Okay, I'm going to be honest: the only reason why I'm here is because I stupidly shot myself in the foot like an idiot over on ComicFury, and The Duck was honestly the only other webcomic host I could think of that has a longstanding and solid reputation (I remember KeenSpace/Comic Genesis was once an ideal host, but I think they've pretty much fallen dormant in recent years). While I was at CF though, I noticed a lot of people complaining about another host called Webtoons, and I've seen a rather unfavorable comment or two about them here as well, so it's just gotten me curious as to what exactly is so bad about Webtoons? I've only kind of glanced at their site, but from what I can see, they do seem to have a rather huge catalog and archive of comics . . . albeit, a lot of them seem to be mostly manga-inspired, and I'll admit that was a problem I had when I was on Smack Jeeves many ages and moons ago, in that they seemed to have something of a zeitgeist that catered mostly to manga-inspired comics (along with stolen sprites and LGBTQ+ themes).
So again, I'm just curious as to what the deal is with Webtoons, and why do they get such a bad rep, despite seemingly like a huge, thriving site?
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Comic Talk and General Discussion *
What's So Bad About Webtoons?
I believe it's mostly in regards to how strict they are about what's allowed on their platform, and the inconsistency with which they choose to be strict.
Their TOS leaves a lot to be desired in terms of what's acceptable and what isn't.
It's a similar story with Tapas, though I've heard it's mostly Webtoons that's known for adhering to their archaic rules.
That's as much as I've understood, but I also understand that it's a very, very saturated platform.
It's possible it's envy or whatever else as well, although I doubt it.
Most people who complain about it got banned from the platform for really dumb reasons a lot of comic artists wouldn't be banned for, from what I've understood.
I personally came here because I knew my comic wouldn't get taken down here if I broach sensitive topics, horror material or whatever else.
While it's basically an archive in case Tapas takes down my comic, I've seen more traffic on it here than on Tapas. Weird how that goes.
GeekyGami wrote:Sounds a lot like how TV Tropes operates, they too are not only inconsistent with their rules and how they enforce them, but often times certain rules of theirs were incredibly vague, yet they expected you to understand it like an SAT. That, and they just love to tunnel-vision on your mistakes, however few they may be compared to your otherwise legit edits and contributions. I . . . speak from experience.
I believe it's mostly in regards to how strict they are about what's allowed on their platform, and the inconsistency with which they choose to be strict.
Their TOS leaves a lot to be desired in terms of what's acceptable and what isn't.
It's a similar story with Tapas, though I've heard it's mostly Webtoons that's known for adhering to their archaic rules.
Most people who complain about it got banned from the platform for really dumb reasons a lot of comic artists wouldn't be banned for, from what I've understood.Yeah, unfortunately, I was booted from ComicFury specifically for my forum conduct (which is to say, I made the mistake of sharing a couple of dumb memes, and made a comment or two out of my occasionally crass and childish sense of humor). FWIW, I'm rebooting my comic for a new season this fall, but the older strips were presently in reruns on CF, and much like your situation, my comic saw more traffic as well as actually got comments, subscriptions, and ratings on CF than it ever did when I originally published it on Smack Jeeves many ages and moons ago (that's what hurt me about my CF banhammer more than anything).
I personally came here because I knew my comic wouldn't get taken down here if I broach sensitive topics, horror material or whatever else.
While it's basically an archive in case Tapas takes down my comic, I've seen more traffic on it here than on Tapas. Weird how that goes.
As for Tapas, I haven't even bothered checking them out, but I've heard my share of criticism towards them as well. Again, this is why I like sticking with tride and true sites that have been around for a while, and have really established themselves on da interwebz . . . heck, I can even remember when this place used to be Drunk Duck!
I think I've read some complaints about the commenting system; much like you can't delete and report others' comments as a creator in case of trolling or typing up and posting something spammy/nasty.
Another one was the fact that you don't get notifications about receiving comments below {each of} your comic{'s pages} which in my case is… kinda off.
What GeekyGami said.
Mainstream webcomic hosts like that aren't about artistic expression, they wanna keep it as squeaky clean and advertiser friendly as possible. The more colorful and inane, the better. No sex, gore or potentially risky material of any kind allowed. >:/ Only took me one look at the list of permitted content to know not one of my comics would ever fly on those sites, ha.
ThrisbyDude wrote:Oof, yeah. That was a problem I remember with deviantART (which I all but completely abandoned after the made that horrific new "Eclipse" theme/layout permanent): you couldn't actually delete such comments, so your only options were to either "hide" them, or turn off comments altogether. I remember once a long time ago a deviation of mine had suddenly gotten 400+ new comments in a day, and it turned out that apparently a couple of users had somehow started RPing amongst themselves in the comments section, so I had to turn off the comments for that one.
I think I've read some complaints about the commenting system; much like you can't delete and report others' comments as a creator in case of trolling or typing up and posting something spammy/nasty.
Another one was the fact that you don't get notifications about receiving comments below {each of} your comic{'s pages} which in my case is… kinda off.To be fair, a lot of sites are falling victim to this lately. Like on YouTube, just subscribing to a channel isn't even enough, you have to click that bell icon to actually be notified of new content from said channel, because otherwise, you won't know unless you just happen to check the channel for yourself. (As a smalltime Content Creator on YouTube, some of my subscribers have even told me they were unaware I was still uploading new content because they never received notifications). Even on social media sites like Facebook and Instagram, for whatever reason, neither of them seem to like to notify you whenever you receive a comment or reply from somebody anymore.
Mainstream webcomic hosts like that aren't about artistic expression, they wanna keep it as squeaky clean and advertiser friendly as possible. The more colorful and inane, the better. No sex, gore or potentially risky material of any kind allowed.I mean I won't lie, this was definitely one perk about ComicFury and even Smack Jeeves way back when, is that our comic sites were ad-free . . . right now, I'm admittedly a little uncomfortable with the somewhat questionable ads on The Duck, if only because I know a majority of my readers will probably be outsiders who aren't too familiar with sites like these (unless webcomics are something they're into), and may think I'm hosting my comic on a site that may appear sketchy to them since I do create "Everyone" content that rarely reaches PG-13 stuff.
But I can definitely see the issue of not catering to artistic expression (again, my comic certainly didn't fit in with SJ's zeitgeist back in the day), as this meme clearly illustrates:
I mean yeah, I get that my content is niche and all, but honestly, my best years on YouTube were definitely 2007 to about 2011/2012, when the whole site actually catered to the little guys who sought a platform to share their creativity and originality with others, as opposed to how it's devolved into a sea of vapid and narcissistic vloggers who whine about their lives, or react to stupid TikTok videos, or pretend to be experts and tell you all the reasons why your channel and content sucks.
Like I said, while I'm not entirely 100% sold on The Duck to host my comic, at least I know it's been around a long time, and does have a solid rep, so at least that counts for something.
Comic Fury has always existed on the whim of the admin and his chosen mods. An interesting character and I wouldn't wish to say a bad word about him, but if you know the full history of the site, you'll know there's no shame in being banned.
Webtoon and Tapas are corporate giants by comparison and that comes with all the expected baggage and content limitations. Webtoon is the biggest I think, while Tapas is the one with a history of sneaking suspect clauses into their terms of service. It's a jungle out there and you may have cause to wonder how you keep from going under.
I have been learning more about this very thing.
Again, it's not so much that I'm upset about being banned (I can see how some of my forum behavior raised some eyebrows), it's more that after over a year and a half of planning, and a number of months designing my comic's site to have it all shut down because I shot myself in the foot is what hurts more - especially since my comic was doing much better in terms of traffic on ComicFury than it ever did on Smack Jeeves.
Even now, I'm doing my best to work around The Duck's limitations, but said limitations are quite disenchanting to be honest . . . I guess you could say I was spoiled with CF and even SJ being far more user-friendly and allowing artists and authors to do far more with how they customize the overall look, appearance, and layout of their comics' sites. The Duck's not bad, persay . . . again, it's just rather limited in comparison. But, considering these other hosts seem to all have a singular, streamlined look for all comics they host, I suppose I can't complain too much . . . still wish things worked out differently on CF though - even if I had to grovel.
J_Scarbrough wrote:I have never laughed out loud more or as loudly while reading these forums than when I saw this meme.But I can definitely see the issue of not catering to artistic expression (again, my comic certainly didn't fit in with SJ's zeitgeist back in the day), as this meme clearly illustrates:
Inconsistency in application of standards led to my exit from Webtoons. I was not asked to leave, but did so of my own volition.
I was also on Comicfury at one time. While I was never banned, I left for reasons of my own.
The Duck, I find, is an accepting group. There are some very fine cartoonists showing their wares here.
kawaiidaigakusei wrote:J_Scarbrough wrote:I have never laughed out loud more or as loudly while reading these forums than when I saw this meme.But I can definitely see the issue of not catering to artistic expression (again, my comic certainly didn't fit in with SJ's zeitgeist back in the day), as this meme clearly illustrates:
Blame the flat earthers. They took over YouTube with their idiots on parade opening up the doors for such things as mud fossils and just turned the stupid up to a twenty-five on a scale of one to ten.
So there was a backlash but the flerfs and the other idiots on parade are alive and well and thousands and thousands of viewers love the content so the algorithm encourages talking heads. But the Anti-intellectuals just love to continue to prove Dunning-Kruger and debunking talking heads has become a sad necessity to fight the idiots on parade. It's a battle for the heart and mind of the world. (Which remains a sphere)
And who doesn't love Professor Dave?
kawaiidaigakusei wrote:Internet 00s: NerdsJ_Scarbrough wrote:I have never laughed out loud more or as loudly while reading these forums than when I saw this meme.But I can definitely see the issue of not catering to artistic expression (again, my comic certainly didn't fit in with SJ's zeitgeist back in the day), as this meme clearly illustrates:
Internet now: Normies
God I miss those days. Nothing will take the fun out of something more quickly than going mainstream. Internet has become the new TV, with the all money grabbing practices and vapid drama content of its former big brother. I used to enjoy amateur reviews and such for the passion in it, people talking about nerdy stuff just for fun. Now every damn vid on youtbe has sponsors, any time a touchy subject comes up it goes "whoops sorry, can't show you that, can't use that word, we'll get demonetized."
Apologies for going off topic, but that image really hits hard.
God I miss those days. Nothing will take the fun out of something more quickly than going mainstream. I used to enjoy amateur reviews and such for the passion in it, people talking about nerdy stuff just for fun. Now every damn vid on youtbe has sponsorsNot at all.
Apologies for going off topic, but that image really hits hard.
Even before it was all made public about what a horrible company Channel Awesome has been, I was such a huge fan of Nostalgia Critic in his earlier, more "innocent" years, back when his trademark was screaming like a banshee and swearing down the house . . . I even began using a Sony camera for filming and Adobe Premiere for editing my productions because Doug Walker had influenced me. Then after he un-retired the Nostalgia Critic character, it all came crashing down for me: the addition of those other Scrappy castmembers, those unnecessary skits, the far more analytical approach to his reviews, reviewing more recent movies, not to mention his inflated and swollen ego, and like you say, it was clear the passion was gone, and with the sponsorship, those insincere charity shout-outs, and such has made Nostalgia Critic virtually unrecognizable.
Similarly, there was Mike Mozart: his toy fail reviews were always fun to watch before he went all political, and then when he tried to return to toy reviews, it was clear he was trying to be unnecessarily edgy, and once again, you could sense the lack of passion in the videos.
Honestly, I can't think of too many YouTubers, other than personal friends of mine, whose content has maintained its original charm and appeal throughout all these years as YouTube has become far more corporate and mainstream. I'd say James Rolfe is perhaps one of the only ones who has maintained some integrity in his content - sure, he's gotten a lot more professional as well over the years, but at least he still cares about the artistic aspect of his content, and that he continues to enjoy creating his content.
J_Scarbrough wrote:
You got off lucky. I remember once long ago getting in trouble on deviantART for non-sexual nudity (and anything unmentionable being obscured and censored for comedic effect to boot), and I was still new to the site at the time.
Deviantart is so massive at this point I'm surprised you wouldn't have slipped through the cracks.
The amount of nudity I see any time I go on there is, well, 1/4 of what I end up seeing
GeekyGami wrote:Yeah, it's almost like walking through an art gallery with all those nudes on display. Gosh, someone might mistake it for something real in the history of human artistic expression or something.J_Scarbrough wrote:
You got off lucky. I remember once long ago getting in trouble on deviantART for non-sexual nudity (and anything unmentionable being obscured and censored for comedic effect to boot), and I was still new to the site at the time.
Deviantart is so massive at this point I'm surprised you wouldn't have slipped through the cracks.
The amount of nudity I see any time I go on there is, well, 1/4 of what I end up seeing
Other than the odd plastic model kit, I've never put anything wearing clothes on Deviant art. I thought nudity was a requirement.
I remember back when I was far more active on deviantART, one guy I was following did tremendous fan art of various different cartoon shows (particularly ED, EDD N EDDY), it was like he could really imitate and replicate these show's overall look and style so well . . . then gradually, he began doing more and more NSFW art of various cartoon females and such, then it finally got to a point that it was all he was doing; he said he was just being "daring," but I missed his old days.
But not just that - other people I followed and watched regularly were deactivating their accounts, some of them were either moving elsewhere (like tumblr for example), others just kind of gave up completely, so with less people for me to follow, that gave me less of a reason to stick with the site altogether. Like I said, what finally did it for e was when this ugly "Eclipse' layout became permanent.
But yeah, it is kind of ironic how dA pretty much ended up devolving into Rule34 Lite.
And it's just the kind of stuff I do. I really should post more over there but I'm lazy. DD takes up so much of my time and besides my near unique medium is a hard sell.
But I'm a fan of exploitation movies so I do the crazed stuff I always wanted to see in a video store or on Skin-a-max but never did.
Personally what I have against Webtoons is that they just barged in and sucked all the air out of the webcomic space as a great big, slick, corporate entity.
Them and Tapas.
They took all the energy and vitality out of the space and smoothed it down into a bland, uniform blob… A space that used to be filled with so much variation and life basically got hijacked and gentrified.
It's not the fault of Webtoon or Tapas though… I mean it IS in a way- they saw a market that we created and just copied us webcomic hosts and gobbled it all up without asking or acknowledging- but if DD had had sustained funding back in the Platinum and Wowio days then we would probably have expanded to fill the same role eventually.
It would have been a bit different since we would have been one of the original webcomic hosts and not a later copy like them so we'd still have ties to the energy that started this boom, but we would also have become commodified too.
All this is just a difference in philosophy though.
-Practically the benefits of a place like DD is that you get more freedom in everything you do, deeper ties to the history of webcomics, you can be a big fish in a small pond, and you get more say in the site you're hosting on.
-The disadvantage is that you're on an older site, you'll have less viewers directed at your work from the in-house comic promotion systems because we have a lot less viewers overall, and you'll have less name recognition for our site than you will on Tapas or Webtoon.
-Practically the benefits of a place like DD is that you get more freedom in everything you do, deeper ties to the history of webcomics, you can be a big fish in a small pond, and you get more say in the site you're hosting on.Well, like I said, I know DD has a longstanding and solid reputation . . . I remember waaaay back when when I was first looking into a host for my comics, a friend of mine who was already using KeenSpace/ComicGenesis listed that, Smack Jeeves, and DD as possibilities, but he had a specific problem with each of these; with KeenSpace/ComicGenesis, it was how buggy/glitchy the site as a whole had become (actually, they seemed to always have such problem, they were just slow or unresponsive in their efforts to fix them, but with both SJ and DD, his issues were with the domain names: Smack Jeeves, he felt, sounded like a site that promoted violence, while Drunk Duck he felt promoted alcoholism. IIRC, the main reason why I had gone with SJ at the time was because it seemed like we could do more in the way of customizing our how comics' websites looked, and since I was a little more proficient in HTML coding back then as opposed to now, I think that was the main draw for me.
-The disadvantage is that you're on an older site, you'll have less viewers directed at your work from the in-house comic promotion systems because we have a lot less viewers overall, and you'll have less name recognition for our site than you will on Tapas or Webtoon.That's what's hurting me the most right now about my ban from ComicFury. Granted, again, my comic was still only in reruns at the time (and still will be until mid-October), but unlike Smack Jeeves, where it didn't fit in with their zeitgeist, and therefore nobody even read it, on CF, which clearly has a big and thriving community, it was doing very well for itself with nearly a dozen subscribers, regular comments, and a soild 5-star rating, which was making feel so excited about the future of the comic when its new rebooted season starts in October. No offense, but so far here, I almost feel as though I've stepped into a nearly-deserted ghost town, which has made me feel incredibly crushed and discouraged about what sort of readership and engagement my comic's new season will even have.
I mean for a smalltime Content Creator like me, feedback is a rare, yet precious commodity that's always in short supply. The more corporate and mainstream YouTube has gotten over the years, the less my work on there has been seen and the less feedback I get as a result, so at times, it almost feels like why do I even bother pouring my heart and soul into something new I create when I know hardly anybody is even going to bother looking at it? I really didn't expect to get much attention on CF, but I did, and it's already one of the things I miss the most about them.
When I began my first webcomic I hadn't drawn a thing in over a decade. it showed. It debuted on Drunk Duck. I migrated to Comicfury after the big crash and entered the typical once a week hamster wheel. I listed on topwebcomics, did the mutual admiration thing, participated on forums etc. At the end I had around 150 subscribers. Averaged a new sub per update.
My departure was due to what I saw as unfair treatment of other creators by the community. I was not banned or asked to leave.
I got back in the hamster wheel and put a much better product on webtoons, mirroring on Facebook. Was surprised at the number of eyeballs it got on webtoons. A questionable censorship issue had me "fixing" a panel to be reinstated. I was ashamed of myself for doing so and departed.
Due to personal circumstances my production is currently at a standstill. My readership is a hair north of nil.
Yet, I am better off. A smaller community? Certainly. But more accepting. And there is a lot of heavy lifting being done by a dedicated few to keep things going here.
I wear the fact I was never banned at other sites as a badge of shame.
Like I said, I was just happy that my comic was getting attention on ComicFury, as opposed to its original run on Smack Jeeves in 2011-2012 when nobody even bothered with it because it wasn't another manga, sprite, or LGBTQ+ comic that dominated their zeitgeist, and that's what's hurting me the most. I even offered to meet the admin halfway and agree to stay off the forum, if I could at least still continue to host my comic on their site, but I guess he wouldn't go for that.
I wasn't even there long enough to really get to know anyone in the community too well, and as it turns out, that played a factor in my ban, which I can understand. I'm old school, I'm of the era of the internet before social media and especially Discord really took over, I've been used to being part of message forums and other online communities where people know me, and come to expect stupid stuff from me without warning . . . I miss those days, and I think in CF's case, I got a little too comfortable with their community too quickly, so when these people who barely knew me were seeing examples of how crass, childish, and immature my sense of humor can be at times (especially if I'm blowing off steam), that unintentionally set off some red flags with some of them. I joined back in December as an author, but didn't really get involved with the forum until June, then got banned in July. I really, really wish they'd give me another shot - I'd even publicly apologize and explain myself if I could, but clearly my last attempt to plead my case with the admin wasn't even addressed in our last correspondence . . . then again, he did explain to me my ban was less about being personal, and more of them erring on the side of caution due to past incidents involving unsavory characters who have infiltrated their site with bad intentions. That's not me at all, but based on this information, I can see why the admin and mods felt their call was justifiable - it'd be like if I yelled "FIRE!!" in a crowded building that's been threatened by actual arsonists before.
But getting back to the topic at hand, again, the growing problem with the internet and digital mediums in general is that it's become more and more "mainstream" as time goes on - there's just not a lot of room for originality anymore, and unless your content fits in with whatever the popular trends are (going back to YouTube, it's become a sea of vapid and narcissistic vlogs and reactors), chances of your work or content being see is next to none. James Rolfe once said he proved that the internet was the ultimate form of getting exposure for your work, and that was true once upon a time; now it's not.
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