The Patreon Divide.

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CGCookie
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Patreon is a growing website for artists to make extra cash from creating art in which their followers can buy, download and have the .PSD and sometimes videos of making the art for themselves.

It's a great idea in theory but there has also been a pretty noticeable backlash.

  1. The first topic is whether or not you could even make money creating fan art of well known characters? Sakimi Chan is making a great deal of money doing mostly fanart creations and many have wondered how is this even legal? Isn't she making money off of a copyrighted character? There is a lot of gray area that is involved with this. 
  2. The second topic is in regards to the "quality slip" or what many believe to be a shift in subject matter, mainly doing large breasts etc. This morning in particular I was reading the comments on Zeronis' Tifa piece and there is a divide in this idea of patreon being bad for high tier artists. 

We have no plans on being on Patreon and that is not the reason for this entry, more trying to understand the general consensus behind Patreon and the artists involved with it. Do you agree with the divide or do you feel supporting the artists you admire is the reason you stand with Patreon? 

Let me know your thoughts in the Comments below!

***Update***

Great responses everyone! I am glad to see how well thought out and mature the responses have been. I want to keep this as an open discussion where all opinions on either side are discussed freely but without becoming heated! On that note if any comment is bashing Sakimi or Zeronis purely to detest them, I will delete those comments. I choose each since Sakimi is the highest grossing digital artist on Patreon and Zeronis is a high profile artist working at Riot Games who had his recent image sparked some discussion about Patreon in general. They are high profile artists and with that comes a great responsibility since they have an influence on inspiring artists. They are both artists I respect and have followed for years so remember to be respectful as well and let's stay on the subject matter for the discussion!

Thanks again everyone for your thoughts and insights, it's been very interesting hearing everyones opinions on the matter!
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XEBES's avatar
XEBES
People don't understand the value of cost. If they did, they wouldn't be so eager to throw their money at their screens and at any outlet that will take it. Crowd-sourcing is a revolutionary enterprising platform, and enables creators and entrepreneurs to make their dreams a reality. 

When you are supporting someone to enable them to do what they love to do, you are enabling their ability to work. The cost-benefit of this transaction means you are paying for their work, not necessarily the result of their works. This is why Patreon is a viable platform for artists who create fan-art of Intellectual Properties which do not belong to them, because they are not selling the final products. Thus the finished works can be posted free of charge, which makes everyone happy. But the main point here is that Patreon supporters are not purchasing a final product - They are, instead, purchasing the labor effort required to produce a product.

If more people understood what energy-costs and other simple economic factors were, and actually had a basic knowledge of business ordeals - we would have far less confusion within the Patreon-sphere. However, this is exactly what I would expect from business and economics-illiterate people making business and economic decisions.