Over the past 5 or so months, I have paid attention to the various changes made that appears to give authors more opportunities to place gem 
options in the stories. The skip the wait option is yet another method of insuring that some form of money is spent by the readers within both new and apparently old stories that once upon a time did not originally have any stipulations placed on reading the community stories other than having to wait for more tickets to load. Based on what I have observed⊠reading community stories completely free is becoming more and more a thing of the past. To be completely honest⊠it has been several months since I have even attempted to read a story. Yes, there are still stories that one can read completely free, but maintaining interest when running into the skip the wait option or pay gems in order to continue has diminished my desire to continue reading most of the stories I used to read.
Is this new feature just basically another cheap way of getting readers to spent their money on gems just to read a story?
It appears that the option âskip the waitâ means you spend gems to continue reading on to the next chapter without having to wait to read the next chapter ( there is the free option to just wait to read the next chapter, but the wait time I believe is anywhere from a day to a week or so. Previously, if the writer has released a specific number of chapters, you could read them based on how many tickets you have and just read the story until the last published chapter that is available has been read. But now, this new option makes you wait to read further or pay to continue reading the story regardless of whether you have tickets available to read an episode. )
Early access I understand. An author can kinda schedule their content with it, making a whole 20 or so episodes when they have time and then just putting early access on them so they come out weekly, and it makes them a little extra money if people are impatient for their story.
Skip the wait, though? It sounds like itâs the opposite of how people read Episode
Well thatâs lousy
Iâm so irritated by this new update! Itâs horrible. I have to wait 4 hours to read 2 chapters. I hope episode removes this.
As an author trying to trend, I do actually use this on my completed stories.
I mean, I donât particularly like it, but stillâŠ
I only ever set it at the 6 chapter skip the wait though, as I feel that 6 chapters is still a decent âbinge-ableâ amount, and honestly I donât expect anyone to pay the 16 gems, because itâs extortionate.
I like to think of it as a good ânighttime readâ. 6 chapters before bed, then sleep off most of the wait time, by the time itâs morning the next 6 chapters are almost ready to binge again!
the other options for me just arenât great in terms of binge reading or the constant need to pay gems.
The one thing I really do wish, is that authorâs had control over the gem prices of the wait times.
Just like we do with gem prices in our story choices.
So it would be author discretion not only whether or not they choose to add the skip-the-wait, but also how much they charge for it.
Either way, I know that from a reader perspective, it sucks 
i think this is the only way to use this feature properly
At this point, @Episode. @Melani3 . @whatever else mod and owner,
youâre making your app go to shit. And thatâs on period.
What youâre going to achieve is less people using your app since everything costs gems, because you certainly wonât force anyone to pay that many gems and that much money, or a very small amount of people.
I remember in 2013-2014, when I started on Episode, I loved it because it never asked for money or a reasonable amount (reasonable amount is both money and gem-wise. Not a ton of gems required inside the app, that cost a âsmallâ amount of money, because then youâll end up having to purchase a lot anyway). Now, youâre turning into an app just like any other on the Playstore.
Iâm reading stories without skip the wait
That is awesome 
!!! I think I have a couple of stories that do not have skip the wait options. But to be honest, I have lost a considerable amount interest in Episode as a whole!
what the hellâŠ
Yeah I donât blame you. Thank you to all authorâs who are not implementing this feature.
In general, if you care about the reads and not what your writing, your doing it for the wrong reason!
Totally agree
Only read stories that donât have this feature.
Facts.
I think Episode could have come up with a better way.
Super annoying, For instance, we get 4 tickets at a time and the author letâs you get 3 chapters of reading before having to wait 12 hours again. This is the worst feature and honestly since this was put in, i use the app much less now. Nice way to get rid of your users Episode. You will see the drop in downloads and reads due to this. Its honestly greedy.
Bad businessing 101
This!! bc i hate wasting passes skipping through episode originals just to get 4 diamonds