Moving Platforms and the Temporary Discontinuation of AnthroBrand's Paid Services
Hello there! I know the title of this article seems ominous, but it's not all bad news! As per usual, we are going to dive into things one point at a time, that way I have ample room to explain my views before moving on to the next thing. With that being said, on to the first thing!
Swapping Platforms
As many of you know, we have been using Patreon to collect donations to help fund AnthroBrand. The site costs money to maintain and we also spend countless hours providing free consultations and advice to the Anthro community. Most of the things we do are completely free and they are going to stay that way, and I'm sorry to the subscribers we are inconveniencing by swapping platforms. So, why the change?
In recent months, it has come to light that Patreon has made some questionable business decisions. The only one that I can absolutely validate as being true is the fact that they fired their entire security team in a very short amount of time. Once I read this news, I reached out to a few members of the Anthro community who also work in cybersecurity. I got their opinions and mulled it over for a bit, but ultimately decided that Patreon was no longer the place for AnthroBrand. As of writing this article, our Patreon page has been completely shut down and I have requested that all of our data be removed from the site. For anyone who is also considering moving platforms, please be advised that you have to submit a privacy request on Patreon in order to delete your account. It's not complicated so please don't be intimidated by the process.
Where to from here?
AnthroBrand will be moving over to Ko-fi and I'd like to take a second to highlight why Ko-fi turned out to be the best choice for us:
- Ko-fi offers one-time and monthly subscription donation options
- They also have Discord integration with a role management bot
- Each tier can be set to a minimum amount, but they offer custom amount options to each and every donor that signs up
- Way, way less fees when it comes to donations
- Direct, automated deposits straight to your money-site of choice
- User friendly website
Now, there are some limitations to Ko-fi and it is definitely not the best solution for all creators. The biggest limitation, that I am aware of, is their intolerance for NSFW content. I know that's a massive pain to hear, but I have these other options for those who are looking to jump from Patreon to a new platform where they can create NSFW content without fear:
- SubscribeStar
- PixivFanbox
This article is, by no means, a slight to Patreon or their services. I encourage everyone out there to make the right choice for your business. Now that we have fully covered the first thing, let's move on to the second thing!
Temporary Discontinuation of AnthroBrand's Paid Services
Back in March of this year, I enrolled in Flight School to become a pilot. Happily, I'm only a few hours away from being eligible for my checkride and finally getting my Private Pilot's License. It's been a long road to get here with lots of late hours spent studying, and a ton of flight hours each week. Now that I'm nearing my first big milestone towards becoming a Flight Instructor, I've realized that I will need to put in even more time to earn my Instrument Rating, Commercial Pilot's License, and finally my Certified Flight Instructor license. I've wanted to chase this dream since I was little, and I am incredibly fortunate to finally be able to!
I'm sure some of you are asking, "What does this even mean?" I totally get that and I'm happy to break it all down.
TL;DR - AnthroBrand will no longer offer full or part-time management services. Things like commission queue management, subscription service management, and Discord overhauls are going to be temporarily suspended simply because we are a team of two that run all of AnthroBrand. Shilo is working more hours at her job, and I'm still working full time while also going to flight school.
What services will still be available after this change?
AnthroBrand will still offer the following services for free, as we always have:
- Productivity Consultations
- Scheduling Advice
- Task Management Strategies
- Marketing Strategies
- Discord Administration - Limited to small tasks like bot help
- Telegram Group Administration - Limited to creation and voluntary participation
- Online Community Advice
- Continued Management for on-going large projects (Fan Reanimated and other Multi-Animator Projects)
- Continued hosting of the AnthroBrand Library of help articles
I would like to thank everyone that has been with us for the past three years. It's been a long road of living, learning, and persevering through some of the toughest times any of us have ever known. The extra income from the donations we get have such a massive impact on our lives and our ability to run AnthroBrand as it is. Our goal has never been to make a lot of money with anything AB related, but we are endlessly appreciative of every dollar we receive.
I'd also like to extend my most sincerest thanks to the clients who enrolled in our paid services and helped show us that the time we put in is worth it. The amount of hours we put in, for free, will always outweigh the paid ones, but those few really help balance it all out for us. To each of our paid clients, thank you, thank you, thank you for your patronage and I'm sorry that our paid services are coming to an end.
As always, my email and DMs are open for anyone who has a question about us or anything we do. If you send me a message on Twitter, however, please allow a few days for me to see it. Twitter does not notify me of direct message requests.
Thanks for reading!