MadamMateria
patreon
Tier Changes and Theft
🕑 Added 2022-10-12 12:47:41 +0000 UTCYou can read a bit more about what happened and my feelings here, but the TLDR on the matter is I'm not happy. There is an account in the 1$ tier, I suspect I know which one, that's been mirroring my low-value content to a third part site.
This has meant previews have been leaked, art I worked with others for, the death of my friend which was kept private, have all been leaked out. It has devalued my work, and those that support me for that little, by making it all readily available. While I cannot access view numbers, there are 25 people there whom have favorited the mirrored work. That's nearly double the amount that actually support me.
I normally wouldn't care. I recognize with piracy, it's not someone who'd be paying anyway. Even myself, I'll hunt down out of print RPG books in order to play with my friends, or backup files of games I own in order to make sure they outlive the hardware life. I do not condemn those people with interest in my work who can't afford it, I'm flattered.
However, I do condemn the one doing the stealing. If this was just my public posts, like some of my other fellow artists (of the 38000+ who've been stolen from there), I wouldn't care. But this was paid, and personal information. I'm no million dollar corporation, I'm living with bugs in my cupboards, barely staying above water; and even that isn't guaranteed as I move forward. Stealing from the poor is frankly disgusting.
As a result, I have moved a number of works to higher tiers, and issued a first wave of complaints to this site. I have spoken to a lawyer, and other creators, and we will see how things go moving forward in that regard. In terms of here, there will no longer be content for sub-support tiers, and I will be monitoring my Patronage closely as well as this site in the meantime. If I catch any more content being stolen, I will know who's done it, and while it might not do much, I will be bringing down the banhammer.
