J_Scarbrough wrote:-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.
While I'm certain I'm much younger than you (possibly) I have a firm belief that you shouldn't be discouraged by radio-silence on a site upon first using it.
My way of doing things recently has been not to put all my eggs in one basket.
I upload on Tapas, I upload on Duck.
I upload on Youtube, I upload on Newgrounds.
I upload on Deviantart, I upload on Newgrounds. (For illustration.)
With Newgrounds, Youtube, and Duck/Tapas, what I've noticed is that the bigger the platform, the greater the saturation, the less likely the abundant amount of attention is going to be directed your way.
I have more activity with this comic on Duck than I do on Tapas, despite Tapas being the bigger platform.
More engagement as well, as little as it is.
I noticed this with Newgrounds and Youtube as well.
More engagement, comments and activity on Newgrounds with less there.
You reach a smaller audience, but it's a more active, less passive audience overall.
Any radio silence you notice usually is purely because you've just started on the platform. Most people who read comics, listen to music, ect, will stick to one or two sites, and not deviate from that.
So, due to that, you'll notice that audiences often don't migrate.
So, you start over.
The key thing to keep in mind is the long-term of the platform you're using.
For Soundcloud for example, the long-term is that you'll only start getting attention when you run out of free space to upload music.
It doesn't let you edit existing tracks, which means you have to re-upload, which takes up that free space. The feature is locked behind a premium account.
Ergo, you run out of space, you have to make a new account, with no one migrating over. That's on top of the oversaturation of the platform.
Point being, don't worry about it too hard if the platform's long-term isn't cock-blocking you somehow, although it's my belief if your comic was far along on other websites, that you should probably upload as far along as you'd gotten on other websites, so previous users who were following it don't have to wait weeks or months for the rest.
