This was gonna be a reply to this other forum thread: gelbooru.com/index.php?page=forum&s=view&id=4522 until I realized it was locked lol

This must be a new rule, right?... One of the main uses of this site afaict is to see Patreon rewards, it's (one of) the only way you can actually see them before becoming a Patreon and seeing which one's you'd rather support. It's also how I discover like 80% of said artists & their other profiles since all the other sites that artists use are useless for browsing specific types of content and just rely on social feeds & algorithms. It's legit a better advertiser than most other sources imo (I did become a Patron for several artists for various periods of time thanks to Gelbooru)

Also, many very popular artists have had their reward content on here for years, like hundreds of images consistently getting good ratings, but all of a sudden they're all gone. I thought it was definitely allowed. Stand out names for me are Sakimichan, Dandon fuga and Sciamano240 among others

I find the paywalls lame since early on Patreon was more "Support me so I can create more content like WIP processes, tutorials & art polls" but is now mostly "You don't deserve to see my art unless you pay me", everything else is nothing but a preview lol, but alas I guess this ain't the place for that rant

Now, I'm vehemently against art theft - like posting other people's art without any effort in crediting/sourcing - but I find boorus great coz the tagging system is the superior method for browsing art and most pictures (that I see) are sourced, and it's better than all the activity I see on various community threads & discord servers where all people do is upload untitled unsourced unmarked pics and they don't know the source or care. When they do ask for sauce, usually the easiest thing for me is to come to Gelbooru & search relevant tags


Finally, I wanna ask, is this rule necessary for Gelbooru to operate properly or is it just their opinion that it should be that way? And if the rule is against paid content, does that not include all game CG and the like?

I'm sorry if this thread is not welcome

Edit: Btw, were the paid_rewards tags made as bait so you could find and remove all those posts in one fell swoop?

Kinda. I'm pretty sure the rule started to get enforced during the time Patreon began being seen as a legit source of income, and when more artists voiced complaints that their paid stuff being uploaded for free. Back when patreon wasn't as well-known, the rule wasn't very enforced on sites because it wasn't really seen as harming their livelihood. Now that it's became more recognized as legit source of income, with more artists relying on it, and with the help of DMCA takedowns, sites like gelbooru get more pressure to crack down harder on paid content.

Also while I can agree with that some artists (especially the newer ones) are milking the pateron cow more than you'd expect a few years ago..... people have to eat. Not everyone has a free ride, so if making Splatoon porn is a way for them to finance themselves making more porn, then so be it.

I don't disagree with that, but I just think it might do them more harm than good to eradicate all traces of their paid rewards everywhere outside of their Patreon. People seem to really overestimate the amount of exposure they can get themselves just via their social accounts and Patreon page itself, it's often where their stuff is shared and used that helps a lot. Just like movies, music & games, piracy helps more than they admit, especially when the pirates can recommend the original sources.

Also, value-wise it's usually pretty ridiculous for their old content which is quite pricey on gumroad

Personally, the only ones I've supported are the ones for whom I've seen a lot of their stuff on boorus

You're right, in terms of free content they upload for viewers can see on their social media profiles, it doesn't make much sense to want them removed and prohibited from Gelbooru. Booru's are like an exhibition museum.

And as for the gumroad thing, haven't seen an instance of that yet. Perhaps some artists have to milk things even further?

From the wiki page for paid_reward:


When an artist fully releases paid material to the world, it is allowed to be posted here. I'm not sure on the exact history, but I imagine Gelbooru was always wary of the strained relations this caused between authors and made a conscious effort to remove these alongside better DMCAs or something along those lines.

I did see that. When I first saw that tag it actually contained a lot of posts, I actually thought it was a better way to discover Patreon artists lol, and it was easier to find works of artists you knew that weren't tagged yet. Now it seems the reward tags were nuked

When posts are released later they're no longer considered paid rewards (in those cases the reward is just to view it earlier). Most artists will just sell them on gumroad or something after the Patreon period

I did think it was the result of some kind of pressure on Gelbooru's operations, I guess that can't really be helped

There was no pressure. We didn't allow paywall content, and yet there were Patreon uploads which were restricted by a paywall. So we (Zapdos) convinced Danbooru to also remove them, for the same reasoning.

Maybe they should starve so people who actually contribute to society won't be bribed anymore. No real artist says: "I'm going to quit creating new things because nobody is paying me." This is a huge insult to artists who live by their principles. It's like saying you can't accomplish anything, no matter how monotonous, unless it serves the use of someone else's hard-earned money. They're all hacks selling out to their followers. Fuck 'em.

I don't have a problem with it in general, but some artists can be jerks, and also greedy. Fantia is frequently the worst, because it seems to be the default for artists there to set it up so you had to be a paid subscriber during the month in question to access the rewards, but they never release packs with the past paid content in them. Do you love a teaser they posted in August 2018 and want to see the full version of an image? Sorry, there's no legal way to access it, and it probably isn't archived anywhere else. A lot of those images are going to end up lost to history entirely. Artists that do that but regularly add packs letting you buy the back-issue month(s) you missed are fine, even if I can't afford to buy all the packs I'd like to have.

The other one I've seen I can't describe as anything but insane greed is an artist who set up their Fanbox so each tier only gives you access to the X previous posts. This causes images to constantly become unavailable to you, even though you were a paid subscriber when they were posted. That particular artist does offer an option that gives you access to everything, but it's 50,000¥ a month. (Approximately $482 USD.)

If that doesn't strike you as overly greedy, they also have lowered the limit at least once, by halving each tier's access limits. For example, previously tier two used to give you access to the last 50 posts, but going forward it would only be 25, for the exact same price. I ended up forgetting to unsubscribe and didn't have time to download new posts for several months and it's only thanks to exhentai I got to save copies of images I paid to access. I'm not going to mention that artist's name (please don't pm me asking), but I really don't have a good opinion of them despite liking their art.

On the other hand you have artists that are extremely generous, such as Custom Udon. 100¥ a month gets you access to all their Fanbox posts, and there's no time limits. You can subscribe for one month, download everything, cancel and do it again months later. I've been happy to stay subbed to them to help them out financially a little.

Hey, at the end of the day, it's their art, their content.
They put time and effort to push out that new illustration/animation/whatever it is, so I see nothing wrong in it being locked behind a paywall, and I find the rule of this kind of content not being allowed in Gelbooru understandable and fair.

That being said, I see how having everything locked behind a subscription can sometimes be disadvantageous, too. Especially if you're a new artist still struggling to get your name out there.
And there's no way in hell that I'm ever gonna spend $482 USD on a monthly sub. Greedy content creators aren't gonna see a single cent from me, unless I find their stuff extremely, extremely worth it.

So yes, some artists are cunts, but remember that it's your money. And you can decide on who gets it.
Just like how it's their art, and they decide on how much it's worth.