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Child Porn Allegations at Patreon After Security Team Fired

57 points by biorach 4y ago

alexb_ 4y ago
Yet another website that's outspoken about removing loli/shota turns out to be indifferent to ACTUAL CHILD ABUSE... what a shocker.
- hooverd 4y ago
  C'mon, she's actually a 500 year old dragon.
- anthk 4y ago
  Back in the day (80's) in Spain you could find these depictions (Vibora, CIMOC...) in underground/exTreMe/hardcore fanzine publications but as an excuse on how shitty the low working class neighbourhoods where, in order to show teens with no proper guide to a good sexuality development (or caring parents, generally). OFC you saw junkies, psychos, alcoholics, rapes, kidnaps, all king of drug abuses, corruption from police and so on. The message was: lack of rights, work and education created monsters. And, as I see, the trend continues, sadly. They tried to censor them, but the politicians were not aware that that kind of shit was depicted as a harsh reality in fanzines because of their ineptitude making the worst neighbourhoods in Spain degrade like hell because of the big unemployment (astounding in the 80's). Someone should tell people porn it's just a theatre, and that sexuality requires a partner close to your maturity. Oh, and stop idealizing extremes. You aren't that ugly, neither you one aren't that hot. Stop degrading yourself and idolizing the others with $PRODUCT/fake IG filter/make up. Capitalism exploits extremes and insecurities, stop giving a crap on pose and appearance.
- collegeburner 4y ago
  good. unless we have proof it doesn't induce demand we should purge that kind of degeneracy from the internet where possible. the concerns around erotic plasticity are more than enough to warrant that and brains don't care if someone puts "*she's 150 yrs old btw" in fine print. regardless it sounds like you're more salty about thus than interested in the article? or maybe i'm reading you wrong.
  - falcolas 4y ago
    Sounds like you would like to see Stranger Things and all of the Harry Potter series purged too, since some people look at the child actors in those and become excited. Gymnastics, cheerleading, swimming, vollyball... Not to mention singers who are minors since they have the same problem. Probably worse, even.
encryptluks2 4y ago
- anon291 4y ago
  These two things are not equivalent, regardless of your thoughts about the last election. EDIT: the reason for the polarization of America is the large amounts of people downvoting this comment who believe that worrying about election security is the equivalent of child pornography.
  - encryptluks2 4y ago
    - anon291 4y ago
      Yes, you insinuated that by commenting about potentially wrong news on an article alleging child pornography. Patreon can distribute 'fake news' until the cows come home and we can deride them or say they're wrong or whatever. But distributing illegal content, especially child pornography, is orders of magnitude more depraved, and should result in criminal charges against the executives.
      - trasz 4y ago
        Problem is, at least in US, the idea of fighting child pornography has been weaponised by Christian child groomers - the purity balls and child marriages folks. So when someone displays similar pattern, like Patreon reportedly does, it's hard to ignore that similarity.
        encryptluks2 4y ago
        The pedo projectors as I call them tend to believe it is transgender and leftist that are running underground adrenochrome farms by raping and murdering children, but they can't go onto their local sex offender registry and see it is the preachers and their inbred neighbors getting caught soliciting to minors.
boringg 4y ago
Can anyone determine if SECJUICE is a legit site - never heard of them so not sure how much I trust their content.
- BuleBule 4y ago
  Hey amigo, I founded the site, am not sure what you mean by legit, we are a private members club of information security professionals, who write and publish alongside each other. We do not monetise content, have any sponsors, or try and make money. So we are as legit as any bunch of hackers publishing online could be :)
stickfigure 4y ago
Is there something I'm missing? I'm not a patreon power user or anything, but my impression is that they don't host content. It's all links to youtube or whatnot. What does it mean to "sell content on patreon"?
- kayodelycaon 4y ago
  They definitely host image files. I follow two furry artists that post full-size (3000+px wide) images.
  - 4ad 4y ago
    Correction: they can host files. Most creators host their files somewhere else (e.g. youtube, dropbox, github, etc). You don't have to upload anything to Patreon.
- fennecfoxen 4y ago
  They definitely have jpeg-upload capabilities so that your patrons can read the advance copy of the webcomic or the bonus materials or whatever probably video of some sort too
- _8j50 4y ago
  Probably means advertise content and accept payment on patreon?
whimsicalism 4y ago
Yeah I'm going to need something more than potentially disgruntled employee posting anonymously on Glassdoor.
- SleepilyLimping 4y ago
  > "In our opinion, these creators are using their Patreon pages as a 'shop front' to attract potential customers who can be 'qualified' before being moved onto a more private platform to conduct illegal transactions." Basically "we can't prove this, lol."
  - BuleBule 4y ago
    Hey, author of the article here. It is difficult to prove anything when none of the former members of the security team are talking and Patreon is stonewalling. I can tell you what I have discovered though, HUNDREDS of allegations going back a decade. If you read through my article a little more, I found two different glass door posts from a couple of years ago talking about child porn, hundreds of Trustpilot reviews from Patreon users saying that they have reported CP and been ignored, in many cases those reporting CP had their accounts suspended. I have spoken to a number of people who have told me that they have repeatedly tried to report what look like organised CP rings on Patreon, only to be ignored time and time again. Social media is littered with complains about this going back years, allegations are EVERYWHERE. There is very clearly a serious problem over at Patreon, and I have been told it is because internally they have a policy of not taking action against creators unless law enforcement or a court order is involved. I would argue that the allegations you see stretching back years are a direct result of this policy. Patreon is in serious need of law enforcement investigation, this has obviously been allowed to develop into a systemic issue internally.
duped 4y ago
I'm confused by the structure of the article which is just a bunch of interleaved posts from social media, is there actual illegal content being bought and sold or is it animations? If it's the latter it's reprehensible and arguably cover for real CSAM - but it's not illegal in the US. It's (currently) protected speech because of the Ashcroft v Free Speech Coalition SCOTUS ruling. If it's the former, holy shit. I can't believe it's just the security team responsible. And another thing that's not clear, was it them that was responsible for the content, or were they fired for speaking up?
TheRealPomax 4y ago
Except of course for the part where they didn't fire their security team [1], and what actually happened was that Patreon's closing two European offices and one of their many security teams got outsourced with the in-house folks being let go. But hey, good to see we're upvoting nutcase tik tok conspiracies on HN as easily as they make the rounds on Facebook. [1] https://twitter.com/EmilyGorcenski/status/1569684450702770176 https://twitter.com/EmilyGorcenski/status/156968445070277017...
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
anon291 4y ago
My wife used to work at Patreon and given how toxic the culture was, I'm honestly not surprised. The cavalier attitude towards sexual content combined the the natural awkwardness of most engineers basically makes for an environment ripe for this to occur. Also management would regularly dismiss employee concerns, so no surprise there.
stareatgoats 4y ago
OK - so this article actually proves that Patreon is allowing some extremely disturbing content on their site. Patreon needs to step up, clean up their act and publish a credible and sincere apology, otherwise I'm fairly sure a sizeable amount of people will make sure they are done for. Myself included. Edit: looks like this case is similar to the story of the "boy that cried wolf"; just because allegations of child abuse has been misused a lot, doesn't mean it can't be true in this case. Please read the whole article and do your own research. This stinks. https://www.trustpilot.com/review/www.patreon.com https://www.trustpilot.com/review/www.patreon.com
- shadowgovt 4y ago
  I'm pretty sure this article is proving nothing and it's pretty much zero cost to make whatever allegations one chooses anonymously via Glassdoor. The alternate explanation of "grumpy ex-employee trying to make trouble for their former employer because even if the allegations are untrue, having the feds tromp around in your private data is a bad day for everyone involved" is hard to discount here.
  - stareatgoats 4y ago
    Looks like you only read as far as the Glassdoor allegations. Agree those comments are low quality proof. But if you read on you will likely be convinced that Patreon at least needs to publish a credible and sincere apology, as well as promise to clean up their act moving forward.
    - BuleBule 4y ago
      HOLY SMOKES AT LEAST. In my view someone needs to go to prison, in my view they have enabled crime rings to distribute child porn on the platform for over a decade. Patreon needs seriously investigating by law enforcement, they KNEW about this for years and did not act. Their recent statement said nothing, and clearly indicated that they do not see a problem, its a scandal. I have discovered HUNDREDS of allegations going back a decade. I found different glass door posts from a couple of years ago talking about child porn, HUNDREDS of Trustpilot reviews from Patreon users saying that they have reported CP and been ignored, in many cases those reporting CP had their accounts suspended. I have spoken to a number of people who have told me that they have repeatedly tried to report what look like organised CP rings on Patreon, only to be ignored time and time again. There is also petition signed by 95k people to try and persuade Patreon to stop monetising CSAM content, the signs are all there. Am not sure how much more smoke needs to billow out of this tech company before people realize that there is a serious problem over there.
SamoyedFurFluff 4y ago
I find this article conflated multiple things: 1) “family” blogs- this isn’t just a problem on patreon but also exists on YouTube, tiktok, etc. this is when you can film your own children bathing or other settings and sell it as family friendly content. Yes, creepy men comment on these videos and it’s dubious about how or if the parents are exploiting their child— a much better coverage than this article is the Somewhere Under Neith podcast which explicitly explores how vulnerable parties are exploited and overlooked[1] (they also did a series on child marriage and where it is legal to marry children in the USA). 2) drawn or animated adult content - loli/shota shit, legal dependent on country, no actual children harmed here I think this article performs multiple leaps of logic and cites anonymous sources for its more serious allegations. For example it assumes an off handed anonymous glassdoor comment “if half the child porn allegations are true patreon is in trouble” to mean patreon as a company is aware of and endorses any child porn on its platform. It could instead just be someone who saw the same tiktok the article points to alleging child porn. (This isn’t to say there isn’t csam on patreon but I don’t think patreon is uniquely platforming csam based on these allegations. Unfortunately uploading videos of your own children in bathing suits and stuff without their consent is very legal and categorized as family friendly even.) 1. https://www.lastpodcastnetwork.com/some-place-under-neith/ https://www.lastpodcastnetwork.com/some-place-under-neith/
- anthk 4y ago
  1) Stop uploading crap publicly. 2) In a near future neuroscience will cure pedophilia and ,partially, psychopatic tendencies with artifical empathy generators in your skull.
  - collegeburner 4y ago
    will they consent to this implant? doesn't seem likely. and if not are you really so sure about the ehics of forced medical procedures? seems wrong to me.
    - tablespoon 4y ago
      > will they consent to this implant? doesn't seem likely. and if not are you really so sure about the ehics of forced medical procedures? seems wrong to me. If an "implant" could influence anyone mind to the degree the GP is speculating, it could probably also influence them to desire the implant and strongly reject the idea of its removal, which raises interesting questions.
spicyusername 4y ago
Its sad that Twitter posts and Glassdoor reviews are what pass for "primary sources" these days. I'd personally wait to jerk my knee a little longer.
- BuleBule 4y ago
  There is MUCH more to it than that. I have discovered HUNDREDS of allegations going back a decade. I found different glass door posts from a couple of years ago talking about child porn, HUNDREDS of Trustpilot reviews from Patreon users saying that they have reported CP and been ignored, in many cases those reporting CP had their accounts suspended. I have spoken to a number of people who have told me that they have repeatedly tried to report what look like organised CP rings on Patreon, only to be ignored time and time again. Then there is that petition signed by 100k people to try and persuade Patreon to stop monetising CSAM content. How much more smoke do you need to convince you that there is a fire?
xvilka 4y ago
What best (and biggest) alternatives to Patreon are?
- ZGDUwpqEWpUZ 4y ago
  Ko-Fi or BuyMeACoffee, though the latter no longer accepts PayPal.
  - emedchill 4y ago
    SubscribeStar is also one.
seanieb 4y ago
Been a while since I worked on security at Patreon, but I have had some insight to Trust & Safety and Legal teams at Patreon, these allegations sound like absolute junk. Patreon is also pushing back: https://blog.patreon.com/false-allegations-on-social-media https://blog.patreon.com/false-allegations-on-social-media
Overtonwindow 4y ago
Perhaps I’m jaded but I am starting to disbelieve most accusations of pornography, and grooming. It’s being slung around like a slur and I just don’t buy it.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
kklisura 4y ago
Tangentially, about Patreon: I tried removing my Pateron account yesterday, since I haven't been using it for a year now, and the removal procedure is absolutely ridiculous [1]: 1. I needed to open some privacy page 2. Then click some button to make privacy request 3. Pick an option to Erase account 4. Click Allow, so some third-party (?) can access my information and delete it. In their support page [1] they state "Click the Allow button so that our data deletion partner, Transcend, can view your Patreon account — they must have access to the account to erase it." - What the hell is "data deletion partner", first time hearing this term? 5. Click Confirm. 6. Just when I thought that's it, they sent me an email "You've recently made a request to erase your data from Patreon. Please verify that you made this request by clicking the link below.". Of course, this step is not described in their support page [1]. 7. This doesn't remove the account, but adds it to queue so my account will be removed sometimes in the following 30 days. Incredible! [1] https://support.patreon.com/hc/en-us/articles/204605915-Delete-my-Patreon-account#:~:text=Deleting%20my%20Patreon%20account%20and%20data https://support.patreon.com/hc/en-us/articles/204605915-Dele...
- gardenfelder 4y ago
  Reminds me of leaving FaceBook 10 years ago.
  - SanjayMehta 4y ago
    PayPal is worse than Facebook in this respect.
- SanjayMehta 4y ago
  Reminds me of trying to delete a PayPal account.
adultSwim 4y ago
The Instagram account linked by the article is still up. The account links to their Patreon where you can subscribe to "pepperoni pizza" and "habenero" levels. This is disgusting and wrong. I don't care if it's legal. I don't want a company I give money to doing this.

57 points by biorach 4y ago

Yet another website that's outspoken about removing loli/shota turns out to be indifferent to ACTUAL CHILD ABUSE... what a shocker.

hooverd 4y ago
C'mon, she's actually a 500 year old dragon.
anthk 4y ago
Back in the day (80's) in Spain you could find these depictions (Vibora, CIMOC...) in underground/exTreMe/hardcore fanzine publications but as an excuse on how shitty the low working class neighbourhoods where, in order to show teens with no proper guide to a good sexuality development (or caring parents, generally). OFC you saw junkies, psychos, alcoholics, rapes, kidnaps, all king of drug abuses, corruption from police and so on. The message was: lack of rights, work and education created monsters. And, as I see, the trend continues, sadly. They tried to censor them, but the politicians were not aware that that kind of shit was depicted as a harsh reality in fanzines because of their ineptitude making the worst neighbourhoods in Spain degrade like hell because of the big unemployment (astounding in the 80's). Someone should tell people porn it's just a theatre, and that sexuality requires a partner close to your maturity. Oh, and stop idealizing extremes. You aren't that ugly, neither you one aren't that hot. Stop degrading yourself and idolizing the others with $PRODUCT/fake IG filter/make up. Capitalism exploits extremes and insecurities, stop giving a crap on pose and appearance.
collegeburner 4y ago
good. unless we have proof it doesn't induce demand we should purge that kind of degeneracy from the internet where possible. the concerns around erotic plasticity are more than enough to warrant that and brains don't care if someone puts "*she's 150 yrs old btw" in fine print. regardless it sounds like you're more salty about thus than interested in the article? or maybe i'm reading you wrong.
- falcolas 4y ago
  Sounds like you would like to see Stranger Things and all of the Harry Potter series purged too, since some people look at the child actors in those and become excited. Gymnastics, cheerleading, swimming, vollyball... Not to mention singers who are minors since they have the same problem. Probably worse, even.

encryptluks2 4y ago

anon291 4y ago
These two things are not equivalent, regardless of your thoughts about the last election. EDIT: the reason for the polarization of America is the large amounts of people downvoting this comment who believe that worrying about election security is the equivalent of child pornography.
- encryptluks2 4y ago
  - anon291 4y ago
    Yes, you insinuated that by commenting about potentially wrong news on an article alleging child pornography. Patreon can distribute 'fake news' until the cows come home and we can deride them or say they're wrong or whatever. But distributing illegal content, especially child pornography, is orders of magnitude more depraved, and should result in criminal charges against the executives.
    - trasz 4y ago
      Problem is, at least in US, the idea of fighting child pornography has been weaponised by Christian child groomers - the purity balls and child marriages folks. So when someone displays similar pattern, like Patreon reportedly does, it's hard to ignore that similarity.
      - encryptluks2 4y ago
        The pedo projectors as I call them tend to believe it is transgender and leftist that are running underground adrenochrome farms by raping and murdering children, but they can't go onto their local sex offender registry and see it is the preachers and their inbred neighbors getting caught soliciting to minors.

boringg 4y ago

Can anyone determine if SECJUICE is a legit site - never heard of them so not sure how much I trust their content.

BuleBule 4y ago
Hey amigo, I founded the site, am not sure what you mean by legit, we are a private members club of information security professionals, who write and publish alongside each other. We do not monetise content, have any sponsors, or try and make money. So we are as legit as any bunch of hackers publishing online could be :)

stickfigure 4y ago

Is there something I'm missing? I'm not a patreon power user or anything, but my impression is that they don't host content. It's all links to youtube or whatnot. What does it mean to "sell content on patreon"?

kayodelycaon 4y ago
They definitely host image files. I follow two furry artists that post full-size (3000+px wide) images.
- 4ad 4y ago
  Correction: they can host files. Most creators host their files somewhere else (e.g. youtube, dropbox, github, etc). You don't have to upload anything to Patreon.
fennecfoxen 4y ago
They definitely have jpeg-upload capabilities so that your patrons can read the advance copy of the webcomic or the bonus materials or whatever probably video of some sort too
_8j50 4y ago
Probably means advertise content and accept payment on patreon?

whimsicalism 4y ago

Yeah I'm going to need something more than potentially disgruntled employee posting anonymously on Glassdoor.

SleepilyLimping 4y ago
> "In our opinion, these creators are using their Patreon pages as a 'shop front' to attract potential customers who can be 'qualified' before being moved onto a more private platform to conduct illegal transactions." Basically "we can't prove this, lol."
- BuleBule 4y ago
  Hey, author of the article here. It is difficult to prove anything when none of the former members of the security team are talking and Patreon is stonewalling. I can tell you what I have discovered though, HUNDREDS of allegations going back a decade. If you read through my article a little more, I found two different glass door posts from a couple of years ago talking about child porn, hundreds of Trustpilot reviews from Patreon users saying that they have reported CP and been ignored, in many cases those reporting CP had their accounts suspended. I have spoken to a number of people who have told me that they have repeatedly tried to report what look like organised CP rings on Patreon, only to be ignored time and time again. Social media is littered with complains about this going back years, allegations are EVERYWHERE. There is very clearly a serious problem over at Patreon, and I have been told it is because internally they have a policy of not taking action against creators unless law enforcement or a court order is involved. I would argue that the allegations you see stretching back years are a direct result of this policy. Patreon is in serious need of law enforcement investigation, this has obviously been allowed to develop into a systemic issue internally.

duped 4y ago

I'm confused by the structure of the article which is just a bunch of interleaved posts from social media, is there actual illegal content being bought and sold or is it animations? If it's the latter it's reprehensible and arguably cover for real CSAM - but it's not illegal in the US. It's (currently) protected speech because of the Ashcroft v Free Speech Coalition SCOTUS ruling. If it's the former, holy shit. I can't believe it's just the security team responsible. And another thing that's not clear, was it them that was responsible for the content, or were they fired for speaking up?

TheRealPomax 4y ago

Except of course for the part where they didn't fire their security team [1], and what actually happened was that Patreon's closing two European offices and one of their many security teams got outsourced with the in-house folks being let go. But hey, good to see we're upvoting nutcase tik tok conspiracies on HN as easily as they make the rounds on Facebook. [1] https://twitter.com/EmilyGorcenski/status/1569684450702770176 https://twitter.com/EmilyGorcenski/status/156968445070277017...

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

anon291 4y ago

My wife used to work at Patreon and given how toxic the culture was, I'm honestly not surprised. The cavalier attitude towards sexual content combined the the natural awkwardness of most engineers basically makes for an environment ripe for this to occur. Also management would regularly dismiss employee concerns, so no surprise there.

stareatgoats 4y ago

OK - so this article actually proves that Patreon is allowing some extremely disturbing content on their site. Patreon needs to step up, clean up their act and publish a credible and sincere apology, otherwise I'm fairly sure a sizeable amount of people will make sure they are done for. Myself included. Edit: looks like this case is similar to the story of the "boy that cried wolf"; just because allegations of child abuse has been misused a lot, doesn't mean it can't be true in this case. Please read the whole article and do your own research. This stinks. https://www.trustpilot.com/review/www.patreon.com https://www.trustpilot.com/review/www.patreon.com

shadowgovt 4y ago
I'm pretty sure this article is proving nothing and it's pretty much zero cost to make whatever allegations one chooses anonymously via Glassdoor. The alternate explanation of "grumpy ex-employee trying to make trouble for their former employer because even if the allegations are untrue, having the feds tromp around in your private data is a bad day for everyone involved" is hard to discount here.
- stareatgoats 4y ago
  Looks like you only read as far as the Glassdoor allegations. Agree those comments are low quality proof. But if you read on you will likely be convinced that Patreon at least needs to publish a credible and sincere apology, as well as promise to clean up their act moving forward.
  - BuleBule 4y ago
    HOLY SMOKES AT LEAST. In my view someone needs to go to prison, in my view they have enabled crime rings to distribute child porn on the platform for over a decade. Patreon needs seriously investigating by law enforcement, they KNEW about this for years and did not act. Their recent statement said nothing, and clearly indicated that they do not see a problem, its a scandal. I have discovered HUNDREDS of allegations going back a decade. I found different glass door posts from a couple of years ago talking about child porn, HUNDREDS of Trustpilot reviews from Patreon users saying that they have reported CP and been ignored, in many cases those reporting CP had their accounts suspended. I have spoken to a number of people who have told me that they have repeatedly tried to report what look like organised CP rings on Patreon, only to be ignored time and time again. There is also petition signed by 95k people to try and persuade Patreon to stop monetising CSAM content, the signs are all there. Am not sure how much more smoke needs to billow out of this tech company before people realize that there is a serious problem over there.

SamoyedFurFluff 4y ago

I find this article conflated multiple things: 1) “family” blogs- this isn’t just a problem on patreon but also exists on YouTube, tiktok, etc. this is when you can film your own children bathing or other settings and sell it as family friendly content. Yes, creepy men comment on these videos and it’s dubious about how or if the parents are exploiting their child— a much better coverage than this article is the Somewhere Under Neith podcast which explicitly explores how vulnerable parties are exploited and overlooked[1] (they also did a series on child marriage and where it is legal to marry children in the USA). 2) drawn or animated adult content - loli/shota shit, legal dependent on country, no actual children harmed here I think this article performs multiple leaps of logic and cites anonymous sources for its more serious allegations. For example it assumes an off handed anonymous glassdoor comment “if half the child porn allegations are true patreon is in trouble” to mean patreon as a company is aware of and endorses any child porn on its platform. It could instead just be someone who saw the same tiktok the article points to alleging child porn. (This isn’t to say there isn’t csam on patreon but I don’t think patreon is uniquely platforming csam based on these allegations. Unfortunately uploading videos of your own children in bathing suits and stuff without their consent is very legal and categorized as family friendly even.) 1. https://www.lastpodcastnetwork.com/some-place-under-neith/ https://www.lastpodcastnetwork.com/some-place-under-neith/

anthk 4y ago
1) Stop uploading crap publicly. 2) In a near future neuroscience will cure pedophilia and ,partially, psychopatic tendencies with artifical empathy generators in your skull.
- collegeburner 4y ago
  will they consent to this implant? doesn't seem likely. and if not are you really so sure about the ehics of forced medical procedures? seems wrong to me.
  - tablespoon 4y ago
    > will they consent to this implant? doesn't seem likely. and if not are you really so sure about the ehics of forced medical procedures? seems wrong to me. If an "implant" could influence anyone mind to the degree the GP is speculating, it could probably also influence them to desire the implant and strongly reject the idea of its removal, which raises interesting questions.

spicyusername 4y ago

Its sad that Twitter posts and Glassdoor reviews are what pass for "primary sources" these days. I'd personally wait to jerk my knee a little longer.

BuleBule 4y ago
There is MUCH more to it than that. I have discovered HUNDREDS of allegations going back a decade. I found different glass door posts from a couple of years ago talking about child porn, HUNDREDS of Trustpilot reviews from Patreon users saying that they have reported CP and been ignored, in many cases those reporting CP had their accounts suspended. I have spoken to a number of people who have told me that they have repeatedly tried to report what look like organised CP rings on Patreon, only to be ignored time and time again. Then there is that petition signed by 100k people to try and persuade Patreon to stop monetising CSAM content. How much more smoke do you need to convince you that there is a fire?

xvilka 4y ago

What best (and biggest) alternatives to Patreon are?

ZGDUwpqEWpUZ 4y ago
Ko-Fi or BuyMeACoffee, though the latter no longer accepts PayPal.
- emedchill 4y ago
  SubscribeStar is also one.

seanieb 4y ago

Been a while since I worked on security at Patreon, but I have had some insight to Trust & Safety and Legal teams at Patreon, these allegations sound like absolute junk. Patreon is also pushing back: https://blog.patreon.com/false-allegations-on-social-media https://blog.patreon.com/false-allegations-on-social-media

Overtonwindow 4y ago

Perhaps I’m jaded but I am starting to disbelieve most accusations of pornography, and grooming. It’s being slung around like a slur and I just don’t buy it.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

kklisura 4y ago

Tangentially, about Patreon: I tried removing my Pateron account yesterday, since I haven't been using it for a year now, and the removal procedure is absolutely ridiculous [1]: 1. I needed to open some privacy page 2. Then click some button to make privacy request 3. Pick an option to Erase account 4. Click Allow, so some third-party (?) can access my information and delete it. In their support page [1] they state "Click the Allow button so that our data deletion partner, Transcend, can view your Patreon account — they must have access to the account to erase it." - What the hell is "data deletion partner", first time hearing this term? 5. Click Confirm. 6. Just when I thought that's it, they sent me an email "You've recently made a request to erase your data from Patreon. Please verify that you made this request by clicking the link below.". Of course, this step is not described in their support page [1]. 7. This doesn't remove the account, but adds it to queue so my account will be removed sometimes in the following 30 days. Incredible! [1] https://support.patreon.com/hc/en-us/articles/204605915-Delete-my-Patreon-account#:~:text=Deleting%20my%20Patreon%20account%20and%20data https://support.patreon.com/hc/en-us/articles/204605915-Dele...

gardenfelder 4y ago
Reminds me of leaving FaceBook 10 years ago.
- SanjayMehta 4y ago
  PayPal is worse than Facebook in this respect.
SanjayMehta 4y ago
Reminds me of trying to delete a PayPal account.

adultSwim 4y ago

The Instagram account linked by the article is still up. The account links to their Patreon where you can subscribe to "pepperoni pizza" and "habenero" levels. This is disgusting and wrong. I don't care if it's legal. I don't want a company I give money to doing this.