There's a lot of talk about tipping, consumers, etc.
Being a Patron (which is what Patreon was trying to do) traditionally meant supporting someone, no matter what their output. If your tortured genius put out one work a year, so be it. If they popped out Sunflowers then even better!
There doesn't have to be any quid pro quo at all.
It's what we now call Basic Income financed by someone's surplus.
Don't overthink it. It's not a tip, it's a gift, an expression of support. It may be something more, but in the end you're giving money to someone, period.
As an aside, it's really unclear if Patreon payments should be considered income in the US. It's a gift, but it's up to the giver to handle that. I doubt creators would need a 1099 in that case either.
Is this historically accurate? Most of my renaissance art history class memories involve artists kinda getting controlled by their patrons a lot of the time. Plus, the patron usually got to own/sell/commission works from them. Sure, some of it was at the time, it looked good for you to have artists in your keep, but it wasn't some sort of no-strings-attached benevolence, and the situation they put out no work for extended periods and still stayed on with their patron feels more like survivorship bias. How many middling royals were going through patronizing artists who didn't become a big deal and then dropping them?
Almost all succesful creators on Patreon give you benefits for subscribing (early access to content, behind the scenes, etc.), so I don't see how you could possibly convince the IRS that it's a gift.
I don't, not the slightest amount, and I still don't try to convince the IRS that my sole source of income is 'a gift'. (not counting the pathetically small YouTube revenue)
It doesn't ACT like 'a gift', it acts like a paycheck. If a guy gets paid by a car dealership because he's the owner's kid without having to do anything, the IRS doesn't care whether he has to work for real but it very much cares whether he pays his taxes on his income.
But we have a specific word, patronage, to describe a payment that is specifically NOT for work, and of course a platform named for that my might reasonable consider payments on it patronage not payment for work.
At EU there is a tax issue so you pay money + 23% VAT.
It isn't consider a gift as you a gaining something (access to page) so you need to pay tax on that.
This is one thing that bothers me with patronite and other platforms. I wish I could simply send a gift (without acces to anything) and not to pay another tax on already taxed money.
The flipside of that is that Patreon handles the ugly details of making sure the right amount of VAT / sales tax is paid on transactions - and from a creator's point of view this is a big part of their value proposition.
If creators had to administer that stuff on an individual basis they'd have no time left for creating.
VAT rate is EU state based (varies 16-25%), the VAT has to applied to the one's 'donating' the money state of residence, as long as there is more than 10k euro/year revenue.
Many EU states tax tips as well (all the way -> VAT/corporate/income/social tax)
When Patreon is structured as “For $5/month you get X, for $10/month you get Y, for $15/month you get Z” can you really argue it’s a gift? It’s very transactional.
I'm not sure how representative my personal data point is, but I don't really pay attention to the perks. I pick a tier based on how much money I want to send their way.
Yes but those rewards are rarely fungible. As I understand it's more about recognizing the patron (e.g. your name in the credits) and giving them special status in the community (e.g. early access) rather than getting something of real monetary value.
> There doesn't have to be any quid pro quo at all.
I mean yes and no. I feel like I'm getting a fairer deal from some Artists than others that I support. So I admit I sometimes only subscribe for 1-3 months, and then unsubscribe, when Output is low, or variance in content themes is too high. The price then isn't really justified.
Also, for some artists, Patreon serves as an ad-hoc subscription platform. If I'm essentially being promised 3-4 units of "Art" per month, you bet I'm going to unsubscribe if the Artist doesn't post at all, unannounced. It's also not fair to call these "gifts" - I get exclusive access to most of the content on Patreon and with one exception, all Artists advertise it as a service. I'd be different if I could consume their content on another platform for free, but often times I can't.
Tbf though, I still don't have a reliable income, so maybe I'd change my habits once I got that taken care of.
In nearly every case, it’s obviously not a gift. Every single time I’ve ever subscribed to someone on Patreon is because I’m purchasing a subscription for extra content.
Being a Patron (which is what Patreon was trying to do) traditionally meant supporting someone, no matter what their output. If your tortured genius put out one work a year, so be it. If they popped out Sunflowers then even better!
There doesn't have to be any quid pro quo at all.
It's what we now call Basic Income financed by someone's surplus.
Don't overthink it. It's not a tip, it's a gift, an expression of support. It may be something more, but in the end you're giving money to someone, period.
As an aside, it's really unclear if Patreon payments should be considered income in the US. It's a gift, but it's up to the giver to handle that. I doubt creators would need a 1099 in that case either.