Talking About Stuff #3

Hey everyone. Yes, I know, I know, another "it's been a while" update post. But there's a very good reason for it, I'm afraid. Not due to a mental health crisis or personal tragedy or anything, but something else important that I'll talk about a little later.

So first of all, you probably noticed, either on the "About" page, or in the entries on this Web Log, that I have finally come up with a new name. I've only spent literal years trying to think of a name that best represents the fact that I no longer feel like I belong in either a male or female classification. Needed something that:

1. Sounded cool
2. Was androgynous
3. Was short enough to fit into an arcade game high score table or 8-bit RPG

Anyways, Ramona is dead. Only Ash is here now. Thank you, drive through.

Now, the real point of this post here. Sadly, I've been looking at my financial situation, and let me tell you something: it's not good! A lot of my sources of income are gone, and everything is getting expensive. On top of that, my webhosting costs have skyrocketed. When I signed up for my host back in 2005, it was a little under $190 a year. Currently, it is now over $250 a year. That's a lot of money! Money that I can't really afford, and, being real here, I do not make even a fraction of that a month through Patreon. Now, this is not me trying to be judgemental and turning this into a rant because how DARE you not support me, or some shit. People aren't throwing money at me for the same reason I'm not throwing any money at me: because nobody's got any goddamn money! Times are tough, people are getting laid off, and the job market sucks.

What I'm getting at here is that 2026 will probably be the final year this site exists. At least in this form, having a domain name and hosting for large files. I have considered switching to a different host, but sadly, I can't afford those, either. Unless your rate is something like ten bucks a year, I'm going to have to move to a free platform like Neocities. While I like Neocities and I'm glad that the platform exists, I worry about changes I would have to make to fit in there. This site has a lot of images, will that murder the amount of storage I can have? Will I have to remove all of the write ups of adult games that I've done? I'm just thinking about various changes that I may have to make to fit within a new system of rules.

Also been thinking of ways to try and get additional sources of income to metaphorically keep the lights on. Do I swallow some of my pride and do Twitch streams again? Do I swallow all of my pride and try pitching articles to publications that tried really hard to make me kill myself years ago, that will pay me less than 1/3 of what PC Gamer gave me in 2018, and whose editors will then go on Bluesky and accuse me of killing the industry for accepting the pittance I was offered? The fact that I've had to even consider these options has been pretty distressing; I didn't get into writing about games because of the money and attention, but I have unfortunately reached a point where I am going to need both of those things. It doesn't help that it seems like the only way to make any money in games in 2026 is to either be a racist, be a transphobe, or force yourself on an unconscious woman, but tell the internet that you feel really bad about it. In any case, I still have until the end of January 2027 to enact any changes, but I felt like I should let everyone know now so it doesn't come as a surprise later.

In the meantime, I've not just been thinking about income. Been looking at redesigning the site itself, finally coming up with new and better Patreon tiers so people have more of a reason to want to contribute, among other things. I turned 40 in September, and I guess making a bunch of grand sweeping changes is my mid-life crisis. Otherwise, I'm just going to keep on doing my thing until I'm not able to anymore.