How does Comics Feed work?

[fanyart]

I love scrolling through the website's "Comics Feed - A stream of trending comic episodes" as a means to discover new comics to read and have always thought that it was calculated the same as the "Trending" section on the front page.

But some of the comics I know, while they are very high in the Trending section at the time, never show up in the Comics Feed, like Beefpaper (which is also Popular, so there's no way that lack of readers' engagement would be the reason).

I wonder if it's because the episodes are animated gifs and the Comics Feed is limited to jpgs?

I'm really curious about how this feature works and if there are technical limitations, like file formats or episode legth... Not only because I want to see my favorite comics in my favorite part of the website, of course, but it also makes me wonder how many interesting comics I might have missed this way... O_O

[Pandastrophic]

I honestly unsure exactly how the Comics feed works but I think the first 5 comics on there are picked by the staff? I'm not sure honestly, sometimes I see a 'Staff pick' sub header on them.
When my comic was in the comic feed once it was neither trending at the time, nor in the staff picks of the website.

But once you scroll past the 5 comics (in the 'more comics' section) I'm pretty sure it shows you comics from the trending.

[getsuart]

Frankly I don't know... Sometimes my comic is in the comic feed section, and I don't even know why, other than "woah cool!".
And from what I remember, there is already an answer... somewhere in the forums..? Maybe I dreamed about it too, it's possible XD

[fanyart]

@Pandastrophic I'm talking about the web version, where the comics aren't picked, not the mobile.

@getsuart I searched hard but couldn't find any hint. The only thing I figured from other threads was that it should be the same as the Trending, but it apparently isn't, that's why I'm asking (not that the calculation of Trending isn't obscure itself, but I don't care much about that since all my favorite comics show up there and also I don't use that section to browse comics)

[michaelson]

It's similar to how trending functions.

The Trending + Popular section on the front page are series based meaning the entire series contributes to an overall score. The Feeds page is comprised of trending episodes which only factors in the score of the newest episode (the newest episode also has to be posted within the past X amount of hours relative to the current time).

So, while a series can be Trending, it doesn't necessarily mean that the episode is trending - the series might not have been updated recently which automatically disqualifies the most recent episode from appearing in the Feeds page.

Visa-versa, an episode that appears in the Feeds page might belong to a series that won't appear on the Trending + Popular section because it's possible that the series doesn't have a high enough density of episodes in order to acquire a high enough score.

[fanyart]

Thank you for explaining it, Michael! The thing that still bothers me though, is that the comics I expected to appear in the Comics Feed had updated just a few hours prior. Maybe they didn't qualify because they were scheduled from several days before?

[michaelson]

I'm not sure if that's the case. I'll look into this.

[fanyart]

Thank you, you're awesome, @michaelson ! I wonder if that could be the case because I remember freshly unlocked episodes didn't show up there too, until I... ahem... complained... ^^' Sorry to bother again with a similar thing >.>;;

[jacintawibowo]

Ooh I really need to check that out more often!
I did see an animated gif as I was scrolling through though, so it's probably not the file format thing.

[fanyart]

@michaelson Now that I think about it, it's probably not because the episodes were scheduled, if I remember correctly, I had my latest Trivia from Nature episode scheduled for about a week and it did show up in the Comics Feed... Well, I'm not complaining about anything, I was just wondering why some of my favorite comics never show up there when they should be eligible :/

@jacintawibowo Tales from the Well was also one of the comics that I never saw there :/
The Comics Feed section is really neat, it's my favorite part of the site because you can see the previews of the actual episodes there, not just the icons (which are sometimes quite misleading). That's why I am asking this, because finding out some comics I know just don't show up there makes me wonder how many interesting comics I might have missed :/

[jacintawibowo]

Oh, yeah I noticed my comic didn't pop up when I was scrolling through it. I started getting worried because you mentioned saving as a .jpeg and I save my pages as .pngs >__> that does make me wonder where all the other comics are! :0

[fanyart]

@jacintawibowo Right? While Tales were updated and got a lot of likes and comments... Maybe it's because the Comics Feed doesn't refresh as often as Trending that some comics just don't "get the slot to be shown"?

From what I recall, Tethered, Grassblades and both Oops versions always show up there, which always makes me happy and proud, but at the same time worried why others like Tales, Beefpaper or Dragon Tutor never show up there, because I want to see them there too (｡•́︿•̀｡)

I asked my friend who loves watching statistics for my comics about what he had noticed so far and he said that while Trivia always show up there, World of Wishes' recent pages didn't show up there either, even though they were trending. (But those were opening pages and the series isn't as popular as Trivia, so who cares.) They were jpgs and scheduled a week prior, if that's of any help.

It's just a mystery as to what each group of comics has in common ^^'

[jacintawibowo]

Dang! That's weird, because Tales updates pretty closely to Oops. I usually find Oops updates soon after. Gosh...what comics could I hae been missing out on >__>
I'm surprised Beefpaper isn't there! I thought at best it would get there for being a gag-comic and having a big fan-following! Even Dragon Tutor? So strange.

Yeah maybe there's a pattern to it. It's certainly interesting how you have two series running and one manages to get into the Comics Feed while the other doesn't. Maybe because World of Wishes' just started? Has any new-comer webcomics gotten into the Comics feed? Hmm!

[fanyart]

That's why I came here to ask about it, but the staff is probably very busy with the ending of SP and all, than to answer our silly questions TT_TT (Now I realized it sounds just like a thread from the "why my comics isn't popular/featured" box that people seems to have grown tired of.)

I don't think newly started comics have a disadvantage there, though. Tales, Beefpaper or Dragon Tutor aren't new at all. I'll keep trying to figure out what's the difference between Trivia and WW, since I have that cool advantage of both kinds of comics, but so far, I'm clueless >.>

[jacintawibowo]

Yeah..I really don't want to come off as that kind of person ("why isn't my comic popular") but I am genuinely curious! Oh the struggle!

time will tell maybe? We'll see how WW performs so far!

[fanyart]

I and my friend kept watching CF all Thursday and Friday, and again, Tales didn't show up and neither did Dragon Tutor, while both were trending pretty hih.

Also, what we found REALLY weird was that Tap Winter Fest episode 9 was there for 2 days, while ep 10 never showed up, but ep 11 was there again - I highly doubt that people just decided not to read ep 10.

We also noticed that the CF section doesn't refresh very often - when you come back in 6 hours the comics are mostly the same, only few of them were replaced with new ones or changed position. While in the same 6 hours the Trending section changes most of its comics.
Could this be the reason, @michaelson ? That the Comics Feed takes more hours to refresh so some comics never get a slot in there? But at the same time, this wouldn't explain why some series are always there while some never... It's so confusing @.o

[jacintawibowo]

Oh! I was actually really curious about that, since I got a lot of comments for Poppy's appearance in Tales this week. Still not enough to show up on the CF, huh? That's so weird!

Wooah? Tap Winter Fest Ep 10 was by Isaac at Life, and that comic is really popular! That's quite surprising.

Yeah I noticed the CF section doesn't refresh very frequently. Maybe with all the Friday comics updating, some make it into the feed while others don't? That doesn't explain how Tales and Dragon Tutor consistently don't show up though..

[fanyart]

No good, I have to say watching Comics Feed has become quite depressing because nothing has changed this week either Nor Tales nor Dragon Tutor nor Beefpaper showed up there, even though they were all on the front page in Trending for quite a while. (World of Wishes as well, and wasn't in CF either) And one Winter Fest episode didn't show up there either, though I can't remember which one it was.

I don't like this. I always loved that section because of the episode previews and because even comics with less subs sometimes showed up there (like Lindemannade or Me and my Tapastic) so it seemed like an ideal place to search for new comics

[michaelson]

Unfortunately, I can't divulge too much information on how the comics feed works and how things are weighted. There haven't been any algorithmic tweaks to the comics feed recently so things are pretty much the same.

The Trending + Popular section operate on a different timer than the Comics Feed.

[fanyart]

I see. I understand that, thanks for answering. I don't think this "issue" was new, it's just that it took me time to gather the courage to ask about it >.>;;

I noticed it doesn't refresh as often as Trending (my comic is still hanging there even though I updated yesterday and it's probably not in the Trending anymore), so that some comics just don't get the slot - what's weird is that some series never seem to get the slot, even though they're popular...

Well, it seems I'll just have to say goodbye to Comics Feed and go discover comics a different way