Some time ago I began to take interest in webtoon creation, and I found myself in need of some brushes which were not available at the time or no one had made them. This brought attention to the fact that brushes can be made and so I began making them manually for the purpose of easing “wip” of the scenes which have lots of details.
Then an idea came to mind to start publishing them up for free on clip studio site as they were not yet of highest quality which some artists may still find useful, and then i started getting clippy gifts and so with clippy i was able to buy brushes that i wanted and it made me really happy, and so as i got better so did the quality and i decided to try and sell them for clippy, i posted a few and didn’t expect much traffic but then suddenly people started buying them and i got even more points at that point and could buy products/brushes/3D models for high 1000p prices.
One time i made a super detailed brush and wasnt sure if it should be sold even, and so i put a 2,500p price tag not expecting anyone to buy it, as a t the time it was quite a high price for the material and suddenly i started getting notifications of people purchasing it, and so in few weeks time my account was at 20,000+ clippy points mark, with which i had no idea what to do.Which brought curiosity as to wether people want to use real money if i actually tried selling my products.
Getting Scammed as a seller By big corporations
And so I began to search on the internet if people actually sell brushes, through this I discovered the korean webcomic tool website, and decided to register my store there. Initially the deal was that they take 10% of my income which sounds like a great deal right?
However after my first 20$ i couldnt withdraw them due to minimum withdrawal price being 50$, after waiting for months i finally got my 400$ and wanted to withdraw them as a full sum which if they were truthful would mean they take 40$ off that and i receive 360$, and this is where the scamming began, when you sign up they sure do love complicating thing and adding massive volumes of text to make it confusing when reading the policy for selling on their website. Apparently 10% goes for selling itself and then their team to process money and then another bunch of services such as promotion on the website and their employes keeping track of all products, which they should pay them not take it out of my check. Other rules regarding processing taking another 20% and for the transaction on paypal i pay too… while the nail on the head being that i have to pay tax to the korean government even tho im not a citizen making me pay their taxes ‘for selling on their land’ not to mention the fact it’s an online store and so at the end they take 62% of my income.
Outcome
I tried to argue and explain that it’s not fair to market your service as 10% off only when in reality it's far from that, to that scheme they have ‘proper’ korean tax paper and all the rules intricately written in the fine print of the clause. Later they changed policy to 20%.
As a general user who does not practice law i of course could not do anything about it and only received 155$ back from my initial 481$ pay, which sucks and some readers might say but katzz this- and katzz that-, when it’s just about basic human decency and honest work not scamming artists with fine print on a piece of paper, and so i took down my store from there as they dont deserve my input and clearly dont respect it either.
And that website being ACON 3D, while i no longer have the screenshot of that damn tax paper i still remember how upset that made me, and for anyone who wants to purchase products there i do not recommend as they clearly abuse their income policy and do not value their sellers despite marketing as such.
