No, they're saying that, unlike Webtoons, Tapas at least has means to take care of harrassment and communicate with your audience.
You don't have profiles on Webtoons.
People can only know you have a comic if they can search it up or if you've promoted it. And even then, it just shows your comics.
Don't have a comic? You're just a name. It's kinda no different than an anonymous messaging board unless you get regular commenters. Can't block spam, can't send announcements, can't send pms.
You can report comments, but that barely works, tbh.
And it's because of this that you hear so much about the harrassement. There would probably be the same level if Tapas had a similar set up.
I didn't say there's no good way of doing it, I mean that copying WT's way of promoting comics ain't it. Acting like the site spits out good comics 24/7 and it's like you're getting the whole store for free+premium, making a disconnect between readers and creators. Letting people customize and moderate on Tapas is already a very nice difference (though we almost lost a lot of customization), since it becomes that artist's space, not just the website the person is interacting with where they click and cool comic appears.
I started around 2016...and uploaded on both platforms.
Tapas
Pros
-Geared towards creators
-Moderation of your comment section
-Blocking users
-Customization
-Direct messaging
Cons
-Lack of creator support (monetary wise compare to Webtoons)
-UI is cluttery
-Visibility if you're new is almost impossible
-Comics are scattered all over the place (premium and free comics are mixed)
-Algorithm change (website update) is messed up.
-Search engine can be improved
Webtoons
Pros
-Large built-in audience to grow your brand/comic.
-Large creator compensation via Beta-credit and better CPM on ads (HUUUGE PLUS ON WEBTOONS since money talks)
-Algorithm was updated and can help up and coming creators
-Spotlight is always changing to promote new comics
Cons
-No moderation on comments
-Childish audience
-Overly sensitive safety guidelines in terms of adult and violent content despite flagging as mature and self censoring.
-If you don't have anime style, 90% chance your comic will not do well. Majority of the audience expect typical Korean romance and/or BL.
Can't really talk about Webtoons since I do novels, but Tapas is alright. As far as novel posting goes, I do prefer it to all other platforms, but it still has a lot of problems. The main reason why I prefer is has to do with a kinder, more mature audience and the fact that Tapas blessedly does not do ratings (seriously, what are other novel platforms thinking by having ratings? Any schmo who hasn't even read your story can come by and give it 1 star).
I think my biggest problem with Tapas lately is that there seems to have been an algorithm change where your story is basically invisible if it happens to be fantasy or romance and does not have a big audience. I think it gets swallowed up by bigger stories that get a crap-ton likes more than yours does whereas before it doesn't?
Tapas also blatantly features popular stories far more than it used to. Like... Staff-picks (which they appropriately changed to "Novels we love, curated weekly") used to just feature up-and-coming authors, now they just seem to rotate between novels that are super-popular and ones that are premium (with maybe one or two novels that are new/have small audiences). I'm pretty sure I've seen the same novels being featured for 3 rotations. I actually preferred it when they had a popular novels section at the top of the page and had a staff-picks for novels near the bottom so that they could feature smaller stories without hurting their bottom line. shrugs
I feel the same about distinguishing free from paid stuff. I'll get a notification about a new comic, get really excited by the summary, and then find out that I have to pay to read past the first 5 updates. It's just frustrating and I'd rather not deal with the site altogether. I prefer Webtoons, because I know that most of what I click on will eventually be free to read. I used to constantly read on Tapas a couple years ago, but now I only keep up with is Fangs and Heartstopper. And I've just recently bought the hard copies for both so I don't need Tapas anymore. It's a shame, but I guess Tapas appeals to other people and that's fine.
I really don't like Webtoons for the following reasons.
Newcomers like myself have little chance of getting even remotely seen.
It seems to me they focus on their own popular strips.
No community spirit. No forum.
Hate the layout.
Hate that its mostly Anime look stuff front and centre (though Tapas is guilty also) There are other styles!
On Tapas I can tap fresh and get some new content by new creators.
Thus giving newbs a chance to at least have it be seen.
No such luck on Webtoons (unless im missing something)
Fine for established creators but bad for everyone else.
To be fair, the anime-styled comics show up more in Popular and similar places because they're, well, what get popular, most of Webtoons' audience are teenage girls (like... me) and would gravitate towards comics with that kind of style cuz that's what they're used to. Lots of them are weebs, people. A lot of them really like reading manga.
Still sucks though, but I can't entirely blame Webtoons for that. They're a company that needs to make money, so the algorithm kinda picks up on those anime-styled comics because a lot of people are reading them.
I'll be honest, I'm still not sure why Webtoons is so heavily linked to Tapas. Are they owned by the same people? Or is it because they're both popular sites for webcomics? (Sorry if this is a silly question!)
Anyways, I only use Tapas for my novel. I honestly have really enjoyed being on the site and have had great engagement. I think that's partially because of how active the forums are - which is awesome. I do wish though that the content being uploaded was... a bit more cognizant at times. I don't want to name anyone involved but a friend had an incident on the site recently that really hurt their feelings and I completely understood why. Basically, I wish comments and reviews could be moderated better (like the author can moderate their comments and reviews on their works before they go online).
I'm guessing because Webtoons and Tapas are the most popular comic hosting sites and many creators post on both. They also have similar audiences.
Also the fact Webtoons doesn't have a forum or anything, so many Webtoon creators come to the Tapas forums for tips, talk about comics, or just in general hang out.
From another point of view.
I think that tapas would have big troubles if WT had the same good stuff for the creators that Tapas have.
I only came here in the beginning because of how it works. Then I tried out WT because people said that's where the reader is.
And at that time, if WT was as awesome as Tapas from a creators view, I would have jumped.
But now, 2 years later I ONLY wish to stay at Tapas.