I think they are, payments do come, communication between authors and editors exists, thet’re responsive, the adrevenue and the revenue from gems aren’t that great but that’s just me, if you care about the money you need to get good stats also it’s not really a problem if you don’t upload consistently, I was never told off whenever I didn’t update in time and whenever I didn’t update anything in some weeks.
You have the right to share your patreon link. If you want to give your readers early access to your newest episodes via patreon, I think you need ask permission.