That Unemployed Friend #006: Patreon, Substack and the Ugly Business of Getting Your Hustle On
The What to Do of What to Do For Money
I’ve been doing my best to slow walk this whole “monetization” nonsense and Elly Musk messed it all up. During last Friday’s doomsday panic over his fumbling of Twitter I rushed out a thread laying out my Patreon, which I’ve been working on for over a month, and posted it for all the world to see. Reception was overall positive, a truly heartwarming number of up-and-coming nu-metal bands I love signal boosted it and, while it didn’t make me a millionaire overnight, when you consider that - for all my efforts - I’m a crazy ass gimmick account asking people to trust me the fact I raised anything day one is pretty remarkable. But I evoked a very pointed and well liked sub-Tweet against it and though it’s truly pathetic to confess, reader I was shook.
I’m not angry that I ticked a few folks off with the debut of my Patreon, no way- I’m asking for people’s credit card numbers the skepticism is deserved. More importantly it was real criticism, shit I needed to be called out on. Where I went wrong in my was foregrounding the promise of access to other people’s shit. Even if my motivations for collecting non-streaming albums or magazine scans are good, paywalling them is a weird look that raises more questions than answers. Chiefly it leads into the next issue which is that you could, credibly, accuse my whole operation of being plain theft. I mean, what do I do all day other than rip shit off YouTube and repost it to Twitter? An uncomfortable recent example came when I grabbed DerpyChamp’s trombone hero creation and reposted it to the tune of 1.7 million views. His original upload? About 37 thousand. You can argue it in different directions - I gave credit directly under my Tweet with a link to his video had I not posted anything at all he would have got nothing does that make it worth it? - but the fact remains I snatched his video off YouTube and reposted it without permission. And now I want people to pay me to do that? So I’m not upset that I was called out on my shit, I’m more frustrated that I let it happen. For all my recent bluster about how we’re gonna “bring nu-metal back” I’m literally just A Guy. All the pepe memes in the world can’t mask the fact that I’m an unemployed 30 year old hitching his wagon to the worst genre ever on a website that is being junked by the least funny man on earth. Overstepping into had enough of this dude territory feels like kicking the leg out from a very fragile enterprise.
I saw Deftones last Sunday! Performing in PetCo park in downtown San Diego. Never been there before. A really beautiful city the airport is almost directly next to the downtown so there’s big planes coming and going close by plus a harbor not far either. It’s almost like something you’d build in SimCity come to life, all the important pieces of your metropolis in the same general vicinity. PetCo park is no exception, a massive stadium right plop in the middle of everything. For the duration of my time there, no matter where I was standing, you could see up and into all the shining luxury apartments nearby. A thought struck me like a dime dropped from a skyscraper; all this stress, all this effort, all this content so that I may have the chance to one day… break even? If my lil Patreon returned to me $4,000 a month that would both be an incredible success and much less than I was making at my old job.
I will always be suspicious of my pessimism towards modern pop-culture but dammit I just can’t shake the feeling that something is not right. This is hyper-capitalism. Everyone and then some is scamming as hard as they possibly can while the American regulation state is helpless to do anything about it and before the price of comfort rockets as the Earth becomes more unstable. Art is suffering because the people that could be writing your favorite album of all time are too floored by the cost of living to bother. Artists with a platform are slaves to the algorithm, putting out songs that might go viral if only to break through the whales that fill up the entire top 10 all at once, while those without platforms have to moonlight as Twitch streamers, meme page admins, tee shirt designers and keep a day job that all leaves them too exhausted to even think about picking up a guitar. New art doesn’t resonate because the kids that should be making it can’t imagine a future where it matters and the adults that might be able to do something about it are either nervously clutching their purses, hoping someone else steps up first, or slavishly dripping drool from each tooth at the opportunity to make things even worse. Old men do not plant trees under which they will never sit anymore, they are ripping up the ones we do have from the ground and building houses we will never be able to afford with them. The most beautiful, brokest people you’ve ever known pay everyone on time with tip and a thank you note. The richest man on earth bought my favorite website and fired the most critical staff by accident.
Alright, phew! You know, I wrote that big ass doomer paragraph on Monday when I was way down in the dumps and since then I’ve brightened up considerably so let’s move on. I have a Patreon and a Substack. If you’re reading this you’re probably enlisted in the Substack somewhere and may be wondering what gives. Don’t worry. The Substack will continue. In fact, you’re reading something right now that isn’t going to be on Patreon at all.
Here’s how the divide is (roughly) gonna go: Podcast, podcast exclusives; Patreon - Nu-metal newsletter; Patreon and Substack - personal and political junk (such as this); Substack. I get that this is a bit shit, you were after all here first why would you be walled off from anything? Well, I have to expand into Patreon just because Substack isn’t enough. I’m still nowhere close to making enough money to live on, at this point I’ve probably got another two or maybe three months left before I’m broke. Patreon has a wider array of options for generating revenue while Substack has three. But even beyond money there’s a lot of possibility on Patreon that I can’t accomplish here. Did you know they’ll actually make and ship tee shirts for you? Crazy. So if you’re subbed here and want to do just one or the other and/or don’t really care about my personal life I won’t be offended if you cancel this and go there. And if the entire enterprise has worn you down and you just want to cancel well… I’ll be hurt but understand.
So that’s where we’re at. I’m feeling pretty good about things. Working on a lot of shit all at once and, hey, the podcast is out too. I think I can get together a modestly profitable enterprise and am generally much calmer now that Twitter hasn’t gone down… yet.
It's been a pleasure following you on this journey from the day a goofy ASCII art meme where you didn't even get the tablature for the Blind riff correct somehow trickled into my feed and it was an instant follow. I'm determined to keep supporting you on this journey because everyone should be able to follow their passion into a sustainable lifestyle.
I was thinking about what Twitter accounts I would be really sad to see go if the site imploded, and Nu Metal Moments was one of the first ones I thought of. I hope everything works out, trying to monetize yourself is weird and hard
Also!!!!!! I wanted to share that I got an email this morning telling me that the SAW VI SOUNDTRACK is now streaming everywhere, and that just seems relevant to your interests cuz it has a Suicide Silence remix, Type O, Lacuna Coil, and stuff like that. So if you didn't know about this already - https://ingrv.es/saw-vi-1c3-1 !