To make this clear: Patreon is a platform mainly used by creators, artists, musicians to get a reliable income directly from their fans. Apple is trying to steal 30% of the income of our favorite artists.
Good thing none of us have iPhones here, right, guys? Right?
Honestly I wouldn’t touch Apple products with a bargepole. I dislike closed ecosystems
Its not closed
The door is just very very tiny
I always end up with MacBooks after startups and love to have something I can just pick up and use whereas my PC is my command center. Most of my shit is web or local web services so just need a Mozilla terminal. Also, I can’t fathom buying one out of pocket. I’ve also never had an iPhone, it doesn’t make sense to my brain.
So…if you’re just using web stuff, you could probably save a heap by using a Chromebook. That’s what my wife’s personal laptop is and is perfect for web stuff (and has the option of Android apps too, like Mozilla). It’s not her only computer though.
You’d rather be spied on constantly by the largest panopticon ever created, because they allow sideloading.
Honestly this is voting for Trump over Kamala; we need a viable alternative. Why have they taken personal computing from us?
You can deGoogle Android if you want, hopefully better alternatives, that don’t suck, like Linux Phone™ 🙏 arrive before too long.
Except all the posts I see about degoogling start with purchasing Google hardware.
other options besides graphene exist, like lineage OS that work on a ton of different phones. and sure graphene requires google hardware but nobody says you have to buy the hardware from google direct. buying used is different than buying from google
It’s also an option many people would be fine with. I’m okay with Google having my money. Paying companies for products is perfectly fine. I just don’t want them to have my data and invade my privacy
like what? I dumped my google hardware in the process
So you’d rather be spies on by the formerly largest panopticon ever created AND not be able to side load?
If you think Apple is some paragon of privacy you might want to do some research on that lol.
No, I’d rather use my device like I want to use my device instead of how I’m told to use it. I don’t need to sideload on this device but glad I can if and when I want to. I prefer having a computer with me rather than a purposely stunted device kept that way to sell other devices in the ecosystem.
You say it’s purposely stunted, I say it has guardrails that saves me hours and hours of family IT support time un-fucking my elderly parents phones. This was something I’d have to do every single time I was home when we had android phones.
I would dump Apple in a heartbeat if something better existed. They’re not good but they’re the best for my personal scenario of the current options.
You really shouldn’t be so downvoted for sharing your experience. While not ideal it’s valid and understandable.
It happens if you express any positive sentiment towards Apple. I don’t give a shit, downvotes matter not.
I don’t need my phone to be a completely open computer, I have a computer and a server for that. I need a communications appliance, and since I’m the family IT guy, I need the lowest bullshit device my boomer parents can operate. My parents are not going to run some high privacy custom ROM because I’m not going to troubleshoot their problems. I realize that those ROMs are objectively better if you’re only considering the phone, but I basically have to manage a fleet of devices, and it’s easier troubleshooting if I’m also using the same. I don’t love Apple, it’s just easier.
Were being spied on regardless, better to choose the option that allows one to do the most with it. If I could throw together my own phone and run a Linux variant on then I fucken would, but as it phone hardware is ass and Linux mobile doesn’t exist for my phone.
You can’t logic people out of an emotional decision. The hatred of Apple runs deep.
The obviousness of this is how Android users troll Apple discussions but Apple users don’t troll Android discussions.
They have insanely strong opinions on what other’s choices that it borderline religious.
Been locked in this ecosystem for a while guys. I’m not proud of it.
It’s better than the alternatives, unfortunately. I really want to dump Apple; the products are waning in quality and the company is spending a lot of time genuflecting for king tangerine. But it just works.
“Just install grapheneOS” my brother in Christ, I have no time or interest in fucking up with the primary communication device I rely on to reach family, friends, and work. I don’t have time for the hobbies I want to do let alone adding work-adjacent activities under the cloak of a hobby.
The ecosystem is really seamless, especially with a MacBook and Apple watch in the mix.
Though I don’t think there is any winning in the smartphone space. There is a duopoly and even if you personally use graphineOS you still are benefitting and helping the Google ecosystem by using Android apps.
Sadly I don’t think we can “vote with our wallets” on smartphones. We need legal legislation that forces both Apple and Google to be consumer friendly.
Agreed. And someone on this side of the Atlantic with the teeth to bite Apple’s face off when they pull shit like they did with right to repair or not allowing progressive web apps.
“You need to let end users be able to repair your devices.”
“Okay we will sell a $700 repair ‘kit’ and each replacement part is $1000 and also they’re hardware locked to the original device so you can’t reuse older devices for parts. BTW you need our certification.”
Nothing would prevent you from communicating with a Graphene OS phone. It’s a smartphone OS, not compiling Arch here…
But use whatever excuse you can find to stay in the Apple ecosystem, that’s fine.
Perhaps the parent commenter has apps they need to run for work? I know Microsoft Authenticator isn’t supported on Graphene, which is admittedly bullshit but it’s a requirement if you work in the government or high security industry like utilities. If that’s the case they should be given a work phone, but companies don’t do that most of the time in my experience.
Or perhaps they’ve had a bad experience with an older version. I know that Ubuntu Mobile couldn’t even make calls on a lot of devices for a while. I recently had an experience where DTMF signaling didn’t work, which meant I couldn’t navigate phone trees to do things like get prescriptions filled.
Point being, there are lots of real reasons folks are stuck in their predicament.
The temptation to be snarky is strong, but we risk hurting imperfect allies instead of fighting our real enemies.
It totally could and probably would. I am a phone OS tinkerer myself, but the above poster is right that it is a lot of hobbyist type tinkering and you can brick your device and fuck it up so you can’t communicate with your friends and family.
I agree with the main sentiment that these alternative OSs for phones and computers are a lot better in a lot of ways, but we are unwise to act like getting your computer or phone that way is that easy. Trying to get an alternative OS working well on a device can very easily consume an entire waking day or more, and bricking is not impossible, especially with phones.
Just buy a Fairphone from Murena with /e/OS preinstalled. You don’t have to do anything yourself. It mainly works like a phone without any issues, all the features I need work on it and I didn’t have to install it manually and supported the devs
Installing graphene was not like flashing a ROM ten years ago. You just follow the simple steps on the web installer.
Never too late to switch to GrapheneOS.
I can’t unlock my bootloader so i’m fucked.
I don’t rofl
Yeah, hopefully Patron doesn’t roll over and just removes the option to do it in iPhone. Taking away functionality will make Apple look bad, which they deserve.
They already caved.
On Wednesday, Patreon said Apple has renewed its requirement that all Patreon creators must move to subscription billing. The deadline to do so is November 1, 2026.
I really think this move blows and I wish they would reverse this decision and make an exception.
However Tim Cook didn’t wake up one day and wonder how he could fuck creators. Apple takes a 30% cut of all app transactions. This is how they benefit from the enormous and highly successful app platform and ecosystem they created. It’s not pure evil to say “hey use this platform all you want but you must share some of what you make there with us.”
It does suck that they won’t let creators off the hook though. This is like taxing rips.
The platform is enormous and highly successful solely because it is a monopoly in the Apple ecosystem
I guarantee you if other app stores were allowed on Apple devices, they would take significant market share with a far smaller cut of revenue
To follow this logic: if you use an e-banking app, Apple will soon claim to be entitled to 30% of all transactions. Same for paypal, ebay, you name it
Well call it tithe for your digital overlord.
God only asks for 10%… shows you what Apple thinks of themselves.
Apple charges 30% when you sell digital goods within an app. That’s not the same as moving money in your bank account or buying something on eBay.
It’s still robbery, but it’s not the same.
When people subscribe, they typically get something digital in return on Patreon.
So 30% tax on buying digital goods on ebay?
Does eBay sell digital goods?
I’d kinda expect the answer to be yes if so if you use the ebay app? If not, I’m actually surprised.
I’m not sure but I’m wondering if a key counts?
Like a digital game key? I’d say yes.
If it’s not a big part of eBay though, I can see that maybe sneaking past as Apple might consider the app as selling physical goods and overlook a small portion of digital?
Why does Apple feel they deserve a 30% cut? In cases like this, Apple aren’t providing any value at all.
- Apple aren’t providing the content - the creator is.
- Apple aren’t providing a platform for the content - Patreon is.
- Apple aren’t providing a platform for discovery - people aren’t finding Patreon creators solely via Apple products.
Sure, Apple are providing a payments platform, but why do they deserve 10x what Stripe charges?
It’s just platform-milking, just like Meetup.com’s latest antics; there isn’t deep analysis needed to everything, haha. “Capitalism” is totally a legitimate answer despite being just one word.
Meetup is now owned by Bending Spoons, who have also enshittified wetransfer, Evernote, eventbrite, AOL, vimeo. They buy decent products that never exploded to ipo status, fire everyone and milk the rest for whatever they can charge.
You got a link to what meetup has been up to?
They were sued by Epic Games for the same shit and Epic won on one count which allows them to put links to alternative payment methods and go around Apple.
So couldn’t patreon just argue in court that this precedent was already set with epic?
That is how case law works, yes.
I’m just wondering then why Apple would even push this if a president was already set with Epic. What a bunch of greedy corporate bastards.
Expecting Patreon to not want to bother fighting them over it, and they are correct in that assumption.
On Wednesday, Patreon said Apple has renewed its requirement that all Patreon creators must move to subscription billing. The deadline to do so is November 1, 2026.
Edit, adding my source: https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/patreon-creators-have-to-switch-to-subscription-billing-by-november-thanks-to-apple-203759852.html
This is THE way that Apple gets any revenue from the enormous and highly successful app platform and ecosystem they created. They say “go nuts, make money on our platform, but share some with us in exchange for our maintaining that platform.” This is reasonable. Apple is providing a service to Patreon, and access to their tremendous user base. That ain’t nothing.
I agree that subjecting creator donations to the 30% is about the shittiest use case for this and I wish they would make an exception. But your post about how Apple is doing absolutely nothing here is garbage.
Apple is doing nothing in this particular case, not in general. There’s cases where the 30% is more justified.
It’s one way but not the only way. They make money from developers before they even write a single line of code, every year.
Lack of competition. No other app store is allowed to operate on Apple devices. They have a monopoly, which is the only reason they can charge as much as they do
Sure, Apple are providing a payments platform, but why do they deserve 10x what Stripe charges?
I don’t believe that 30% cut includes payment processing. That’s an additional fee
Sad to think about how little creators actually get at the end of the day. Example of a $100 donation/subscription:
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Apple takes 30%
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Card companies take ~4%
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Patreon takes 10%
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Taxes take another big chunk
After all that a the creator would have, what, $40?
No other app store is allowed to operate on Apple devices
That’s only true outside of Europe. In the EU, they were forced to allow third-party app stores. The US government doesn’t have the guts to do that, since they focus more on the needs/wants of companies, whereas the EU is really focused on consumer rights.
- Card companies take ~4%
- Patreon takes 10%
Does Patreon’s cut not include payment processing?
The other thing that’s ridiculous in the USA is how much credit card processing costs. Stripe is around 3%, while in countries it can be half of that (in Australia, it’s commonly around 1% for debit cards and 1.5% for credit cards).
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They provide the payment system. They also mandate it.
If you subscribe on the website you don’t have to pay the extra. It’s only for subscriptions initiated via the app
An app you can only get via the Apple store, mandated by Apple?
Yeah. But why would you use the app? I personally didn’t know there even was an app.
Maybe it offers something better than on whatever web browser Apple mandates, or maybe no reason but user preference.
PWAs aren’t great on iPhone… They intentionally limit some functionality to push people towards the App Store.
Some people want everything as apps for some reason.
Because apple is a “premium” product, so you have to pay a “premium” fee for normal stuff so it feels like you’re using “premium” services
But you’re getting literally the same Patreon content.
But you’re paying more, so it’s “premium” content, clearly.
Gotta recoup all those fascist donations
So, all business is becoming a protection racket?
Gotta love walled gardens! /s
Technofeudalism.
Timmy Cook is just a bean counter. He’s got nothing to innovate or build. That’s Apple has been buying back shares non stop. Their lead designer jumped ship a while ago. It’s only a matter of time.
They still have wicked hardware, nobody is near their M5 performance/watt though
Good perf per watt, but super expensive, walled garden, internally spying and nearly unrepairable.
Choose another payment method. Choose another platform - web based? - where these fees don’t apply. Hell, buy a throwaway droid phone to keep your money from apple’s greedy hands.
Google imposes the same restriction, if you buy a digital service (such as a Patreon subscription) you need to pay the Google tax.
I don’t know if Patreon got an exemption from Google, but any smaller developer doesn’t for sure.
YT influencers fled to patreon because of google doing the same thing.
More people will be forced to use other platforms like subscribe star and pixiv fanbox
kinda like how youtube takes massive cut of ad revenue, which is why they switch to patreon, brand deal and promotions. 30% is pretty steep for small content creators, that isnt peddling right wing grifting.
I hope Patreon will just switch off the ability to pay through the iOS app, along with a nice fuck you-message to Apple that pops up when you first open the app
Last time this came up Patreon simply allowed the creators to charge the commission directly on top of the price for non apple users, or eat the 30% loss. So everyone not using iOS would pay, say, $5/month, iOS users would pay $5+30%. Hope they retain that option.
That’s actually a good solution
Is it? Previously this was considered tips
Now it’s 30% for what? Running a payment gateway and hiding an unsubscribe button deep in the App Store UI.
Competitively payment gateways charge 1-3%, but when you lock down a platform you can charge 10x that.
It’s logical but it probably scares away some customers. That’s why the “just eat it” option exists. iOS gives you access to an enormous market and payments are slick and easy. Creators may want $5 but if they can get 30% less from 500% more people, it’s still a good business for them. There’s no strict reason why they must obsess over taking 100% of the sticker price. There are a million examples of businesses who are willing to accept a discount for high volume business.
It reminds me of gas stations that only accept ATM cards and not credit cards, because they don’t want to lose the 3% that credit card companies take per transaction. They’re trying not to lose that 3%, but it will inconvenience some customers and lose them some business. That could easily be worse than 3%.
So yes Patreon could say “go find a laptop and enter your credit card number in our web page” but there are people who won’t do all that because they expect to be able to pay with one tap. And businesses are on the AppStore because that great payment experience makes it super easy for them to convert customers.
It’s just not as straightforward as saying “fuck you Apple, I’ll take my business elsewhere.”
It’s against App Store rules to inform your customers they’re being fucked by Apple in any way. If you do, they’ll take it down.
Isn’t it against the law in many places to charge customers without providing a breakdown of what they’re being charged with?
Not that I’m aware of.
Makes me think why ever since Photoshop was first created, Apple became the go-to for creatives for decades, and now Apple thinks it wants more money than just the fanatics going after their latest product.
Apple screwed their pro market anyway. Sometime back . The history with apple and creatives relates more to print history I’d guess . Adobe needs to be ditched , and is in some areas. Windows is a shitshow as we know. There are lessening reasons to be wedded to either Mac OS or Windows as they continue to enshittify and I for one welcome it.
Our collective migration to Linux is inevitable
Apple keeps screwing up, just look at the latest hideous update of macOS and its “Liquid Ass” interface
I didn’t even know there was a Patreon app. I signed up through the website. On a computer. Old school.
Hasn’t this type of thing already been litigated?
Yes it has, but now, all of our consumer protections have been obliterated
What is the intended enforcement mechanism?
Companies whose profits are taken sue Apple for not only lost revenue but also punitive damages.
Yes, it has. And Apple (mostly) won.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epic_Games_v._Apple
In January 2024, the Supreme Court denied the full appeals of both Apple and Epic in the case, leaving the case primarily a victory for Apple in allowing them to continue restricting app distribution to their App Store and to continue restricting in-app purchases to Apple’s payment systems, but requiring Apple to allow developers to link to external websites offering alternate payment options (off-app purchases).
Ah, I hadn’t seen it went to the Supreme Court and ruled this way.
“Walled garden initiates universal tollbooth policy overhaul.”
There are a few EU alternatives. Why are those not being considered.
LiberaPay is one.
I’ve never heard of them. They look kinda neat, you’re still paying the processor fees, but they can save you a few percent.
