Monthly Musing · 1:30pm Jun 1st, 2017
Purpose defines a people, but a person can redefine their purpose.
At the start of every month, I put up a philosophical statement, then a page break, then explain what my patreon is, what the rewards are, and thank EVERYONE who is a patron. This way, if you don't want to read all the boring money stuff, you can instead debate philosophy in the comments.
So. Patreon. In the olden days of yore, nobles of all kinds would sponsor a live-in artist, let them do as they please, pay for their housing and lodging, simply because they liked their art (and as a way to brag about their wealth--"Well, I'm housing Da Vinci, beat THAT!"). Patreon is a modern, internet-based evolution of that; I do my art technically entirely for free, and my patrons choose to pay whatever they like for each chapter I release. They can even choose to put a maximum amount on what they pay per month. In turn, not only do I produce content here, I offer rewards for those that pledge a certain amount! Thus far, nobody has taken me up on the rewards, but the option for me to review something in this blog, or to make a one-shot, or for you all to tell me what MUST be updated, it's all available.
Understand: I write for free. But this is a significant chunk of my income--my primary source, in fact. I'd write even if it wasn't, and the fact that so many of you have agreed to support me means more than I can ever express. If you'd like to help out, check out my page--I'm not even asking for much.
And finally, thank you to hawthornbunny, William Purdy, Jared Baker, Jacob Bielski, FanOfMostEverything, Peter Wildani, David Sallmann, ScottBecker, FencepostErr1r, Karl Kornel, Alamais, Leonard Rinehart-Mann, and Charles M. Hagmaier for their continued donation and support.
The last few months i've had to restrain my spending due to a convention last weekend; later today i need to square away my post convention finances, but i'm expecting to once again have a free hand on finances for next month.
I'm certainly eying that $20 tier; i can afford it, but that level of sponsorship is going to make its presence known on my monthly budget, so i may only be able to justify maintaining sponsorship at that level for a month or two.
But, "Steel Soul" was the story that first brought me to this website, and "Steel Spirit" convinced me to stick around, and see what else this site had to offer; somewhere along the way hell froze over, and i started watching the show a few days ago (ive seen seasons 1-3 so far, and i expect to get started on season 4 later tonight).
4555035
A fair warning: I do Patreon updates by chapter released, not by month. If you want to limit your monthly donation, there is an option for that, but you have to explicitly state "No more then X dollars per month." It's how the system works, unfortunately.
4555135 I am aware of the per chapter billing; $20 monthly would barely register as a line item in my budgeting.
Anyways, my finances are now back on even keel, and i have a free hand for spending going into next month; so as of writing this i have already upped my commitment to the $20 per chapter mark, and put a 5 times per month limit in place to prevent any potential cost overrun.
Assuming you maintain the 4 chapter per month average i've seen from you thus far; this commitment level is going to roughly double my current Patreon commitments, but i REALLY want to see "Steel Spirit" continued.