So I've been creating, a fantasy-adventure comic strip that I post for free on my website, Giant in the Playground , since 2004—almost sixteen years, which I think counts as a century in internet reckoning. In all that time, I've been supporting myself with a combination of book sales, merchandise sales, and advertising revenue. It's been going pretty well. The advertising revenue dropped off to zero a year or so ago, but it was OK. I managed. But then the server where I host my comic (and our very popular gaming forums) slowed down over the last few months before finally crashing to a halt. Where I would have normally been able to absorb an unexpected cost like this, the fact that I was already covering for the loss of advertising meant that I had an approximately $0 budget to go out and upgrade our hosting. A number of my readers suggested I try direct support in the form of Patreon, so...I am.If you're a long-time reader or a new fan of the comic, this is a way to help the comic stay financially afloat without having to buy a product that you may not need or want. If that appeals to you, then great! If you'd prefer to support me by buying a book ( digital or printed ), that's great, too. This is a wholly voluntary process, and I'm not going to lock any new comic content exclusively behind the Patreon wall. It's just another method for anyone who reads the comic to add whatever level of support they want to give. That's also why there's only one "tier" of support; I'm not going to be doing any extra material solely for the Patreon beyond what I already produce, so there won't be much in the way of stratified rewards.Also, if you don't read the comic at all but you enjoy using the Giant in the Playground forums for your gaming discussions or play-by-post adventures, then this is a way to pitch in and help support the ongoing cost of hosting without buying any of that stupid stick figure stuff. The forums in all their many-headed hunger are the main source of the server problems that precipitated the site slowdown, so if they're important to you and you want to ensure they stick around for the long haul, consider tossing in. In that case, imagine there's an invisible reward listing of, "The forums are turned back on and stay stable going forward."In the best case scenario, this support might reduce the need for me to do quite so many extra income-generating projects and allow me to focus on updating the regular ongoing comic more often, while finishing up some long-overdue promises. And pay for ongoing server maintenance to keep the forums running smoothly in the process. But who knows what'll happen? I'm sort of making this up as I go.OK, thanks for reading!