#shuttering?

[nightcrawlersimpblog]

Woke up to find out there's 100 of you now...

I am a Simp of my word.

I will draw Kurt with 100% effort.

OH SHIT ANOTHER IDEA CAME TO MIND.

Comment or rb if I should redraw a comic panel and which one.

[redsray]

I love the hc that Tim never really stopped taking pictures of heroes and vigilantes even after he became Robin. Not even out of hero worship or anything-- he just found it fun. In fact, being Robin just made this hobby easier to do. He has them separated in folders and definitely has blackmail photos included.

The first time Tim met the Justice League one of his first reactions was to sneakily take at least one picture of each of them. Clark vaguely heard a camera shutter but he could never find any cameras or camera owners.

Sometimes Bruce comes to him and asks for specific pictures of members of the JL doing things they shouldn't be doing i.e Barry ditching a meeting cause he was eating Chipotle in the Watchtower kitchen. No one knows how Bruce gets the pictures except for the other Batfam members.

Tim is the god of blackmail right behind Babs. You need older blackmail or videos? Go to Babs. But Good quality blackmail photos? Tim is your guy.

He has at least 4 folders full of pictures of Dick specifically. One for his time as Robin, one for Nightwing, one for Discowing and one for just Dick.

He also manages to have pictures he definitely should not have because how did you get into the cave before you were Robin, Tim, but he refuses to elaborate on those. i.e Robin Jason out of costume, cozily reading at the batcomputer ("seriously, Tim, that's creepy"), Dick when he first adopted Haley ("were you there when I rescued her?!"), Damian training with the League of Assassins ("how the hell did you get that"), Duke back during the We Are Robin movement ("I do not remember you pulling out any cameras what the hell")

[genericpuff]

Tbh at this point you should just make your own webcomic app/website because it would probably be 100 times better than whatever going on with webtoon right now.

hahaha it wouldn't tho, sorry 💀

Here's the fundamental issue with webcomic platforms that a lot of people just don't realize (and why they're so difficult to run successfully):

Storage costs are incredibly expensive, it's why so many sites have limitations on file sizes / page sizes / etc. because all of those images and site info have to be stored somewhere, which costs $$$.

Maintenance costs are expensive and get more so as you grow, you need people who are capable of fixing bugs ASAP and managing the servers and site itself

Financially speaking, webcomics are in a state of high supply, low demand. Loads of artists are willing to create their passion projects, but getting people to read them and pay for them is a whole other issue. Demand is high in the general sense that once people get attached to a webtoon they'll demand more, but many people aren't actually willing to go looking for new stuff to read and depend more on what sites feed them (and what they already like). There are a lot of comics to go around and thus a lot of competition with a limited audience of people willing to actually pay for them.

Trying to build a new platform from the ground up is incredibly difficult and a majority of sites fail within their first year. Not only do you have to convince artists to take a chance on your platform, you have to convince readers to come. Readers won't come if there isn't work on the platform to read, but artists won't come if they don't think the site will be worth it due to low traffic numbers. This is why the artists with large followings who are willing to take chances on the smaller sites are crucial, but that's only if you can convince them to use the site in favor of (or alongside) whatever platform they're using already where the majority of their audience lies. For many creators it's just not worth the time, energy, or risk.

Even if you find short-term success, in the long-term there are always going to be profit margins to maintain. The more users you pull in, the more storage is used by incoming artists, the more you have to spend on storage and server maintenance costs, and that means either taking the risk at crowdfunding (ex. ComicFury) or having to resort to outsider investments (ex. Tapas). Look at SmackJeeves, it used to be a titan in the independent webcomic hosting community, until it folded over to a buyout by NHN and then was pretty much immediately shuttered due to NHN basically turning it into a manwha scanlation site and driving away its entire userbase. And if you don't get bought out and try your hand at crowdfunding, you may just wind up living on a lifeline that could cut out at any moment, like what happened to Inkblazers (fun fact, the death of Inkblazers was what kicked off the cultural shift in Tapas around 2015-16 when all of IB's users migrated over and brought their work with them which was more aimed towards the BL and romancee drama community, rather than the comedy / gag-a-day culture that Tapas had made itself known for... now you deadass can't tell Tapas apart from a lot of scanlation sites because it got bought out by Kakao and kept putting all of its eggs into the isekai/romance drama basket.)

Right now the mindset in which artists and readers are operating is that they're trying way, way too hard to find a "one size fits all" site. Readers want a place where they can find all their favorite webtoons without much effort, artists wants a place where they can post to an audience of thousands, and both sides want a community that will feel tight-knit. But the reality is that you can't really have all three of those things, not on one site. Something always winds up having to be sacrificed - if a site grows big enough, it'll have to start seeking more funding while also cutting costs which will result in features becoming paywall'd, intrusive ads, creators losing their freedom, and/or outsider support which often results in the platform losing its core identity and alienating its tight-knit community.

If I had to describe what I'm talking about in a "pick one" graphic, it would look something like this:

(*note: this is mostly based on my own observations from using all of these sites at some point or another, they're not necessarily entirely accurate to the statistical performance of each site, I can only glean so much from experience and traffic trackers LMAO that said I did ask some comic pals for input and they were very helpful in helping me adjust it with their own takes <3).

The homogenization of the Internet has really whipped people into submission for the "big sites" that offer "everything", but that's never been the Internet, it relies on being multi-faceted and offering different spaces for different purposes. And we're seeing that ideology falter through the enshittification of sites like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc. where users are at odds with the platforms because the platforms are gutting features in an attempt to satisfy shareholders whom without the platforms would not exist. Like, most of us aren't paying money to use social media sites / comic platform sites, so where else are they gonna make the necessary funds to keep these sites running? Selling ad space and locking features behind paywalls.

And this is especially true for a lot of budding sites that don't have the audience to support them via crowdfunding but also don't have the leverage to ask for investments - so unless they get really REALLY lucky in EITHER of those departments, they're gonna be operating at a loss, and even once they do achieve either of those things there are gonna be issues in the site's longevity, whether it be dying from lack of growing crowdfunding support or dying from shareholder meddling.

So what can we do?

We can learn how to take our independence back. We don't have to stop using these big platforms altogether as they do have things to offer in their own way, particularly their large audience sizes and dipping into other demographics that might not be reachable from certain sites - but we gotta learn that no single site is going to satisfy every wish we have and we have to be willing to learn the skills necessary to running our own spaces again. Pick up HTML/CSS, get to know other people who know HTML/CSS if you can't grasp it (it's me, I can't grasp it LOL), be willing to take a chance on those "smaller sites" and don't write them off entirely as spaces that can be beneficial to you just because they don't have large numbers or because they don't offer rewards programs. And if you have a really polished piece of work in your hands, look into agencies and publishing houses that specialize in indie comics / graphic novels, don't settle for the first Originals contract that gets sent your way.

For the last decade corporations have been convincing us that our worth is tied to the eyes we can bring to them. Instead of serving ourselves, we've begun serving the big guys, insisting that it has to be worth something eventually and that it'll "payoff" simply by the virtue of gambler's fallacy. Ask yourself what site is right for you and your work rather than asking yourself if your work is good enough for them. Most of us are broke trying to make it work on these sites anyways, may as well be broke and fulfilled by posting in places that actually suit us and our work if we can. Don't define your success by what sites like Webtoons are enforcing - that definition only benefits them, not you.

[vintagehomecollection]

This eating counter has so much character it could play several roles. As a dining table for two, it is a handsomely carved three-sided arrangement that allows you to sit facing your partner while eating rather than the wall.

Beyond The Kitchen: A Dreamer’s Guide, 1985

[kidokear]

ultratober24 /// Day 4&5

Lust & Railcannon

I would like you all to know that I have been giggling the entire time I was drawing this. This is so silly. XD

[goryhorroor]

horror sub-genres: paranormal

[taffywabbit]

so like. at what point are we going to stop listening to game companies saying "the game was poorly received and didn't meet our sales targets, and that's why we're removing it from storefronts and taking down all the servers mere months or even weeks after release" for titles that had a long expensive development, were barely marketed, and nobody knew they'd even released until after they heard they were getting shut down and couldn't be played/purchased anymore?

I feel like the prevailing takeaway for anyone who doesn't just conclude "yeah, game was pretty mid, makes sense to me" has usually been "this company just has unreasonably impossible sales expectations and treats every project like a failure if it doesn't print a trillion dollars". but these ARE allegedly experienced business execs who aren't complete idiots, and after this most recent debacle with Concord I'm starting to wonder if a bunch of these "games getting wiped out of existence when they underperform instead of just being allowed to persist as they are and maybe improve with time" cases in recent years might be more of a Warner-Discovery type situation, like nuking an entire animated series or film that was worked on for years and preventing it from being sold because it has to be officially unprofitable for the company to use it as a tax write-off. I look at a game that was worked on for 8 years and only made available for 2 weeks, and it's hard not to see the parallels.

great work, AAA games industry, really normal and sustainable stuff you're doing over there as usual

[cletusthurstonbeauregard]

I had a feeling when this shot of Ruby alone and saying "thank you" came onscreen near the end of the last episode. It's the kind of thing shows do when they strongly suspect they're not going to get another season.

Here's hoping someone else buys the property from WB.

7/6/2024: looks like Viz Media's bought the RWBY property. Let's see how this goes...

[livelovecaliforniadreams]

[yellowtrinity]

mieu mieuuuuuuuu

[bamsara]

Guess what plushie came in the mail!! (The cat was a paid actor)

[hotcinnamonsunset]

'I wouldn't mind doing this again' -> 'we just have to keep it very casual, of course'

[vintagehomecollection]

House Beautiful Weekend Homes, 1990

[pixelglam]

The Harbor House, Martha's Vineyard 🦪🇺🇸

[goryhorroor]

horror sub-genres: techno

[edorazzi]

Due to scheduling conflicts we're celebrating Tintin Day early this month! 🥳

Someone said in tags that they could totally see Tintin needing International Rescuing at some point. What better way for the Hood to put iR's integrity on the line than revealing all to a world-famous reporter? Would the Tracys jeopardise their whole operation to save just one life?!

(Un)fortunately Tintin hasn't shown up at work since 1929, so the only sacrifice here will be an old man's dignity. Again. 🪦