No, we cannot. In fact we shouldn’t. Take me for example. When I started out on Tapas, I had no views. I promoted my work through those promotion threads and Facebook. At any rate, I wouldn’t have reached 2K views without those threads. Besides, you HAVE people talking about certain topics. You just need to look harder for them.

Also Sub 4 Sub helps literally no one beyond inflating numbers to look better but actually hurt you in the long run with dead subs.

Now I think promo threads on the forums are kinda bogus anyways since most of us are also creators, but anyways-

I think the reason people keep making them is that promo threads have a 'expiration length.' People only dive so far in promotion threads to look so really only the top posts get clicks.

Threads like the official milestone mega thread are link graveyards at this point because nobody checks out the later ones, and I think people realise this hence why they constantly make new ones.

However, I think milestone threads are really pointless. What would I care if a comic or novel has 30 or 300 subs? And why people have to do hyper specific ones like 40 subs or so? I get 100 subs but still, check existing threads please.

I think if you are going to make a promo thread, then atleast make it an interesting topic like genre, or something other specific people would actually look for. Like if people are looking for action comics for example, that's where a promo thread could be used for.

Well, the problem lies more with the small dopamine rushes new users get when joining sub4sub threads.
I get it that users jump in here, hoping to boost their numbers for views, milestones, etc.
And sub4sub requires the least amount of work to do so. But after reaching a certain amount of subs, it stagnates. And because of said dopamine, they desperately need to get back into this vicious circle again. But that's just my opinion, man. : P

And before I left:
A. I agree with Duals opinion and
B. If anybody wants to convince me otherwise or tells me their part of the story, save it.
I'm not really interested in continuing this.

Totally agree. But i will admit, posting in those thread gives you feeling you are actually doing something to promote your comic, which you should 100% be doing. And there just aren't that many avenues to do that for free. So people will do what they can. unfortunately alot of places artist try to get followers are also filled with other artists instead of an audience. =/

You can mute the promotions category and for you, they will stop :).

So few compared with just straight out promotions. Even if you mute it you can go scroll through that category and see if there's anything you want to contribute to (and as soon as you're on a thread it gets pulled back into your feed). Maybe it's just me but forum feels a lot saner/more focused/fun without that category filling the page .

The problem with muting is, I actually am interested in those topics as I found a lot of interesting comics in them. But now there are just too many of them :,D

Also I don't think, they are even helping. Whenever I check one of those out, almost none have a heart or show that a series got clicked. So they are basically just link drops, noone cares about. On the other hand, threads with themes or challeges are way better visitet.

Hello, random fellow creator here. I was reading these and they made me think.
1. I would like a thread where a person can post ONE link and 100 people don't try to promote themselves. Like, can we take some attention away from ourselves and appreciate someone else's hard work?! I just saw some ask for feedback, nothing more. 10 people posted links to their stories. Like, seriously?!
2. I wish Tapas would give the small people like us a chance to be showcased. Maybe once a week, pick novels and comics that are not well known or popular, and tell people to go check them out. Even just a couple small ones from each genre. Literally ANYTHING.
3. Y'all are some cool people. This conversation was not only fun and respectful, but it showed me different angles of them same situation.

I believe one thing are promotion threads and another thing "promotion" threads.

People sharing in promotion threads related to the art of a series, latest chapter, latest sentence, and other dynamics that don't actually require for the meaningless sub x sub activity are ok. After all people are having actual conversations or just simply promoting they are being active regarding their comic. Sub x Sub is meaningless because it's not often someone will read your comic because they liked it, is phantom subscriber, it's there but does nothing important.

There are other threads as well which are not in the promotion Category and still allow promotion, it cost nothing to select said category or to scroll down a bit more to find them, as well, if conversation is what some are looking for, I believe the discord Server is ideal for that as well, since everything is separated in categories and the only place you get to promote something is in the promotion channel, so I believe in there you'll find a more satisfying experience and to talk about diverse themes with other people, as well for advice, asset recommendation, tips and other things.

I feel like they shouldn't completely stop and instead there should be like one person that posts them. Just so it isn't bombarded at all. Also I prefer this place over the Discord ngl...

Even NOT doing sub-for-sub has given me quite a few dead ones. From my experience it's pretty inevitable that you're gonna collect dead subs. Even my first subscriber who seemed VERY interested my comic, leaving a like, and a detailed comment, quickly, was never seen again after the first episode, and recently he unsubscribed all together. And that was NOT a sub-for-sub.

I've been noticing a lot more promotion threads more and more recently, ever since the discord became a thing (Don't know if that correlates though). Even though I've only been here for a few months, I feel like there was a lot more interesting topic threads back then. Now, whenever I scroll on through the forums looking for interesting threads, all I see (apart from the popular ones) are "sub 4 sub" "Share your series" "Lets grow to together" etc. Like one or two promotion threads, I can handle. But do we really need 100s of them. And from experience with these threads when I first joined, they didn't seem to do much in finding new viewers. Like in one of these threads, someone subbed to my series and then unsubbed hours later. I guess they were expecting me to sub to their series or whatever.

Glad to know Im not the only one who noticed this

I am guilty of sometimes posting just to see, but as I still have long thought, NO ONE posting there EVER gets even 1 click. Go look. Pages upon pages of 0 click posts. I wish they would stop, too.

People posting religiously and 0 clicks. Maybe 1 out of 100 getting views this way at best.

Promoting OTHER'S work seems to work well.
So, what do you do if you're new? I'd say to keep updating and catch the fresh section algorithm, get a good cover, and join small discord communities to exchange reviews etc

First I was like "what promotion threads?" then I was like "Oh yeah, I muted all the threads in that category"

You can do this in your settings

Screen Shot 2022-01-22 at 7.57.48 PM.png865x389 26.1 KB

I think part of the problem is just how buried you get on tapas. I do think that most promotion threads end with people posting their work and not reading other posts, but I think some of that can come from creators feeling like getting a certain subcount is their only chance of even getting onto a page where somebody will discover their work.

I blocked it because people would create identical threads because they believed that somehow they had more "power" if they were the OP. Like I was sick of seeing "Promote under 15" "Promote under 20" Promote under 25".

The mods for a time tried to tackle this issue but newbies continue to ignore it

Aah i remember a time when there's no 'promotion' category & you have to share your series in other threads to promote, at least contributing on the thread's topic.

Hey thanks for making this post. I just started two weeks ago and if I'm being honest, I've been guilty of doing everything you've all been saying lol. My views have been skyrocketing, but I've noticed that a lot of the subscribers are from people who I engage with. Specifically with games, replies, or questions (I remember you from the cameo thread lol).

If I were to look for a solution, I'd say maybe promotion threads should only be created by the Tapas mods and no one else. That way advertising would be organized and people can understand the hustle.

Anyway, I apologize for anyone on the site if they're annoyed for seeing my link everywhere in link dumps and all that. I also apologize for making a "Let Us Promote" thread :v

I won't do that again. ALTHOUGH how do you guys feel about people just leaving links in questions or games when it feels necessary? Should it just be for games on Promotion orrrrr?

I don't mind promotion threads (i use them often tbh) but i dislike when i see promotions in other topics , we really need promotions because it's easy to get lost in bunch of stories.

Also when i say we need them i mean create one, then comment on few, not create 15 just to promote (in spam of few minutes)

Maybe the solution would be, we can only create promotion topics after a certain amount of time or engagement with the forum? As I said, I like those threads myself thats why I don't want to mute them but they are getting out of hands.

While I am guilty of promotion threads, I haven't done one in a while.

The only promotion threads I really support are people looking for stories/comics. I want to be able to find stories that pique my interest, and I want folks to share those stories.

been watching the thread for a bit and i think it's clear the issue isn't promotion threads but promo threads that lack substance beyond being a link dump and then the sheer volume of said link dump threads

limiting it so that only mods would be able to make threads for the category wouldn't make for a solution nor would shutting the whole thing down or whatever but it's be nice if there were more encouragement or better ways to ensure ppl arent making tons of the same thread

like with regards to "recently updated" type threads there's usually a "post your latest page/post your latest chapter" thread for comics and novels on a per month basis; the current one for january 2022 is here1

if folks wanna get genre specific i don't think something like "share your stories with uncommon genre" would do too well (i mean maybe but eh....) but instead be specific to the genre of the story be it horror, historical, comedy, anthology or whatever. maybe toss in a why you chose that genre or something you're looking forward to doing within it (i.e. subversion of some kind or mashing up genres or twist stuff and so on)

also encouraging discussions so it's not just promo also works and imo tend to be a little more memorable in terms of thread types. I think a good one recently was the worldbuilding questions thread. honestly i think more like this could come into play as well maybe with discussion on how folks have developed the characters for their stories, what their alignments might be and why, i think someone did a facts related to your characters that arent story relevant.

There's absolutely ways to make interesting threads but people have to be making those threads (and getting enough engagements before the autoclose kicks in) but also not so much incentivizing participation in these threads (coz imo no one owes you a sub or sub back) but finding a way to show that these are better for promo than the usual link dumps

Not to mention I'm surprised how accepting of plain ol link dumps folks are because who doesn't want an excuse to go on and on about their characters or their story's worldbuilding. Like you don't have to post spoilers but giving a hint of what can be expected in your works or showing off some of the thought that's gone into it can be way more enticing at times than just a link and your blurb

personally with regards to the whole promo flood going on here i just stopped caring since it doesn't seem to be ending anytime soon and people are gonna o what they want. and as much as people try to show the available incentives to joining the discord i've personally joined but it feels way too busy for me (i prefer the small ones ). but like i think it's possible for stuff to change beyond implementation of stuff like "spam prevention" but it'll take time and community effort tho that alone depends on whose got the time and is willing to put in effort

On the contrary, I find those threads don't really promote that much discussion as we all just talk about our own story wrt the topic and no-one else reads it (I don't mean this in a passive-aggressive kind of way; I myself am guilty of this :'D) At the very least, have shorter prompts imo which doesn't ask like 5 questions (which I guess usually means a more specific topic, like for instance 'food in your world' instead of 'worldbuilding' in general). Those threads are fun

I think it got a bit better with the promotion threads, it helps when more people create different
kind of topics and also participate in topics which are not promotion threads.

I don´t have anything against the promo but sometimes it´s multiple topics under each other
which are basically all the same

I think promotion threads are helpful.
The number of readers for my books increased because of that.

But yeah, I believe only those interested in the work should sub it.
the sub for sub thing is annoying if nobody reads.

Rather, it's better if everyone promotes and if you find something interesting, you read it. The promotion subs are necessary for new writers to get more people to actually know and maybe try the stories out.

I don't think they wil go away, because poeple who post there like the illusion those threads create. When they put link there, it makes them feel like: YES, I DID SOMETHING USEFUL, MY COMCI WILL GROW!

It's quite sad, but also kinda funny when you check the thread and see no one really clicks on those links and this happens every time with every thread, lol.