Mid-year 2024 developments from the Policy Team

What’s new in Patreon policy… and how you can help shape what’s next.

Our Community Guidelines are the guardrails that help keep Patreon safe, detailing the sorts of works and behaviors that are and are not permitted on the platform. Today the Policy Team is back with a mid-year update on new developments, including guideline adjustments, AI-related proposals, an upcoming revamp to the Trust & Safety appeals process, planned mental health resources, and more — informed in large part by creator feedback and advocacy work. As usual, we welcome you to engage with us to help steer our policy as part of the Creator Policy Engagement Program.

Community Guidelines apply to creators and fans

As we continue to build more spaces on Patreon for fans to interact with creators and each other, we will make it clearer how our Community Guidelines apply to both fans and creators.

With that in mind, we intend to clarify our username policy. Although profanity is generally permitted on Patreon, including within creator or fan usernames that do not violate any other guidelines, username profanity may not be directed at or against another person, ethnicity, or protected group.

Policy updates

In March, we refreshed the Community Guidelines to facilitate more intuitive navigation, language clarity, terminology uniformity, and visual consistency with the company’s reimagined brand. Since publishing the refreshed guidelines, the team has received additional suggestions from creators, which inform the following updates:

• Explicitly stating Patreon’s opposition to human trafficking and sex trafficking.
• Bolstering the language around Patreon’s respect for human rights by citing the standards established in the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs).
• Under Disordered Eating, replacing the term “feederism” with “forced feeding” to be more inclusive and specific.
• Adding nuance under Bestiality: works depicting fictional sexual interactions between a human and an animal from the real world (e.g. a person and a feral wolf) will remain prohibited; however, if the creature interacting with the human is more humanistic than animal (i.e. anthropomorphic, bipedal, and sentient — which would imply the capacity to consent), then that would be permitted.
• Removing “Game of Thrones” as an example of permitted content involving Incest to minimize creator confusion.
• Adding the new participant consent form for Adult/18+ creators to obtain the required written consent from any real human participants visually featured in their creative works. The form was updated in May to meet the latest payment processor requirements. To ensure continued compliance, Adult/18+ creators should begin using it to document participant consent effective immediately and should retain all such documentation indefinitely. Adult/18+ creators do not need to use this form to obtain retroactive consent from human participants featured visually in past creative works, but should retain whatever form of consent documentation they did obtain at the time.
• Replacing the term “photorealistic” (currently cited under Sexually Gratifying Works, Teen Safety, and Violent and Graphic Works) with the term “hyperrealistic” and adding criteria for distinguishing hyperrealistic visual works from animations or illustrations. For example, hyperrealistic depictions of people are anatomically possible and three-dimensional, mimicking natural lighting and movement, and featuring texture such as skin pores, individual eyelashes, or life-like shadows. (Note that these criteria are meant for illustrative purposes and are not exhaustive).

Additionally, the world of generative artificial intelligence is evolving, and Patreon’s policies are evolving with it. We’re working to continue meeting the expectations and requirements of our payment partners to ensure creators can get paid, while also responsibly encouraging creativity on our platform. Due to updated credit card network guidelines, which we updated our Community Guidelines in March to reflect, Patreon is no longer able to support artificial intelligence or machine learning generators, tools, or software focused on the creation of sexually explicit imagery.

Initiatives for your feedback

We are eager for creator feedback on the following AI-related proposals, which we will take into consideration before finalizing later this year:

• People depicted visually in Adult/18+ works on Patreon should be real — as opposed to AI-generated hyperrealistic (see the “Policy updates” section for more on hyperrealism). To demonstrate that people are real and also uphold Patreon’s commitment to consent, Adult/18+ creators should complete ID verification themselves and collect consent forms from participants visually featured on their Patreon (see the “Policy updates” section for more on participant consent forms). AI-generated Adult/18+ works that are animated or illustrated — as opposed to hyperrealistic — and otherwise comply with Patreon’s Sexually Gratifying Works policies, would still be permitted.
• Offering fans access to AI-driven Adult/18+ chatbots, sexbots, or virtual girlfriend-type experiences that incorporate user-generated content (e.g. image generation or manipulation) would not be permitted.

As part of this work, we want to hear from you on which areas could be more clear to you, what questions you have, and whether there are any gaps or edge cases we need to consider or include. In addition to the proposals listed above, we are in the early planning stages for two initiatives that we’d appreciate your feedback on:

• Appeals process revamp. Currently, when Patreon Trust & Safety notifies a creator about a suspension or removal (moderation actions for high severity violations, as opposed to requests for changes or post removals for low or moderate severity violations), the creator can initiate an appeal by replying to the message with additional evidence for consideration. We’re developing a more robust appeals process for creators, and we want to hear from you on current challenges and ideas for improvements.
• Mental health and wellness resources. We want to offer resources to better protect and strengthen the mental health and wellness of creators and fans on Patreon. We’d love to hear from you about what sorts of programming, expert partnerships, and offerings both within the Patreon product and more broadly could help achieve that goal.

External advocacy

Patreon published a statement on behalf of creators in response to news about a potential ban of TikTok in the United States. Citing TikTok’s contributions to creative collaboration and business growth, the piece emphasizes the need for stability in the creator economy and reaffirmed Patreon’s commitment to providing creators with ownership, stability, and control regardless of the outcome with TikTok. As we said in our response: “The creator economy is here to stay, and we won’t stop working toward a world where professional creativity, and true fandom, is possible for all.”

Join the conversation

Livestream: Please join Patreon’s Policy team for a livestream on Thursday, July 18 (10:00 AM PST // 1:00 PM EST // 5:00 PM GMT). The team will discuss these developments in greater detail and take creator questions. RSVPing gives you a chance to submit any questions you’d like the team to address and also ensures that you will receive an email with a recording of the event after the fact, even if you are unable to join live. Note that the livestream will take place in English.

Community Q&A: The policy conversation will open after Thursday’s livestream in a policy Q&A channel on Patreon’s Creator Community Discord. Visit  #policy-live-qa to join the discussion, which will remain open until Thursday, July 25 at 11:00 AM PST // 2:00 PM EST // 7:00 PM GMT.

Email: Feel free to share feedback, ideas, or questions with Patreon’s Policy Team anytime at [email protected].

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The Policy Team is excited to hear from you about these latest developments and is, as always, grateful for your ongoing engagement.