To make this clear: Patreon is a platform mainly used by creators, artists, musicians to get a reliable income directly from their fans. Apple is trying to steal 30% of the income of our favorite artists.
Good thing none of us have iPhones here, right, guys? Right?
Been locked in this ecosystem for a while guys. I’m not proud of it.
Never too late to switch to GrapheneOS.
I can’t unlock my bootloader so i’m fucked.
I am in it for not too long, I wanted a Framework notebook but they didn’t sell in my country so I couldn’t purchase it through my business so I went with macbook and iphone next to because, why not.
I generally don’t care much about things like in the op news tbh, as if I have a subscription for something I use it directly from the website
And stuff like the seemless integration when switching from my phone to my MacBook with my airpods is fucking great.
but I am not a normal techie, I am waaay overindexed on user experience over a lot of things, for example I pay for spotify because the Ux is great for me, I refuse to pay for streaming devices because my own plex/jellyfin server is a much better UX.
I am also refusing to buy cars without physical buttons.
But I like my blue iMessages!
I don’t rofl
Yeah, hopefully Patron doesn’t roll over and just removes the option to do it in iPhone. Taking away functionality will make Apple look bad, which they deserve.
I really think this move blows and I wish they would reverse this decision and make an exception.
However Tim Cook didn’t wake up one day and wonder how he could fuck creators. Apple takes a 30% cut of all app transactions. This is how they benefit from the enormous and highly successful app platform and ecosystem they created. It’s not pure evil to say “hey use this platform all you want but you must share some of what you make there with us.”
It does suck that they won’t let creators off the hook though. This is like taxing rips.
The platform is enormous and highly successful solely because it is a monopoly in the Apple ecosystem
I guarantee you if other app stores were allowed on Apple devices, they would take significant market share with a far smaller cut of revenue
We can safely assume that alternative app stores would have less effect on iOS than they have on Android, where Google desperately wants others to step in and develop their ecosystem. And they aren’t very significant on Android at all. I tried distributing my app on Samsung Galaxy in addition to GPlay and despite its preferential positioning with the world’s largest phone maker, I got peanuts for installs. Not even a rounding error. I literally took the app down. Oh and then Xiaomi got banned from the SDK and they stole my APK for their third party app store and began sending me bug reports about how it was “broken” there. Ah yes the power and glory of alternative app stores… Apple are wise not to dump this cesspit into their ecosystem, which people love because all they want is one decent, unified default that works well.
I hope Patreon will just switch off the ability to pay through the iOS app, along with a nice fuck you-message to Apple that pops up when you first open the app
Last time this came up Patreon simply allowed the creators to charge the commission directly on top of the price for non apple users, or eat the 30% loss. So everyone not using iOS would pay, say, $5/month, iOS users would pay $5+30%. Hope they retain that option.
That’s actually a good solution
Is it? Previously this was considered tips
Now it’s 30% for what? Running a payment gateway and hiding an unsubscribe button deep in the App Store UI.
Competitively payment gateways charge 1-3%, but when you lock down a platform you can charge 10x that.
Yeah, I remember cause my Patreon account asked me what I wanted to do about apple trying to steal my money
p.s. I never push Patreon so have no subs lol
It’s logical but it probably scares away some customers. That’s why the “just eat it” option exists. iOS gives you access to an enormous market and payments are slick and easy. Creators may want $5 but if they can get 30% less from 500% more people, it’s still a good business for them. There’s no strict reason why they must obsess over taking 100% of the sticker price. There are a million examples of businesses who are willing to accept a discount for high volume business.
It reminds me of gas stations that only accept ATM cards and not credit cards, because they don’t want to lose the 3% that credit card companies take per transaction. They’re trying not to lose that 3%, but it will inconvenience some customers and lose them some business. That could easily be worse than 3%.
So yes Patreon could say “go find a laptop and enter your credit card number in our web page” but there are people who won’t do all that because they expect to be able to pay with one tap. And businesses are on the AppStore because that great payment experience makes it super easy for them to convert customers.
It’s just not as straightforward as saying “fuck you Apple, I’ll take my business elsewhere.”
To follow this logic: if you use an e-banking app, Apple will soon claim to be entitled to 30% of all transactions. Same for paypal, ebay, you name it
Well call it tithe for your digital overlord.
Apple charges 30% when you sell digital goods within an app. That’s not the same as moving money in your bank account or buying something on eBay.
It’s still robbery, but it’s not the same.
When people subscribe, they typically get something digital in return on Patreon.
So 30% tax on buying digital goods on ebay?
Does eBay sell digital goods?
I’d kinda expect the answer to be yes if so if you use the ebay app? If not, I’m actually surprised.
What exactly does Apple think that they’re brining to the equation in order to deserve that 30? Is it simply that they’re hosting an app on their store, so therefore they’re entitled to a cut?
So if I write a novel, and get it published, Microsoft can say "We deserve 30% because you used our product to produce your product?
I’m so fucking tired of corporations. It’s well past guillotine-o-clock.
They’re bringing the apple tax to the table
If I was on Patreon I’d tell them to pull the app. Fuck em they have a website.
Right? You’d think Patreon would throw their weight against Apple, as this is clearly not in their best interest. Threaten to pull the app, and if Apple follows through, they get nothing. Alternatively, move payments entirely outside of the app and force Apple to either do something which is guaranteed to be extremely unpopular, or call their bluff. But they won’t do these things or even try to negotiate Apple’s cut.
Apple may appear to swing the biggest dick here, but I am so disgusted by these weak companies just immediately bending over without a fight.
As always, it’s the creators who will be faced with hardship, but neither entity seems to give a shit.
Is It better for patreon to lose 30% of income from Apple pay, or to have Apple users not being able to pay unless they open the webpage and pay from there? Is it better for them to remove the app altogether and have users on Apple forced to use it through the website?
I’d imagine they’d lose quite a bit of subscriptions if they did that. Is that more or less than 30% is something I don’t know.
They could go on the offensive with messaging and get subscribers to apply pressure on Apple to keep things the same… Would it work? Probably not, but it might get some of the Apple users onside.
Is it better for them to remove the app altogether and have users on Apple forced to use it through the website?
Yes. Clearly yes, for everyone. This sort of shit only continues because people don’t do that.
I would imagine this would lead to having less users. Or people that use it less. It would also make the experience for users worse. As such it would lead to less subscriptions. It is not clear to me that this would be better. I’m not sure on whether it would be worse, but I doubt it’d be better for everyone.
And there goes your engagement.
Apples got them, and Apple knows it.
Conversely, Apple is nothing but an overpriced burner phone without the apps. No one is buying it for safari and iTunes.
I fucking hate mega corps. It’s never fucking enough… Ever… Apple has more money than some countries yet these assholes want ever more…
Tax all these assholes into oblivion!
Tim Cook needs more money to forge golden offerings for his good pal Donald trump.
I didn’t even know there was a Patreon app. I signed up through the website. On a computer. Old school.
So, all business is becoming a protection racket?
Terribly need degoogled android to become popular and/or a normal Linux distribution phone to become popular so that normal Linux market share couldn’t be ignored
Technofeudalism.
Timmy Cook is just a bean counter. He’s got nothing to innovate or build. That’s Apple has been buying back shares non stop. Their lead designer jumped ship a while ago. It’s only a matter of time.
They still have wicked hardware, nobody is near their M5 performance/watt though
Makes me think why ever since Photoshop was first created, Apple became the go-to for creatives for decades, and now Apple thinks it wants more money than just the fanatics going after their latest product.
Apple screwed their pro market anyway. Sometime back . The history with apple and creatives relates more to print history I’d guess . Adobe needs to be ditched , and is in some areas. Windows is a shitshow as we know. There are lessening reasons to be wedded to either Mac OS or Windows as they continue to enshittify and I for one welcome it.
Our collective migration to Linux is inevitable
Apple keeps screwing up, just look at the latest hideous update of macOS and its “Liquid Ass” interface
Choose another payment method. Choose another platform - web based? - where these fees don’t apply. Hell, buy a throwaway droid phone to keep your money from apple’s greedy hands.
Google imposes the same restriction, if you buy a digital service (such as a Patreon subscription) you need to pay the Google tax.
I don’t know if Patreon got an exemption from Google, but any smaller developer doesn’t for sure.
Yet another reason to never ever use Apple. So if I just use the Patreon website and not an app, do I still have to give Apple 30% of my money? Seems like that should be illegal.
