When Elephants Fight

When Elephants Fight
IGG v KS

The following is a blanket response to questions and comments from several people both on and off this blog.

We authors know that the reader is king, and that we are competing with TV, movies, and beer for his hard-earned dollars. I would not presume to gainsay readers’ market preferences.

At the same time, solidarity with my brothers in the craft obliges me to make sure readers’ sovereign decisions are as soundly informed as possible.

It’s undeniably true that Indiegogo has engaged in partisan and unethical behavior toward creators on their platform. They should face repercussions for those actions.

It is also true that the only currently viable alternative to Indiegogo, Kickstarter, has a much worse track record of gross partisan discrimination. To refresh the reader’s memory, Kickstarter rejected a film exposing the butchery committed by abortionist Kermit Gosnell. Indiegogo allowed the film makers to fully fund the project.

I have always said not to give money to people who hate you. Like all aspirational statements, it admits of degrees. Indiegogo takes only 5% of what backers pay to the author, while arch-Leftist Jeff Bezos’ Amazon takes 30%. I do business with the latter because it involves no formal and low material cooperation with evil. My dealings with Indiegogo follow a similar moral calculus with even lower material cooperation, and the evil is less grave.

Indie authors, by definition, do not enjoy the benefits provided by a traditional publisher. They must pay for editing, cover and promotional art, and formatting out-of-pocket. Nor do indies receive advances to offset the cost of time spent writing.

Mitigating the production and opportunity costs incurred by foregoing a traditional publisher was the last obstacle keeping indie authors from devoting our full efforts to publishing stories normal people want to read. The new patronage system ushered in by crowdfunding seemed to have solved this problem. Unfortunately, one major crowdfunding service has consistently embraced SJW behavior, and the other has brazenly stolen from a dissenting publishing house. Indiegogo will not miss the $100 denied them if an indie author’s campaign fails, but he’ll certainly miss the $2,000 he’d hoped his readers’ goodwill would provide.

I see no good solution. When elephants fight, the grass suffers.

9 Comments

  1. Rigel Kent

    The other day I saw Vox Day mention that he and others have been working on another option, and that it's what they used for Alt Hero Q after Indiegogo pulled a fast one. I believe he also said that they'd be opening it to the public within a month or so.

    I really hope it works out, I'm really tired of these different platforms playing these games.

    • Brian Niemeier

      I hope someone is able to build a workable alternate platform, too. The fate of Hatreon, Freestarter, and Gab, among many others, doesn't fill me with confidence. Big Tech operates as a cabal to keep competition out. It will take the government stepping in to level the playing field.

  2. Man of the Atom

    This comment has been removed by the author.

  3. Durandel

    It’s not Big Tech, it’s Big Banking too. Even should the Tech canal get broken by the US Gov, payment processors and banks are further up the chain of these crowdfunding platforms where SJWs can stop the funds. It’s more than building alternative platforms and institutions, we need to build a parallel society.

    The election last night needs to make it clear to our side that you don’t fight with kids gloves, always go for the jugular and deal with the aftermath.

    • Brian Niemeier

      Well said. One promising solution to the banking/payment processor problem is to have the post office provide essential banking services like basic checking accounts and bill payments. Some may argue that private companies can refuse to do business with whomever they want, but it is in fact illegal for the US postal system to deny service to anyone.

    • Man of the Atom

      Your solution also has the advantage of using one of the few Constitutionally established and mandated services that is designed to connect Citizens and provide communication and commerce.

      Banking services might also keep USPS in the black.

    • Brian Niemeier

      Good point. They may not even need to drop Saturday delivery.

      I'd love to take credit, but other countries' postal services already offer banking.

  4. Man of the Atom

    Won't be easy, but the on-going fight gives us opportunities to show the normies how corrupt the Silicon Valley Tyrants really are. Gotta get to that 10% understanding the threat.

    • Brian Niemeier

      A lot of normies woke up when Alex Jones got unpersoned. That's the razor's edge Big Tech has to walk by deplatforming the most influential alternative media figures. Those guys tend to be the most moderate and the most popular, so lots of folks are left wondering why Google and Facebook banned the free speech advocate on the grounds of hate speech.

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