The Internet's largest chat app is introducing a new way to withdraw cash from users: server subscriptions, a Patreon-like subscription button made available on large servers starting in 2022, Discord is expanding its phased subscriptions and a long-term plan to make servers virtually storefront.

"To date, we have paid millions of dollars to thousands of creators and communities. And every day we see more and more creators and communities earning revenue from the Discord server." . Today we are excited to share a new tool that will help you get started making money faster."

The nickel-and-diming of the Discord server begins this week with "media channels." This new type of channel (currently in beta) is designed to host subscriber-only content, for example, "exclusive memes and wallpapers. Art creators could conceivably use this Discord feature to post subscriber-only illustrations, as many comic creators and other illustrators already do with Patreon.

Not a bad deal for creators, but only the beginning of a new revenue stream planned by Discord, which currently charges 10% of server usage fees. Below is a full list of free (currently with three asterisks) chat apps:

As a long-time Discord user, this update makes me feel bad, as I see Discord locking conversations behind a paywall and sharing tips to "turn people into paying customers." It makes me miss the days when I felt like Discord was making Discord for me. The company's calculated, commercial tone is a far cry from Discord, which saw exactly what I needed in a chat app and surprised me with features I never knew I wanted, like a Go Live button and high-quality noise cancellation.

Of course, this is the playbook of nearly every tech company of the past decade. Accumulate market share by subsidizing your product for years to get a monopoly, then figure out how to charge users, then make money after everyone adopts your service; Discord doesn't seem to be happy with my monthly Nitro fee.

In recent years, Discord has aimed almost exclusively at large communities, launching (and often forgetting) features like forum channels and live stages designed to turn the Discord server into a siloed social network ). It's all extra baggage when, like me, you're running a small server consisting of 15 friends who play games together.

Discord remains the easiest and best way to talk to friends online, but today's updates make its current trajectory impossible to ignore. By opening the door to itemized monetization, Discord has essentially become an unwelcoming place.

Two years ago, I urged everyone to enjoy Discord while it was still good. While my worst fears at the time (the Go Live stream crackdown and the demise of radio bots) have yet to materialize, I now wonder if the Server Shop and Tier Templates are the beginning of something worse.

Discord, of course, doesn't see it that way; Yang says that paid media channels are a way to "provide gorgeous insider content to subscribers" in addition to what the server already offers for free. Obviously, there's nothing wrong with selling what you make (thanks to PC Gamer magazine subscribers), and these new payment features are largely just Discord integrating what Patreon already enables. I am saddened that what used to be my oasis to escape the increasingly pay-to-play Internet is becoming more like the Internet.

Giving moderators the freedom to charge for individual features of the server is also likely to be abused; the average experience of finding a new community on Discord is a grayed-out channel where the first impression of the server can only be seen by paying a $10 admission fee seems to deteriorate across the board when it becomes defined by the

Discord has no intention of policing what server owners charge, but instead wants them to use their new tools wisely. Yang warns, "Remember: not every opportunity to earn income has to be a get-rich-quick scheme."

The blog specifically highlighted Valorant streamer Woohoojin's Club Banana server as a successful Discord community funded by subscriptions. Woohoojin, who earns more than $16,000 a month from Discord subscriptions, gives away free subscriptions to regular viewers and asks viewers to give him money only if he "has a lot."

While it is nice not to have to turn servers into microtransaction hellholes, just as the Twitch viewing experience has changed with the addition of various subscription and donation features, as users "become customers," the relationship between moderators and users becomes more delicate.