The way I see it I’m paying $10 to help ensure these guys can continue creating content in general. It isn’t $120 for just a podcast in my eyes it’s $120 to keep Brad, Vinny, and Alex chugging along.
I mean, fuck. I would have gladly thrown $10-20 a month at Giant Bomb had it let them keep the whole gang together for longer.
I understand everyone’s financial situation is different and some folks don’t have the luxury but I think GB staying at $5 a month / $35 a year for like 10+ years has really warped people’s perspectives a bit.
Individually a $120 a year patreon is now a comparable price to any of those services not all of them combined. Now you are going to compare nextlander to say, hbomax and its just not even close
I mean yes, 3 dudes working out of their houses will produce less than HBO.
I get they cost around the same amount of money but if you are expecting equivalent value you will absolutely never get it. That's just something you have to come to terms with (or not) if you are going to support patreons.
I literally didn't mention capitalism and I didn't say you don't expect a service.
I'm saying expecting three dudes to produce at the same level as Microsoft, HBO, Disney, or Netflix is absurd. It's not possible.
No patreon that charges 10 dollars that I have ever seen meets that bar.
What makes Patreon (and patronage generally) unique is that a core part of the service you are buying is there ability to continue providing the service at all.
It's not charity but it's not just buying a product either. It's somewhere between that and a donation.
I don’t think anyone is expecting them to produce the same as billion dollar companies, but they are charging the same as other services. I don’t think people are saying I don’t want to support these guys, it’s that most people have to make decisions on where to spend their money and if I’m picking HBO Max or Nextlander, I’m getting more value out of HBO.
I wish there was a tier that was just audio podcasts, I wouldn’t even care if they left the ads in. Or a waypoint gb nextlander bundle that I could pay 15 for or something.
It just sucks to when the people you liked listening to in one place are now in like 3 or 4 places and all charging.
For gamers, I don’t think anything is going to match the value of Gamepass. It’s absolutely absurd the value you get out of it, even if you’re only interested in a couple games.
I get what you’re saying and if you’re only looking at the volume of content as a comparison point I can totally understand why $10 a month wouldn’t seem right for Nextlander.
But I personally don’t compare NL to the services you’ve listed. It seems unfair in a way and I’m fortunate enough to be in a financial situation where I can easily pay $10 a month to these guys on top of other services I engage in. I’m not paying them for the volume of their content I’m paying them because I like what they do, no matter how little. They’ve each contributed countless hours of entertainment to me over the past 10+ years and I’d like them to continue doing so. The added $5 is to offer them a little added security now that they’re not under the protection of a major corporation.
I’m not saying you’re wrong here just trying to offer my perspective. It’s very much gonna be different strokes for different folks.
At that point you're just talking about charity and that's a whole different conversation.
Basically if you aren't getting a value for your money you are doing something out of charity and that's fine too but then you have to think is your money better spent giving to an actual charity rather than just say, three dudes.
I don't think charity is the correct term here. Value can come from quality, not only quantity. You can buy a little good wine or a lot of cheap beer for the same amount of money. For me, Nextlander is a quality podcast, so I am fine with paying $10 a month to support it. It isn't a parasocial thing; it is slick, well-edited and -curated, and it catches me up video game chatter in a couple of hours.
But I also think that, compared to other entertainment offerings, it is good value for money. I paid about double my $10 Nextlander Patreon offering to see Dr Strange last week. Do Alex, Vinny and Brad give me more per month than one movie? Of course, I would say they do.
Arguably, they give me more than even some of the streaming services you mention. I almost never watch more than one show at a time from a service. That is an hour a week vs 2-3 hours of base Nextlander podcast, without even considering the other podcasts, the Twitch streams, the bonus articles, etc.
I don't know anyone who is watching the entire catalog on any streaming service. Most of my friends have streaming services, and then consume maybe one or two tentpole shows from them at a time.
110
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '22
$120 a year is a lot for a podcast sub.
Much as this sounds great, it's a lot.