Has anyone checked out Liberapay yet?

[NandabaCanti]

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A friend pointed out this service to me earlier, it seems to be popular with a lot of folks involved with open source and creative commons projects. But it isn't limited to them. As a purely donation driven platform it shouldn't ever matter what sort of content you produce, as those who fund you aren't directly paying to receive benefits such as your products/services.

One downside is that they currently don't offer options like paypal for payments, so you're patrons would have to provide a credit card or direct deposit. Also it's limited to USD and EUROs at this time, which could make it troublesome for those outside the US or Europe. They also hold on to funds for a month as a safeguard against fraud and charge backs, though they do offer to do pay outs on a weekly basis.

I'm not sure what they offer by ways of direct correspondence with your patrons, but I would imagine it should be possible to host your game on something like mega and then send out links to your supporters. You'd probably also have to set up your own website for promotion and news updates or use somewhere like here or blogger etc. Anyhow, just thought it looked like an interesting solution, even if it has some shortcomings and thought I'd share it here to see what everyone thinks.

 

[Delmach]

Dont see anything mentioning that they are against adult content. Probably they dont have to mention it because they dont work with Paypal. And apparently it is under French Jurisdiction, whatever that may mean.

The downside of not having Paypal is (at least for me) only a slight nuisance, and im more and more willing to work without it, especially when Paypal is linked to my account anyway. Can just set my regular account to deposit the monthly amount and be free of the restrictions.

The communication between your supporters might be something people would have to look into, but then again, the communication on the current platform most people use is very limited anyway, and creators do make blogs and their own websites more often lately.

Promotion of any NSFW content on the existing platform is already limited to word of mouth mostly, as no one not already knowing your project wont find it anyway, especially since the search engine hides NSFW content. So it basically appears on any blog/forum/imageboard/chan before it gets any real mention anyway.

So it seems like it could work, im pondering though, what really happens when someone making adult content gets on the platform. At least it seems to be somewhat established already. And they started somewhere back in 2015.

 

[Elvishious]

I tried to find something on the TOS of liberapay. Nothing is metionned on the content you can put on the site. I sent a mail to the support to have more informations about it. But the "french juridiction" makes it scary.

 

[Waaifu]

Any Adult content, including pornographic content, content escort platforms, pay-per-view, webcam services and/or violent content

Mangopay is their payment partner and they don't allow any adult content.

If there are chargebacks, you are responsible for them if the origin of them was fraudulent.

 

[NandabaCanti]

One thing that this has going for it is that you aren't hosting any content on their site and patrons aren't paying you to get your game, they are donating to support you as an individual or team who does work they support. Which should free it from any of the restraints on content.

I've been kinda tossing an idea around in my head for a while now, for one way I may approach funding for my primary game once it reaches a point that I start doing releases for it. It would be something of a 3 tier release schedule. For those supporting me with ongoing funding via patreon, liberapay, or anything else I may end up going with when the time comes - they would get same day release links. I'm also thinking I'd like to put my game on something like itch.io, or maybe Steam if they go through with the rule changes they've hinted at. I'd update those one time payment option sites a week after the patrons get it, and finally a week after that I'd post free links to public forums like here.

Basically the idea is that I'm fine with sharing my work freely with everyone, but I'd still like to incentivize those who are willing to show some financial support with quicker access to new content. I'm not sure yet, but that's the approach I think would work best in the long run. And since I'd be planning to give things away anyhow, a donation based service would work just fine for my situation which is what got me a bit interested in this one.

 

[Delmach]

Did not find that information about payment processor on a wiki but on github after explicitly looking for Mangopay.

I really dont understand why you would have to find their payment processor, then check what content they allow. Thats stuff a website just mentions under their Guidelines or Terms.

Since Liberapay doesnt even make a profit, why would they lure someone in, let them get support for not allowed content if they dont even make something out of it. Could just mention its not allowed, done.

Or do we have the same case of Pat. and Pay. where they also dont allow adult content, but somehow worked around it? Like Pat. did with Braintree? Questions, questions.

 

[Waaifu]

Q: Can I get a credit written at the end of Pepper&Carrot if I donate via Liberapay ?

A: No, I can't get access to your name/nickname here, it's a limitation of the platform but also a feature: your donation are totally anonymous to me.

All donations are anonymous and there's a fee of $0.35 + 2.9% when you transfer money to your wallet to use for donations.

 

[NandabaCanti]

All donations are anonymous and there's a fee of $0.35 + 2.9% when you transfer money to your wallet to use for donations.

You know, thinking back on it, I've actually seen that before, since I've been a fan of David's work for years now. Totally didn't even remember that was the name of the service he was talking about there, lol. So I guess that rules out Liberapay in regards to a service where you'd be able to easily share links with those who're supporting you.

 

[DarthSeduction]

You know, thinking back on it, I've actually seen that before, since I've been a fan of David's work for years now. Totally didn't even remember that was the name of the service he was talking about there, lol. So I guess that rules out Liberapay in regards to a service where you'd be able to easily share links with those who're supporting you.

That does make it harder, yes, it might not be a bad idea for a supplementary donation platform though, sort of like the people who have recently started including donation buttons in their games linked to paypal. The good thing here being, it's anonymous and what you're developing doesn't seem to have scrutiny. Maybe, since they're a non-profit, they don't have to worry about content as much, so long as it's in accordance with the law.