I love doing this site. One of the good things about losing my job was being able to focus on this site. Or would have been if the past few months hadn’t been one crisis after another. Now that things are calmed down and I’m out of unemployment I need a source of income, which means finding a job. That, however, would mean less time to work on the site again, and needing time off for conventions and a bunch of other problems that would lead to not getting caught up on videos and less time for longer reviews and commentaries, especially around holidays or whatever big even the job would have. Also, even if I find a job with vacation pay I won’t be able to do that for a year, which means losing money going to conventions.
What can I do? I have bills to pay, an outstanding credit card debt (the last of the big debts I’ve had since 2008 and this Crohn’s nonsense) and my parents are hurting right now, too. So it’s either get a job and have less time for BW…or find a way to make money by producing BW content and make this a career. (In other words this will BE a “real job” that people usually insist creatives get instead of making what they create into a real job and being happy.) Videos aren’t making enough money and this host doesn’t like a lot of ads on the site and I don’t have enough views to qualify for Wordads. My only chance, then, to make BW my job–doing something I enjoy as I have the past 6+ years, is the new crowdsourcing service Patreon. So that’s what I did.
If you haven’t heard of Patreon, it’s similar to Kickstarter, except that instead of a one-time donation for a project, you agree to pay every month for continuous content. It’s a good service for creators who make music, comics, articles, videos, or other artistic pursuits. You, as the patron, can even set a limit to how much you want to pay if they charge by the project. I, however, went for the monthly fee because I didn’t know how to properly charge by project and I write article almost every day, do at least one comic a week, and hope to make one video a week.
If you would like to support BW Media Spotlight and help produce more article, comics, and videos (including videos for The Clutter Reports, you can go to my Patreon page, or tell other about it. The videos will still be free whether you support or not, and I have no plans to stop writing reviews and commentaries or cease making comics, but a little help will lead to more and better productions plus all the time I need to work on something I enjoy without taking time for another job I won’t. (Did that for 20 years. What did it get me?) Help or spreading the word is appreciated. (Alternately check out the video category and go watch some of my vids and boost ad revenue. That helps with no financial commitment from you.)
This is my dream job and I want to make it so. I just need help getting there.
