Wait. Just found out that the CEO of Gumroad now works at DOGE? And that he saved up loads of money 'cause he fired everyone and replaced them with AI? I'm leaving the platform as soon as I get my money. Jesus christ. tedium.co/2025/04/06/g... - ThreadSky

clovercomics.bsky.social • 2 days ago

Wait.
Just found out that the CEO of Gumroad now works at DOGE? And that he saved up loads of money 'cause he fired everyone and replaced them with AI?
I'm leaving the platform as soon as I get my money. Jesus christ.

https://tedium.co/2025/04/06/gumroad-open-source-doge-drama/

Comments

kernelleak.bsky.social•2 days ago

@jollyjack.bsky.social I guess that's not gonna surprise you? 🤔

amortes.bsky.social•2 days ago

Thats a yikes from me dawg.
Never buying/selling on that platform again.

escritorian.bsky.social•2 days ago

What an absolute shitheel

raptorettes.bsky.social•1 day ago

I had no idea this was going on, and not just recently but for a while. Somehow it slipped past my radar despite me looking at gumroad as a good example of usability and functionality for digital artists and creators! Open source, self hosted or community driven answers are more and more necessary

neeckin.bsky.social•2 days ago

Huh, add that to them just cutting out all nsfw stuff last year out of the blue

jackaslope.bsky.social•2 days ago

lol it's just another new fucking horror every day

goldengopar.bsky.social•2 days ago

This is crazy

ultralaser.bsky.social•2 days ago

jesus

blackspider.bsky.social•2 days ago

WHAT
the
FUCK???

theangryepicbanana.bsky.social•1 day ago

I never trusted gumroad, and it seems like for good reason...

rclyde.bsky.social•2 days ago

I am getting very sick of these criminals~~

chrisjbaldwin.bsky.social•2 days ago

Hm. I still use Gumroad for e-versions of my books for my Kickstarter campaigns. You can give a "discount code" to your backers so that it costs nothing/Gumroad doesn't make any money off of me, & I use some of their resources. Good? Maybe? I'm still, not sure I like being affiliated. Alternatives?

isobelstarling.bsky.social•17 hours ago

You can give out download codes for your books using Bookfunnel.

floaker.bsky.social•1 day ago

Pop it on itch?

simrob.com•1 day ago

Itch is probably a better fit, but I’ve also found ko-fi nice, I’m curious if there’s a reason people aren’t really mentioning it as an alternative here

floaker.bsky.social•1 day ago

I just suggested what I've used.

simrob.com•1 day ago

👍 sorry if that seemed directed at you, I noticed it at a couple of points in the thread and was just curious if folks knew stuff I didn’t! Itch is probably more suitable for selling mostly/entirely digital stuff.

floaker.bsky.social•1 day ago

Oh, not taken badly at all. Sorry I was a bit terse, holed up ill so not thinking the best.

clovercomics.bsky.social•1 day ago

Alternatives are apparently Jinxxy (which I didn't know about!) and itch, which I had set up alongside gumroad
https://clovercomics.itch.io/
In case you want harlivy smut & not think about stupid people ruining lives 🌱❤

safarimonkey.bsky.social•1 day ago

I believe Jinxxy is specifically for assets for VRChat and other social VR platforms, which is/was a popular use of Gumroad.

safarimonkey.bsky.social•1 day ago

Oh yeah, here we are:

> Your product must be a digital product intended for virtual reality or virtual content creation.

https://support.jinxxy.com/hc/en-us/articles/16736843446669-Marketplace-Rules-Guidelines

thedasghostie.bsky.social•1 day ago

📌

lynxjinx.com•1 day ago

Hihi - yes we are focused on VR creators right now. We can open up to help more creators if there's enough demand... that story is nuts.

zenpei.bsky.social•20 hours ago

*writes down in notes*
good to know

vati.bsky.social•1 day ago

Ooof. Was thinking of using them soon, since they are one of the few places that will sort revenue share with collaborators for you.

Anyone know of another, similar place that can do that?

ziyyigo-tipyigo.bsky.social•2 days ago

@violetblue.bsky.social

anvilwalrusden.bsky.social•2 days ago

The article makes, at the end, a point I’ve now been arguing for a few years (so I’m glad not to be alone): the solution to everyone hating all the platforms and the way they suck is to _get out of them through the Internet_. The Internet is fundamentally an open technology that doesn’t trap us …

anvilwalrusden.bsky.social•2 days ago

…It is true madness that we are allowing ourselves gradually not only to be trapped by corporate platforms that are using the Internet, but acceding to (or supporting!) regulatory strategies that actually will cement the dominance of the largest of those corps for generations to come.

chopchopok.bsky.social•2 days ago

Ewwww

christbot.bsky.social•2 days ago

Yeah, dude is supposedly fucking shit up at the VA, wanting to replace people with a LLM. As a veteran, last thing I wanna deal with is machines hallucinations trying to get an ER authorization or something similarly critical.

nebulonranger.org•2 days ago

Ah yes, time to clone this platform and actually open-source it :^)

barbunicorn.gay•1 day ago

Time to get my things out of there and go elsewhere!!

icetweiz.bsky.social•2 days ago

Yuck
Well, it's a good thing nobody uses Gumroad anymore after the dilemma

oz100.bsky.social•2 days ago

So that explains why Gumroad has a bunch of AI slop and copyright infringing content. For example, I saw a listing selling official Naruto books for $5 that was obviously listed there without credit to and permission from Kishimoto and Viz Media.

oz100.bsky.social•2 days ago

*now has

rozzone.bsky.social•1 day ago

I'll save everyone some time.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/02/27/us/politics/doge-staff-list.html

megamaster1021.bsky.social•2 days ago

Not surprised

clovercomics.bsky.social•1 day ago

Why? 'Cause he has a moustache?

balamy.bsky.social•2 days ago

What is indicative of your lack of surprise here?

jheijndermans.bsky.social•2 days ago

Yikes. Gumroad had always been a misfire for me, so timw to nuke that avenue from orbit.

coolhand.bsky.social•2 days ago

Jesus Christ

I just wrote a script to delete all products via api if anyone wants it

coolhand.bsky.social•2 days ago

Replying to this comment with it too because I dunno how thread visibility is gonna end up

https://assisted.site/downloads/gumrid

naya.bsky.social•2 days ago

that would be awesome! does it export all product related data?

coolhand.bsky.social•2 days ago

Yes! I’m pissed enough that I took a moment to document the thing lol

Here it is -

felisrandomis.bsky.social•2 days ago

I left gumroad after CEO wanted to fuck around with NFTs

Seeing this just furthers my disappointment =/

octoberbird.bsky.social•2 days ago

Holy shit!

sambeawesome.bsky.social•2 days ago

Just a reminder that the CEO is utter trash. He has ZERO issue breaching privacy policy and sharing customer information. (He did that when he was called out with NFT/crypto scandal a couple years back on Twitter cuz he was pissed. 🙃)

lanika.bsky.social•2 days ago

WHAT

rogueren.net•2 days ago

Oh cool, another big corpo trying to take advantage of the open source community while not ACTUALLY contributing anything to it

s4lt0r11.bsky.social•2 days ago

the site that used to allow porn and had a lot of lgbt porn on now works for doge? so they have all these people's information without any resistance?

tigerkari40.bsky.social•2 days ago

Horrid thought :(

xydexxunicorn.bsky.social•2 days ago

Oh, Gumroad been shitty for a long while.

overclockampwave.bsky.social•1 day ago

This is the first time I have heard about the nft thing... yikes..

xydexxunicorn.bsky.social•1 day ago

It was a while ago, on Twitter. Not sure if they ever went through with it. I don't know if NFTs are even a thing anymore. They all seem to have kinda quietly dispersed like so many farts in a tornado.

clementearmando.bsky.social•14 hours ago

All I know is this: so many corporations believe humans are replaceable, and we humans know their services are replaceable. I’m glad to see people suggesting alternative platforms very aware of in the replies here.

tetronimike.bsky.social•1 day ago

@bennjordan.bsky.social cc, might be time to look into other platforms. Itch is great, more games focused but you can def sell music there too.

commoncoc.bsky.social•2 days ago

Always thought he was a bit weird when pebblethrow was also in the sites recommendations

butthead.bsky.social•15 hours ago

I always had a bad feeling about that site

boxbrown.bsky.social•2 days ago

guy is an epic douchebag not surprised

roryblank.bsky.social•2 days ago

I still remember what happened with you there and have never touched the website

boxbrown.bsky.social•2 days ago

that was a wild weekend

thesteelwolf.bsky.social•2 days ago

Can I get the cliff notes version? Not that I need any additional reason to never use gumroad

boxbrown.bsky.social•2 days ago

https://www.engadget.com/gumroad-box-brown-nft-sahil-lavinglia-210047306-210047506.html

thesteelwolf.bsky.social•2 days ago

Yikes, looks like gumroad has just been chasing every techbro grift that comes out.

netherdragon.bsky.social•2 days ago

Please tell me I am reading this wrong...

The CEO of Gumroad is now part of DOGE, aka. the Department of Scammers?

crookedknight.bsky.social•2 days ago

He's specifically DOGE's operative at the VA, continuing the bizarre pattern of Trump putting comics executives there (it was Ike Perlmutter's playground in the first term)

netherdragon.bsky.social•2 days ago

I appreciate the explanation, but the more I try to understand it, the less sense it makes... Like the pattern isn't just bizarre. It's ill-thought through, confusing and overall just a fucking mess.

Like, other than to turn the government into a corporation, what is the real purpose via such ways?

amortes.bsky.social•1 day ago

crash the economy, destroy farms, so the richest people can buy everything cheap, own everything, and privatize everything to make money off every facet of our lives.

its a massive transfer of wealth from everyone to the handful of already richest people in the world + enshitification of everything

netherdragon.bsky.social•1 day ago

Yeah, but the real question stands:

What's the REAL long-term point?

amortes.bsky.social•1 day ago

Think of companies like EA, and John Riccitello. The entire strategy is to take over something that has good will, only to cash in on said good will, leaving the company in ruins, while a handful of people make bank.
They are doing this to the US Gov. Running it like a business, you could say.

amortes.bsky.social•1 day ago

line go up

d9sinc.bsky.social•2 days ago

I hope you get your money and don't find out that they have changed the agreement so that you can't delete your account or claim anything you made for them while on the site and hope that they could use shitty US courts to enforce it.

lessusefulthings.com•2 days ago

The worst part of trying to survive on the Internet as any form of artist at this point is that it feels like the more successful a platform becomes, the higher the chance it ends up selling out.

meaganscottage.bsky.social•1 day ago

Payhip is pretty good, they listen to their creators :)

emberphoenix.bsky.social•1 day ago

I can also vouch for Payhip, but for anyone reading this, do be aware sellers must be in a country where PayPal/Stripe is available, so it's not an option for everyone

jaydeerichardson.bsky.social•12 hours ago

Going to be moving my company's store soon, once I've found an alternative. Sell stuff with nudity (photography & illustrations), so they were best bet I had (when I joined, anyway). They quit doing physical items too, so need to find somewhere for merch anyway.

Open to suggestions.

swordsmanstudios.bsky.social•2 days ago

Son of a...

Is there anyone who takes their job seriously or runs a business honestly any more?!

Good thing I didn't open up one

smuuchii.bsky.social•2 days ago

thank you for your spine

behellein.bsky.social•2 days ago

So, it wasn't credit card companies but his conservative views that ruined all those NSFW artists, then?

arkymouse.bsky.social•2 days ago

Maybe little of column A, a little of column B, all things considered.

bigbigtruck.com•2 days ago

they've been unnecessarily weird about adult content since 2012

scribescales.bsky.social•1 day ago

They're accusations are like confessions to them, pretty much. That's the moral of the story from that same period of time.

infermore.bsky.social•2 days ago

@sheaserrano.bsky.social FYI

dogboner.xyz•2 days ago

BAD!

felixturner.bsky.social•1 day ago

Hmm that's concerning

jametc.bsky.social•2 days ago

I left that platform when he started using sensitive account information to attack anyone who criticized or questioned the way his site was ran, info he shouldn't have had access to.

Everyone just forgot because of convenience and here we are.

Itchio is much much better

d9sinc.bsky.social•2 days ago

I'll not lie, I don't use Gumroad, but I forgot that they were that fucker who did that.

xellette.bsky.social•1 day ago

I talked to this guy once, he's like, super super weird techbro, he didn't understand why artists would get mad at him every time he did something stupid.

I sort of yelled at him for being an idiot?

colesutra.bsky.social•2 days ago

Heyyo @jollyjack.bsky.social, something you might want to have on your radar considering your past issues with gumroad.

jollyjack.bsky.social•1 day ago

Thanks for the info!
I gave up on Gumroad earlier in the year.
As a rule; you should assume a platform is falling apart/up to no good when they remove all channels by which you may contact them for help, which Gumroad DID, months ago.