreon/newsletters/paid communities are more hassle than anything. When I look at the pros and cons of every single revenue strategy, sponsorships has the highest gain and least cons (for me). Sponsors pay at least 10x what ad revenue pays, I don’t have to ask my community for money and the audience are likely to skip the ad anyway if they didn’t want to watch it. Patreon…

I see the same few sponsorships constantly: Skillshare, Brilliant, Nebula, Hello Fresh, BetterHelp, Raid: Shadow Legends. I like to guess which one it's going to be when the creator starts telling a made-up story that leads into the sponsorship segment. The fact that it's the same ones, over and over again, across a wide spectrum of channels, makes me think that sponsorship is not yet a proven reliable source of inco…

I love the oversimplified segments when they have some emperor’s message being intercepted and then someone suggests “you should have used nordvpn!”

Re: The creator economy can't rely on Patreon

#49

Post by monkey_monkey »

lewismenelaws wrote: post #2

I’m a full-time content creator. I feel like patreon/newsletters/paid communities are more hassle than anything. When I look at the pros and cons of every single revenue strategy, sponsorships has the highest gain and least cons (for me). Sponsors pay at least 10x what ad revenue pays, I don’t have to ask my community for money and the audience are likely to skip the ad anyway if they didn’t want to watch it. Patreon…

I took a look at your YouTube channel and it was exactly what I expected it to be.

Re: The creator economy can't rely on Patreon

#50

Post by seusscat »

electroly wrote: post #7
lewismenelaws wrote: post #2

I’m a full-time content creator. I feel like patreon/newsletters/paid communities are more hassle than anything. When I look at the pros and cons of every single revenue strategy, sponsorships has the highest gain and least cons (for me). Sponsors pay at least 10x what ad revenue pays, I don’t have to ask my community for money and the audience are likely to skip the ad anyway if they didn’t want to watch it. Patreon…

I see the same few sponsorships constantly: Skillshare, Brilliant, Nebula, Hello Fresh, BetterHelp, Raid: Shadow Legends. I like to guess which one it's going to be when the creator starts telling a made-up story that leads into the sponsorship segment. The fact that it's the same ones, over and over again, across a wide spectrum of channels, makes me think that sponsorship is not yet a proven reliable source of inco…

One in that list is not like the others. Nebula sponsorships are for creators that are already a part of their network trying to move viewers to their platform.

That's not a diss on Nebula. I think, among all the others, nebula is the most likely to be sustainable. It is creator owned and operated and the pricing model model seems like it is able to make decent money for the people on it.

No affiliation to Nebula, just a happy, paying customer.

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