This is a great discussion topic tho!
Absolutely, this was a question we were really wracking our brains around initially - like do we have a strong enough brand to convince people to subscribe to the platform? I felt like that would be contrary to what I wanted the brand to represent - if we are really a creator first platform, then I think we need to really center everything around individual creators and have it be less about Tapas as a whole.
I really loved the original Support Program back in the day - it felt personal and meaningful. And so when we were building out the new iteration of the Tapas apps - that's what we wanted to emulate so we went with more of a direct sales per series approach rather than a subscription based model.
Though we did brainstorm A TON around a subscription based model since at the time, Apple was pushing very heavily for that format - and for the most part, lots of companies are finding success in customer retention. But the reality that we faced was that, we're just not that kind of brand AND we would need to dramatically bolster our Premium line-up. For reference, we have around 500 total Premium series spread across novels and comics - compared to the library offerings of other platforms, that's definitely not enough (AND it took us around 2 years to get to this point).
Haha, yeah, but it's understandable why we get compared to them a lot. I think what Webtoons is doing to help spread more awareness to more readers by having an entirely free platform is doing a lot to push our industry forward. And while they do that, I think it behooves us at Tapas to focus on making sure that there's a sustainable business model that we can implement to make sure that more creators can do this full time in the future.
Is there a subscription based system that could work for Tapas in the future? Maybe.
But it might be more around Ink Packs rather than the "all you can eat" model around comics and novel. This isn't something that's been heavily discussed here, but something along the lines of a recurring subscription around certain Ink Packs at a discounted price point could be something we're open to exploring. Haha, I know, not AS exciting.