Top all-time · #1688
Patreon
Company blog · blog.patreon.combusinessstartupsprogramming
Patreon is the company blog at blog.patreon.com, writing about business, startups and programming. Since 2017, 43 different Hacker News readers have linked it 45 times, most often “Patreon Lays off 17% of Staff”. The last post was in 2024, but the archive is still widely read.
Too few sampled comments (26) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Patreon's blog for the company's own statements on fee changes, layoffs, content removals and allegations, and for creator earnings figures. One commenter calls its Jack Conte funding post more detailed than a CNBC story.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 26 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Patreon gives creators the tools they need to reliably reach their fans, strengthen their communities, and build sustainable businesses
Most-linked posts?
- /updating-patreons-fee-structure/11 people · 11 mentions · first linked 2017-12-07
- Patreon Lays off 17% of Staff10 people · 10 mentions · first linked 2022-09-13
- On the removal of Come Back Alive4 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2022-02-25
- /vue-js-creator-evan-you3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2018-11-02
- Lessons in YAGNI: Patreon's “*_hack” methods and why they're not2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2019-10-04
- /updating-patreons-fee-structure2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2017-12-13
What Hacker News says?
Scroll way down on this page https://blog.patreon.com/updating-patreons-fee-structure ... apparently people were getting confused by the batched charges
Comment linking /updating-patreons-fee-structure
on “We’re sorry, and we’re not rolling out the fees change”Submitted We’re sorry, and we’re not rolling out the fees change as a story · 1195 points
HN discussionYou're assuming that Patreon will issue all of those charges at once. However, they talk about that problem in the article. What if a Patreon supporter pledges/makes a subscription on Day 1, then another on Day 2, and a third on Day 3, and so on? In their original blog post [1], they spoke about how, ideally , they'd issue each of those charges to the supporter immediately; and then begin recurring billing 30 days l…
Comment linking /updating-patreons-fee-structure/
on “We’re sorry, and we’re not rolling out the fees change”Submitted Patreon Lays off 17% of Staff as a story · 492 points
HN discussionThis is discussed in the original announcement [0] Essentially, some creators were having a problem where their donations dissapeared at the end of the month because the donator canceled before making the payment. To rectify this, Patreon introduced a pay up front system, where the first payment happens when you pledge, and all future payments happen at the beggining of the month. This introduces a problem when you…
Comment linking /updating-patreons-fee-structure/
on “We’re sorry, and we’re not rolling out the fees change”Submitted Patreon Raises $90M Series E at $1.2B Valuation as a story · 334 points
HN discussionI once contacted Patreon about re-adding support for non-SMS-based 2FA & while the customer service agent didn't seem to entirely understand, they did forward my request to the dev team when I asked. A few days/weeks later, it was back[1]. I'm grateful for all those involved who made that happen, as most companies don't listen when contacted about 2FA. And tangentially, while I can't be as certain about my involveme…
Comment linking /TOTP-two-factor-authentication
on “Tell HN: Somebody implemented something I wrote a blog about”Submitted On the removal of Come Back Alive as a story · 322 points
HN discussionProbably a better link than whatever the Instagram post is (behind a login): https://blog.patreon.com/a-note-from-jack
Comment linking /a-note-from-jack
on “Patreon Lays off 17% of Staff”Submitted Patreon Lays off 17% of Staff as a story · 5 points
HN discussionIt was announced on the Patreon blog, the poster chose to link to Instagram (annoyingly, for those of us not on Instagram). https://blog.patreon.com/a-note-from-jack I assume OP expected the blog post to be taken down or changed, so they captured it and linked to the capture instead of the original. I feel like the protocol for this should be to make a capture, post a link to it as a comment in the thread, and link…
Comment linking /a-note-from-jack
on “Patreon Lays off 17% of Staff”Submitted Millions and Billions – Celebrating Patrons, Creators, and Major Milestones as a story · 3 points
HN discussionhttps://blog.patreon.com/a-note-from-jack
Comment linking /a-note-from-jack
on “Patreon Lays off 17% of Staff”Submitted Patreon’s New Features: Tools to Run Your Membership Business as a story · 3 points
HN discussionhttps://blog.patreon.com/a-note-from-jack
Comment linking /a-note-from-jack
on “Patreon Lays off 17% of Staff”Submitted Covid-19 and the Creative Economy: Takeaways from Patreon’s Data Science Team as a story · 2 points
HN discussionThis bit from the employee announcement about how they're handling equity vesting [1] is worth highlighting as a pretty classy move, all things considered: > We’re waiving the one-year equity vesting cliff for all departing employees so that everyone has an opportunity to be a shareholder, regardless of your tenure. [...] All departing teammates will qualify for an extended option exercise period of 5 years, and we…
Comment linking /a-note-from-jack
on “Patreon Lays off 17% of Staff”Submitted Lessons in YAGNI: Patreon's “*_hack” methods and why they're not as a story · 2 points
HN discussionNobody looks like they are going to lose their livelihood over this: https://blog.patreon.com/a-note-from-jack 3 months' of pay + longer depending on tenure at the company. Healthcare until the end of the year. Mental care up to 6 months. They contracted a placement company to place the laid off staff to other companies in the sector. A lot of those people will already get hooked up by a company within a week or so,…
Comment linking /a-note-from-jack
on “Patreon Lays off 17% of Staff”Submitted Lessons in YAGNI¹: Patreon's “*_hack” methods and why they're not as a story · 1 points
HN discussionA blog post was done other than Instagram: https://blog.patreon.com/a-note-from-jack "but as the world began recovering from the pandemic and enduring a broader economic slowdown, that plan is no longer the right path forward for Patreon" So basically, they overhired to meet demands during Pandemic and now as less people are using the platform (??), there is no need for the 17% of people. Interesting.
Comment linking /a-note-from-jack
on “Patreon Lays off 17% of Staff”Submitted Patreon Raises $60M Series D as a story · 1 points
HN discussionI think it was first posted on their blog here: https://blog.patreon.com/a-note-from-jack
Comment linking /a-note-from-jack
on “Patreon Lays off 17% of Staff”EDIT: Due to a blog post I was unaware of, the rest of this post is incorrect. Patreon will still make a bit more money than before, but with the new structure of billing each pledge on its own schedule, not nearly as much as I had outlined. https://blog.patreon.com/updating-patreons-fee-structure/ ORIGINAL: Most patrons provide many small donation amounts. Patreon will, as called out in the article, get a lot more…
Comment linking /updating-patreons-fee-structure/
on “Patreon’s new service fee spurs concern that creators will lose patrons”Actually, from Patreon's update, it sounds like Patreon will, in fact, run five different transactions: https://blog.patreon.com/updating-patreons-fee-structure/ Which is frankly insane, but does explain the change.
Comment linking /updating-patreons-fee-structure/
on “Patreon’s new service fee spurs concern that creators will lose patrons”Patreon has just updated their blog with the rationale for the change: https://blog.patreon.com/updating-patreons-fee-structure/ Unfortunately, changing the payment structure to what they're proposing - while easier to understand - removes any payment-processing value that Patreon was providing. Putting the friction back into these kinds of micro-donations. Seems like a bad business move to me. The hard problem here…
Comment linking /updating-patreons-fee-structure/
on “Patreon’s new service fee spurs concern that creators will lose patrons”Let's run the numbers: https://blog.patreon.com/updating-patreons-fee-structure/ For a $1 pledge: previously creators took home 85c at least, so Patreon was maxed out at 15c. Now they will charge the patron 37.9 cents and the creator an additional 5c. So now they are maxed out at 42.9c. If 15c was enough to break even this means 27.9c of pure profit. That's a _very_ nice profit rate! (The rent seeking is too damn hi…
Comment linking /updating-patreons-fee-structure/
on “Patreon’s new service fee spurs concern that creators will lose patrons”Patreon is presenting this as solely as an improvement for the sake of the creators (see https://blog.patreon.com/updating-patreons-fee-structure/ ). If it's a necessity to Patreon alive, they're not presenting it as such. I have yet to find a creator who is not upset about this change. And they seem to be ignorant or uncaring about the uproar it's caused. This is the end of Patreon if they don't course-correct very…
Comment linking /updating-patreons-fee-structure/
on “Patreon’s new service fee spurs concern that creators will lose patrons”> patron pledges $1, patron pays $1, creator ends up with some amount significantly less than $1, depending on all the fees. from [1], the "previous" (current) situation the creator would receive 85-93% of the amount. So $0.85 from $1, vs .95 from 1.38? Unless I'm completely flobbing the maths, that's ~69% in the new system? [1] https://blog.patreon.com/updating-patreons-fee-structure/
Comment linking /updating-patreons-fee-structure/
on “Patreon’s new service fee spurs concern that creators will lose patrons”Depends on how popular your project is. 1. Evan you (creator of vuejs) makes kind of a salary via patreon [1]. 2. Taylor otwell (creator of laravel) has created many useful projects like spark and forge that generate amazing revenue. 3. Creator of sidekiq (mike) has created a million dollar business by creating premium upsells [2] 4. And finally of course there are free and hosted versions of the software like WordP…
Comment linking /vue-js-creator-evan-you
on “Ask HN: Dear open source devs how do you sustain yourself”
