Donation Drive 2021

Gamers With Jobs Donation Drive 2021

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Gamers With Jobs Donation Drive 2021

Before we begin, we understand that this year may be financially challenging for many. Please know we see you, we feel for you, and we are here for you. Many who want to donate may not be able to, and that is okay. We thank you all the same for being part of this wonderful community. You are the reason GWJ exists year after year. Thank you!

It is time once again for the annual GWJ Donation Drive!

We're honored again this year to kick off the annual Gamers With Jobs Donation Drive. It's the one time of the year we ask for your support to keep the lights on and to allow us to remain one of the few ad-free websites on the internet. Your contributions help us to create content like the weekly GWJ Conference Call podcast, our Twitch streams, Story Roost RPG podcasts, and more! Have lots of questions? We have a General Donation Drive FAQ listed here.

Please go to patreon.com/gwj to kick in whatever you are willing to donate.

One important note—if you want the rewards, make sure the email you use for Patreon is the same one you use for your GWJ account. If your emails are different, refer to the FAQ linked above.

While Patreon is our preference for supporting the site, we understand that some folks still prefer using PayPal. Your donation will still count! You can click on the PayPal button below if you’d rather go that route. Please include your forum name in the notes so we can associate the payment with your site name and make sure you get tagged.


2021: Setting Up for a Major Site Overhaul

In the latter half of 2022, Drupal will stop supporting version 7.0, which means we need to start thinking now about migrating. We need to find people who know Drupal and can help our team build out a new back end for the site. Your donations will go towards making this possible. If you are someone with this experience and would like to join the team, please PM Amoebic or email amanda (at) gamerswithjobs.com. There will be an upcoming post with more details about recruiting the team, so stay tuned for that!


Yearly Charity Twitch Streams

This year we wanted to put more of our focus on Extra Life Day and promote the support of children's hospitals. Enriching our history of social responsibility is important to our community, and we look forward to continuing to be conscientious and responsible members of the larger gaming space.


Donor Reward Tiers

These are primarily tracked through our Patreon! If you are donating through PayPal, and want to redeem a tier, keep in mind that some tiers may be noted as "capped." This means the limit has to do with available supply or time. If you donate through PayPal, and a donation tier is noted as capped and we have reached the limit, we will try to still fulfill the request! It just might mean another production request, which would likely create some delay for last-minute folks to receive their items.

Ordering and shipping of merch will occur after the October 1 billing cycle. Donor rewards will start rolling out in October, with longer-term items like the GWJ dice sets and GWJ goodie bag rolling out a few months later due to production turnaround times and international shipping.

Once the donation drive concludes, each tier level donator will receive an email with a link to surveys to provide more details like T-shirt sizes, patterns, colors, and shipping addresses. We look forward to reading your responses!


Gamers With Jobs Golden Icons

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/8eXIguI.png)

$2.00 — Golden community icon for the forums. A classic. The little guy that goes right under your forum avatar. This is the workhorse that keeps the lights on and the forums alive. We're still collecting community suggestions for the next golden icon design here!


Gamers With Jobs Conference Call Podcast Shout-Out

$5.00 — Shout-Out! We’ll read a short, custom message (300 words or less) from you on the Conference Call. Shout out a friend, thank someone for being awesome, or share whatever is on your mind! This tier includes a forum golden icon.


Conference Call Game Reviews

$10.00 — (15 cap) Ask the Conference Call to play a game and we’ll talk about it! Due to time and commitment constraints, we ask that folks refrain from requesting specific podcasters for specific games. This tier includes a forum golden icon and podcast shout-out.


GWJ Sticker Pack

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/v3hr4AM.png)

$20.00 — (no cap) Sticker Pack - 5 stickers from the following 5 options. Stay subscribed to our Patreon at this or any other tier, and you'll also be the first to see upcoming designs, ideas, and projects for future stickers, as well as other products that will be part of our retail launch in the coming months. Yes, you can have more than one of the same sticker as your reward, if you like! Shipping costs included. This tier includes a forum golden icon and podcast shout-out.

Larger sticker images under the cut!

Spoiler:

Stickers! The weird edgy glow is from the Redbubble site to cast a shadow on their site page to give an idea on die-cut offset. It'll have crisp edges on creation.

GWJ Crest Sticker
IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/EE0hGy0.png)
GWJ Site Header Logo Sticker
IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/RGBBmhQ.png)
GWJ Bombsfall Level Up Sticker
IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/zNiaNum.png)
GWJ Classic Stan Sticker
IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/YsxM3jw.png)
Wiener Bomb Sticker
IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/Qgx8pYH.png)


Gamers With Jobs T-Shirts!

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/MY0V3KT.png)

$30.00 — GWJ Tee! (no cap) Pick one (1) T-shirt from a selection of designs below, and let us know your preferred size. All designs run unisex sizes S - 3X, with some styles available in the 5XL size. Women's scoop neck tees run XS - XL. Shipping costs included. Stay subscribed to our Patreon at this or any other tier, and you will be the first to see upcoming designs, ideas, and projects for future tees and other products. This tier includes a forum golden icon and podcast shout-out.

Shirt Images under the cut:

Spoiler:

Friend Me Up Tee
IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/xtTgZXP.png)
GWJ Crest Tee
IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/mG8L8Wd.png)
GWJ Site Header Logo Tee
IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/QkcB3M3.png)
Classic Stan Tee
IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/UM0fviw.png)
GWJ Level Up Tee
IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/TeOR1VT.png)


Gamers With Jobs Dice Set

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/eH3dvxs.png)

$40.00 — GWJ Dice (10 Cap) Chessex Signature Series Velvet 7-piece polyhedral dice set with a custom D10 featuring the silhouette of our very own Stan! (shimmery grey/black marble with red numerals). Production lead time and shipping on this may take approximately 10-12+ weeks if you're in North America, and longer worldwide, may border customs be merciful. This tier includes a forum golden icon and podcast shout-out as well as two surprise mystery stickers! Shipping costs included.


Gamers With Jobs Shirt + Sticker Pack

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/sCASQgH.png)

$40.00 — GWJ Tee + Sticker Pack (no cap) Pick one (1) T-shirt from a selection of designs and sizes detailed above. Shipping costs included. Stay subscribed to our Patreon at this or any other tier, and you will be the first to see upcoming designs, ideas, and projects for future tees and other products. This tier includes a forum golden icon and podcast shout-out.


Gamers With Jobs Goodie Bag

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/E0MVl5B.png)

$50.00 — Goodie Bag (5 Cap) Generous and beautiful donors at this level will receive a package including a custom GWJ dice set, GWJ sticker pack, and GWJ tee, as well as a hand-written thank-you note. This tier includes a forum golden icon and podcast shout-out.


Thank you all so much! Even if you are unable to contribute your dollars to help the site, your presence here is so important. We love and appreciate each of you! So many of you do things large and small every day to make this an amazing and rare place on the internet—stretching from our forums, to our Twitch channel, to our community Discord. We are so grateful for your time, support, and awesome contributions! Thank you for helping make GWJ such a wonderful place to be.

Comments

Oh my gosh, I totally want the dice. This is amazing!!!!!!!
Too bad I can't get that AND the game review, because I'd totally torture the rest of you with some extremely cheesy otome.

So if I donate this year my little forum icon turns 18 and finally moves out of the house? I'm proud of the little warrior. They've changed so much over the years, but to be honest it's probably for the best. They need to see the real world to get some perspective. Having sharp wit is important, sure, and being willing to fight for your ideals can go a long way. Let them experience what life is like out in the world right now and I'm sure they'll learn and absorb so much to shape their future develo... oh. A dumpster. On fire.

Seems about right. Yes you can stay in the basement, but you're doing your own laundry and helping with the grocery bill. Love ya!

I had asked Eleima about this in Discord, and I was directed here. For the shirts/other physical items, if we want more than one set; we just pay double the amount for the donation right?

Whoa look at all the shiny!

mikeohara wrote:

I had asked Eleima about this in Discord, and I was directed here. For the shirts/other physical items, if we want more than one set; we just pay double the amount for the donation right?

WOW!
I hadn't even considered that people would want more than one thing! I was only worried that people might not even want anything. Thanks, impostor syndrome!

Thank you for bringing this up, I'll update the OP and Patreon post.

I think to avoid confusion, be sure to note this in a private Patreon message, your Paypal message field when donating, or follow up your donation with an email to me at amanda (at) gamerswithjobs.com being really clear with your intent. If you were to double up on, say, stickers for example, it'll look like two other $40 options, so I want to make sure we track you the right way.

To be clear, we will also be opening up the storefront for the Redbubble online retail store in the coming months, so if it's purely a T-shirt or sticker thing, you could also wait for that to go live as well if you're wanting to see what that'll be like. It just takes a lot of time to set up each item and their dozens of design toggles and switches, as well as ironing out some of the intial launch pain points.

(I'm still waiting to hear back from Redbubble why only some shirts are letting me do up to 5X while others are only letting me do up to 3X. I would really like all shirts to go up to 5X! It's a major reason why I chose Redbubble!)

I just figured out why it won't let me do the 5x size for the stan and site logo designs - the image needs to take up more real estate for some reason. I really like having a discreet logo option. I might have to fake the image size with a transparency to reset the design to allow having a little stan or a little website logo in the upper left side of the shirts.

Amoebic wrote:
mikeohara wrote:

I had asked Eleima about this in Discord, and I was directed here. For the shirts/other physical items, if we want more than one set; we just pay double the amount for the donation right?

WOW!
I hadn't even considered that people would want more than one thing! I was only worried that people might not even want anything. Thanks, impostor syndrome!

Thank you for bringing this up, I'll update the OP and Patreon post.

I would probably purchase something for my wife if the opportunity presents itself, but I'd rather be safe than sorry and ask before hand.

Those are some nice looking shirts, and I just might need a couple of them in my life!

4dSwissCheese wrote:

Those are some nice looking shirts, and I just might need a couple of them in my life!

I'm thinking the same thing

I would love to have a shirt with the graphic of the adventurers with ties on top and the demons on the bottom. I love that artwork!!

Moggy wrote:
4dSwissCheese wrote:

Those are some nice looking shirts, and I just might need a couple of them in my life!

I'm thinking the same thing

Yup, me too.

One question though - it says shipping costs included. Does that include overseas shipping?

AUs_TBirD wrote:
Moggy wrote:
4dSwissCheese wrote:

Those are some nice looking shirts, and I just might need a couple of them in my life!

I'm thinking the same thing

Yup, me too.

One question though - it says shipping costs included. Does that include overseas shipping?

Yes! We have a lot of international folks in our community.

I'll continue with my current Patreon level & check out the merchandise when then store straightens out.

Ok, I can't tell if I'm just horribly confused or blind, but are the tiers and associated goodies for keeping at that level or just doing it for a month and then whatever?
Edit - Nevermind, I found the answer. Wasn't expecting it to work this way after previous years, so I was slow on the uptick.

If I just leave my tier as is, will it transfer over to this year's version?

I have upped my monthly contribution this year. Keep up the great work!

lunchbox12682 wrote:

Ok, I can't tell if I'm just horribly confused or blind, but are the tiers and associated goodies for keeping at that level or just doing it for a month and then whatever?
Edit - Nevermind, I found the answer. Wasn't expecting it to work this way after previous years, so I was slow on the uptick.

If I just leave my tier as is, will it transfer over to this year's version?

Yes. The way I'm tracking it, if I'm going down the lists and see that you donated at a certain level in the counts, I'll count you at that level. You don't have to turn the specific tier on unless it's a capped level and you're concerned it may run out and you want to donate at that teir!

Reasoning: Tiers used to get deleted at the end of each year, so it would clear out donor tier name, anyway. I'm not going to punish or ask people to do extra work to fall under a special designation we caused, especially if they've supported us consistently over the years. If you hit a reward level, you'll be getting a survey about something if you hit a donor level during our donation drive

(Not going to lie, it does make me feel giddy to see the tiers next to someone's name though...someone did that. Look at you!! Warm fuzzy feelings).

Upped my tier -- I want a Tshirt.

The reward tiers confuse me. So I will wait for an official store link and let my cumulative monthly contributions ride as-is.

Ah sorry if I've made it more confusing! Love you, thank you. Let me know if I can clarify anything.

*shrug* It's the same confusion I've had since the Patreon payment method was implemented.
The rewards are accessible to single month lump sum donations, but the Patreon model is built on ongoing monthly support payments. If single payments per year are preferred and rewarded then I don't know what value Patreon brings to the drive. I'm content to let my monthly donations ride, but I do get a little twinge of jealousy when my meager monthly donations could have been paid out all at once instead and gotten me some loot as well. 12 months of small payments vs one lump sum on the month where it is counted isn't a big deal. But missing out on stickers? That pinches enough for me to squeak a bit.

And maybe I've just missed places where this has been addressed. It's not a big deal to me, otherwise I would have changed my process, but it has been a point of confusion for me. Maybe there's rhyme and reason to the process. Maybe there isn't.

And to be perfectly clear: I am not upset or angry or hurt. Just confused and happy to be in a position where I can hide a small monthly payment in my budget.

Maybe this isn't the best place to post this but I didn't want to start a new thread to announce that I was no longer going to donate.

I'm probably one of the few people here sporting a V18.0 golden Icon but I haven't used it in forever. I don't know when I made my last post but it's been a while. It's not you it's me. I've recently turned 52 and over the last few years have slowly stopped visiting GWJ. Much of that is that I've started to lose interest in gaming ... well probably more accurately in gaming as a hobby. I still play video games but I've become a very niche gamer and the games I play are mostly indy and strategy games that just aren't talked about much here or anywhere for that matter.

GWJ was such a big part of my 30's and even 40's I don't know how many hours I have spent on this web page but probably more than any other. I've got nothing but love for GWJ but it doesn't make sense to continue donating to a site I hardly ever visit. Growing old sucks I guess your interests change and I'm just not that into gaming anymore.

Bernie Sanders meme template

"Once again, I am asking you to donate to GWJ."

Rezzy wrote:

*shrug* It's the same confusion I've had since the Patreon payment method was implemented.
The rewards are accessible to single month lump sum donations, but the Patreon model is built on ongoing monthly support payments. If single payments per year are preferred and rewarded then I don't know what value Patreon brings to the drive. I'm content to let my monthly donations ride, but I do get a little twinge of jealousy when my meager monthly donations could have been paid out all at once instead and gotten me some loot as well. 12 months of small payments vs one lump sum on the month where it is counted isn't a big deal. But missing out on stickers? That pinches enough for me to squeak a bit.

And maybe I've just missed places where this has been addressed. It's not a big deal to me, otherwise I would have changed my process, but it has been a point of confusion for me. Maybe there's rhyme and reason to the process. Maybe there isn't.

And to be perfectly clear: I am not upset or angry or hurt. Just confused and happy to be in a position where I can hide a small monthly payment in my budget.

Thank you for the detailed response! It's always good to ask because maybe it could help someone else understand. Thank you for kindly keeping a little space for us in your pocket <3

Someone please correct me if this sounds wrong, but at the time that we moved over to Patreon, there was a lot of dust up about paypal being predatory towards creators and donors, which was a few years before patreon started being more predatory towards creators and donors. Now it's kind of six up, half a dozen down and they're both predatory towards creators and donors, just in different ways. Since I have to interface with paypal in my day job, I'm still of the opinion they're the grosser of the two and still prefer patreon. That sentiment may be outdated and uninformed, I haven't dealt as closely with patreon on the back end as I have with paypal.

All in all though, I'm not sure it has been discussed, in detail. I think part of it is "this is how it always was" but also "how do we keep track of 400+ people who often dip in and out over 365 days?" How do we move from a system that was started and maintained the way it always was for over a decade and into the modern era? What does cumulative mean for those continually ongoing vs those who do it sporadically (few months on, few months off, repeat)?

I've looked into some options, but most seem to be of the "donate at $15 a month and every 3 months we send you a shirt" variety and not a cumulative total and if you drop your donations mid-checkpoint it leaves either party open to dispute. From what I could find, most artists who do cumulative totals tend to track them manually on a good-will basis, and have a much more modest pool of contributors than we're currently have. Patreon does not have support for tracking cumulative rewards, unfortunately.

As far as only monitoring the month, I can at least speak to that being tradition as well as time. At least the way we're set up currently, I'll be taking about a week off of work to do distribution in late october/early november (some of that is handled via drop shipping from redbubble. thank goodness. At least I'll get to use my vacation hours!) - however anything having to do with dice is coming to me in bulk, which will then will be sorted, packed, parcelled, and shipped. Most of that will happen during that week off work; It's likely some orders will happen before that during weekends and evenings alongside producing, editing, and planning podcasts, articles, etc. If I could have my current day job as only part-time to do this, I would seriously consider it! Monitoring and managing ongoing physical reward tiers for a community of our size throughout a whole year would be a decent part-time job once the actual onboarding and execution was hammered out.

I also wanted to do redbubble so people can eventually buy a wider range of stuff whenever they want without having to go through the donation drive as an intemediary, with a wider range of item types and clothing sizes! That can run itself for the most part, which it is nice to keep some of that separated. The setup is ...significantly more involved and intricate than anyone who has never done such a thing before may expect. I've been working on drawing up designs, comissioning designs, item and design placement, etc since sometime in July. Next year's donation drive will be something different, and the merch site won't be as heavily involved (there's some possibility of some merch items could end up in some future tiers, but not to the extent it was this year - the primary thrust of this year involves funneling time and resources to give the merch site it's legs to walk on it's own

Transitioning to a more modern patreon method is something I'm interested in pursuing, but do not have the technical and professional patreon knowledge to really kick off in a major way without getting familiar first. I'm incredibly open to working with anyone who has back end experience with patreon for businesses though! If anyone knows someone, send them my way! At this point....I've blown the dust off and trying to figure out the basics of how to patreon, so I appreciate people's patience during the learning process. Please forgive if it's kinda quaint or cheese balls while I get my footing <3

Copingsaw wrote:

Maybe this isn't the best place to post this but I didn't want to start a new thread to announce that I was no longer going to donate.

I'm probably one of the few people here sporting a V18.0 golden Icon but I haven't used it in forever. I don't know when I made my last post but it's been a while. It's not you it's me. I've recently turned 52 and over the last few years have slowly stopped visiting GWJ. Much of that is that I've started to lose interest in gaming ... well probably more accurately in gaming as a hobby. I still play video games but I've become a very niche gamer and the games I play are mostly indy and strategy games that just aren't talked about much here or anywhere for that matter.

GWJ was such a big part of my 30's and even 40's I don't know how many hours I have spent on this web page but probably more than any other. I've got nothing but love for GWJ but it doesn't make sense to continue donating to a site I hardly ever visit. Growing old sucks I guess your interests change and I'm just not that into gaming anymore.

Thank you for posting and sharing - You are not alone! I think this is common as time and interests change. We don't ever want people to feel weird or guilty about commitments and tastes and how those can vary over the years. You've been along for an incredible journey so far, and letting your path mingle with ours all the while has been an honor. Best wishes on wherever your road takes you.

I still play video games but I've become a very niche gamer and the games I play are mostly indy and strategy games that just aren't talked about much here or anywhere for that matter.

This part though....going out on a cliffhanger and leave us wanting to know what kind of indie hotness is on your radar is an ace move and I salute you.

I have a question about the game review incentive. It feels like that reviewing a bunch of games, on top of the regular podcasts, would be a large lift for the weekly GWJ crew. Are you all thinking of bringing in other people for some of these review podcasts? If there are members of the community that are big into particular genres of games, it could be a great time to hear new voices and get their take!

Transitioning to a more modern patreon method

May I suggest OnlyFans

staygold wrote:
Transitioning to a more modern patreon method

May I suggest OnlyFans

You do realize that you're one of the people making the content, right?

LastSurprise wrote:

I have a question about the game review incentive. It feels like that reviewing a bunch of games, on top of the regular podcasts, would be a large lift for the weekly GWJ crew. Are you all thinking of bringing in other people for some of these review podcasts? If there are members of the community that are big into particular genres of games, it could be a great time to hear new voices and get their take!

I like this a lot

staygold wrote:
Transitioning to a more modern patreon method

May I suggest OnlyFans

you may not!

Bumping this as a reminder that the donation drive is coming to a close at the end of September, which is in just a few days! We've got a couple of dice sets still available, and of course tee shirts and stickers

Sorry to raise this from the dead, but is it possible to change my tier now?
I raised it for the drive and now want to go back to my original level. However, I seem to only have the option to cancel.