I Miss the Old Tapastic

[Doubtcent]

Hello, this is Doubtcent, small-time creator here on Tapas. Long time creator for almost 7 years.

You've probably seen me here and there, and if you're on the forums, you've probably seen my post I made five years ago, "Are you new here?"
I used to make weekly comics, but now I make dailies in hopes of growing an audience. But the thing is, that tactic won't work anymore. Practically every bit of advice I gave years ago is now bunk on this site.

I was there when they took down the support program.
I was there when they launched the app.
I was there when they changed the name from Tapastic to Tapas.
I was there when they opened the platform to novels.
But now I'm thinking about leaving.

From day one, I praised this place since it was a lot nicer, and a lot more creator focused. There was a community to talk with, stream with, bounce ideas with and collab with. But now? I feel as though this site is a shell of its former self.

If you want proof, you can see that by checking the "fresh" tab. What do you see? It's all the same thing: Romance.

But why?

Here's a little history. (Not 100% accurate so feel free to correct me)

Ever since they opened the door from webcomic "bites" to novels, this was the first problem. I knew that this site was never going to be the same because after talking to writers and some book publishing houses, the biggest market of readers out there are into romance. It's only natural that after a week of starting the novel section that romance shot to the top. As a business, Tapas had good reason to make this a priority. From then on, every staff pick and everything on the trending tab was anything with romance. So what could any comic creator do to stay relevant?

Simple. Make a comic about romance.

Unless you were a big time creator before this trend started, it's really hard to grow an audience if you're not looking to create something with romantic elements.

It used to be that if you wanted to grow on here, you uploaded daily, you posted often, you kept your content consistent, and you did your best to make something of quality. There was a whole community based on that. Now?

Make a romance. You might show up.

I'm not making a romance. I make a simple, family friendly, daily slice of life. That's not going to cut through the thousands of romance creators by a long shot. So what hopes do I have to grow an audience? In all retrospect, it's slim to none. I missed my chance of growing my audience years ago, back when novels were not a part of Tapas.

There are other reasons of course, like when the copyright terms and conditions change months ago, or when mature content (actual porn) was being promoted on the premium tab.

But I was willing to overlook all of that because of the audience I still had. The audience that stuck around. The audience that has probably left ages ago and just forgot to unsubscribe.

So to anyone who sees my old "are you new here?" post and has hopes of growing on this site, it's not true anymore. I'm done trying on this site. I'll still post my dailies, but only because everything I've made is still here. But based on my metrics, there is no home for me here.

Thank you and have a nice day.

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Edit: Just wanted to be clear, I'm not against the awesome writers and romance creators out there. I'm just worried that the structure of Tapas unwittingly likes to lean heavy into trends to a fault, which can then push creators to only try to stay relevant rather than doing the thing that they want to do. A huge part of it IS the market, but being here long enough still gives me a looming concern.

Simply, Tapas is flawed like any platform, and I believe the site needs some updating to let creators grow if they put the work in. Of course I have no idea how to do that, but seeing a response does give me some hope.

[crosswarrior7]

I'm a novel writer, and even as a novel writer, that truth still really sucks. I mean, I enjoy reading romance, yes, but the fact that you have to have a romance base or you get nothing... It really sucks My passion story has more of a fantasy/action focus with characters, yes, forming relationships (romantical and not), but it doesn't do nearly as well as the story that sounds more romance-y that I also write And it continues to break my heart that I have to struggle more for it to get any love just because of that. So although I cannot completely understand you, I definitely understand a little, and it makes me even sadder that there was a time that battle wasn't as big here as it is now.

[Doubtcent]

I don't blame novel writers at all. I love reading stuff on here and I don't mind romance. It's just how the site went and leaned so hard into it because it's what brings the big bucks in the physical book publishing industry. It's a trend that still holds strong, and I think that Tapas did a poor job with how their site is set up for small creators who don't make romance. Their structure and how their tabs are placed has been an issue for years, but it's only gotten worse. I wish you luck on both of your projects.

[VibrantFox]

I'm not putting the blame on romance as a genre or it's subgenres but I will say it's worth acknowledging and addressing the fact that Tapas seems to have put most of it's focus on advertising and promoting what's presently popular on the platform and trying to hold on to that reader demographic for as long as it can.

I'm an "oldie" too and it's definitely tiring but at this point all i can do is wait for the next shift in trends. Those of us who've been around long enough remember when slice of life and gaming were the dominating genres and that's what folks would nitpick and complain about then. Now it's romance. Things change so may as well try to hold out till it does.

I will say the rhetoric about novels is a bit concerning as they're really not to blame. I was ecstatic to see something like that added even if the novel base started out (and still relatively is) pretty small. Some of the earliest title I remember being added were Zoo, a few big mystery titles, some dramas and of course romance. Tapas tries to spread things out and see what would take off. As we can see now we know what worked.

I've tried to be observant of trends and while slice of life died down a bit it's far from obsolete. It's just no longer Tapas' poster child.

Do I miss "old Tapastic" yeah maybe a bit but there's only so much grumbling to be done and I think if we so desperately want a shift to happen we're gonna have to get vocal about it and show what we want through engagement and numbers on stuff other than romance. Personally I really want to see a boom in fantasy, sci-fi, and action. The stories I have planned and want to release fall in those genres but if I dared to put it out now I'd probably have to include some level of a romance subplot to get eyes on em. The way I see it the only options are to silently give up or get loud and fight harder for what I want and I'm going the latter even if I'm tired as all else.

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I also apologize if my response seems ranty but i feel there's so many complaints on romance and valid as they are I feel like it's more whining than trying to form a solution

[crosswarrior7]

Thank you so much, and I understood that you weren't blaming us. And I completely understand enjoying it but not entirely agreeing with how it's advertised and such. Definitely share a lot of similar feelings toward Wattpad for a similar thing.

[crosswarrior7]

I'm curious. I'm not really all that active on Tapas--Wattpad is my home site and the place I'm most active--but how do you mean by being vocal about it? Is there an actual way to fight to get the trends to move or do they just have to by themselves? Again, purely a curious thing xD Not doubting you or anything.

[Doubtcent]

Yeah I getcha. I was actually excited for novels back in the day, but based on who I've met in the publishing industry and writers who do it full time, they all say romance is the big one and has been for decades. I don't know if it's going to shift to anything any time soon, but my main concern is that on other sites I'm slowly growing an audience. Here? Nada. And that's just how it is.

[Doubtcent]

I don't really put any blame on creators, heck anyone making anything and posting it online I commend you! It's just the way the site is right now.

[crosswarrior7]

The focus on romance thing in the industry actually really amuses me since some of the really big name fantasy stories -- Harry Potter and Percy Jackson -- actually didn't have much of a romance focus. It is so odd how the industry does that.

[IndigoShirtProd]

While I understand your feelings of exclusion, and I do agree with some of the points you've made, I don't know if it's fair to boil down everything in the way that you have. Having a company like this in a economic system which dominates most of the world is going to go down a route that going to be less favorable to those who the "mom n' pop" feel of older Tapas. That's just not sustainable, especially if the company owners want to expand. And Tapas diversifying and trying new this, regardless of how some may feel about them, or most, is something I can respect. They're trying to find what works better, and missteps are bound to happen.

I think there are fair criticisms to made about the way the site looks and how smaller comics are advertised. It does feel like it's harder to get your foot in the door nowadays, but that not because of Tapas or Webtoons for that matter. It's also because more people are making more webcomics and flooding hosting sites. Now you can blame companies for how they curate their sites, I'm not denying that.

Novelists, new novelists, have such a hard time on this comic site that I don't it's fair to claim that the introduction of novels onto the site was a "beginning of the end" kind of moment, though I realize you're not being that dramatic over it. Novels was just another way to expand the site and bring in more, diverse readers.

And you also have to think about who's on the site. Who has the free time to be on a comic hosting site in the middle of the day? It's mainly teens and young adults, so popular comics skew towards those demographics.

[Doubtcent]

I think it's because Harry Potter and Percy Jackson are for more towards kids, (and eventually go more mature as they go on) while romance hits the biggest category that has money: adults. So it's a mix based on age demos.

[VibrantFox]

I haven't been actively posting but I do try to loosely keep an eye on what's getting the most engagements (ie likes, subs, comments) and landing in the trending or popular tabs. I'll note that I try to keep these separate from anything wholly staff curated because the numbers are based mostly on reader interaction.

The way I see it though is if romance is what's getting the most clicks (between tapas ads, popular series, and just word of mouth) then wouldn't it be possible to try to drive traffic to series of other genres (say action, fantasy, etc). Obviously these aren't getting as much promo from tapas since romance is what's earning them money so then it only makes sense to me try try and match or at least come close to those romance numbers on other content.

There's already a pretty big handful of series outside the romance genre with good content. Look at where harolddeleted and his comic was back in the day. I think if we want more of those we've got to be engaging with them more and promoting the hell out of those genres ourselves. show the big guys what we want and maybe they'll listen if we're loud enough y'know?

[crosswarrior7]

I actually only got Tapas last month or the month before because Wattpad has been a bit disheartening lately and I wanted to branch out, so I'm not very aware of how things were previously. And I see your point. I just sometimes wonder if enough people really want the non-romance-focused books enough to warrant the shift--or perhaps better worded, sharing--of trends.

And again, as a new Tapas user, this is just very interesting info to have because I'm still majorly learning how to make Tapas work for me XD

[IndigoShirtProd]

show the big guys what we want and maybe they'll listen if we're loud enough y'know?

Man, I wish it was that easy. But as it stands, think were a vocal minority here on Tapas. Because while I do think the team listens to a lot of what the creators say in the forums, I think there are more readers that can't or don't say anything and have come to terms with the changes.

[jjfresh]

Yo. I've been on Tapastic since 2013 (according to the upload date on my manga page). I still called it Tapastic for few years after the change.

I remember the support program /cry.

My personal experience: Freshly updated comics would appear on the front page, or with the Fresh tab, it made it possible for people to explore whatever is available rather than what has the most views right now. I believe that is what allowed me to gain a following when I was active back then.

The website still tries its best to be as creator focused as possible. But you have to try to understand why certain genres started creeping to the front of the page and it has to do with their algorithm for Featured, Trending and Popular. They were pretty transparent about what they measured, though I'm not sure if I can find the explanation easily now. It didn't start with preferring romance and BL, but when those genres are what were hitting the top charts, other creators follow

Romance and BL are very popular and they're also very easy to make. The thing that would always make me laugh is how all you gotta do is make a thumbnail that says "BL" in the corner (and a cute drawing) and an instant 2k followers, when this trend first started.

Do note that it's harder. But it's not too difficult because some good stuff does make it on Trending. I'm not sure if Trending vs Popular changed so I won't say more but there's some unique, oddballs that make their way through. It's always gonna be harder, you gotta capitalize on the opportunity when Tapastic started then hang in there.

[VibrantFox]

I can totally get this viewpoint but one thing that I think isn't taken into consideration (at least by the traditional publishing crowd) is that what's popular in online publishing can change on a dime o slowly over time.

Yes romance is making big bucks but there's still other genres with pull. If instead of looking at the traditional market and focus on other online publishing platforms it's a little easier to see where trends are moving. Getting to my point though, I'm referring specifically to one of Tapas main rivals (whose partner is a megacorp loaded with money and thus able to freely take a bit more risk) Webtoons. Presently that I've noticed on WT is that aside from romance they've also got a readerbase with strong interest in fantasy and action comics. They're still fairly dominated by romance but it's close enough that sometimes the lovey dovey is winning and sometimes action punchy stuff is winning

One series I watch a lot is Freaking Romance (haven't caught up on the reading but I follow the artist/writer) and he's found a way to mix the two and the readers are still hooked. Literally the big twist that I heard was it's drastic shift from romance to paranormal/thriller. But it worked and he's still got 2M loyal readers.

Romance is trending but there's definitely other genres making waves. It's just worth noting that possibly due to cost Tapas probably can't take as much risk and thus is sticking to it's guns. No not everyone's happy with is but like my other reply mentions there's still probably ways for us to make waves ourselves. It's just gonna take work to get there.

[Doubtcent]

In all honesty, I'm still going to update on here, but my engagement has actually gone down months after I started making dailies. While on other sites, I've been slowly growing. I just feel like this isn't it for me anymore.

Even if the genre shifts, there's nothing on the website to help dedicated creators to grow an audience other than, as I see it, moving to another website. Which I have, and it's not bad.
I feel something needs to change, but I don't have the best idea on how, so I'm not worrying about it anymore and moving on.
Unless they add an "upincoming creator" tab or a "daily" tab like thing, I'm just going to slowly move away my focus to other sites.

[IndigoShirtProd]

I can understand the feeling of needing to move on. Sometimes it's the better and healthier option. Hopefully, you'll still hang around in the forums though.

They do have a "new and noteworthy" tab on the front page which is comparable to an "up in coming creator section." Though I think the main issue with "getting exposure" is when you've been on the site for a while, maybe a few years, and you still only have minimal growth. Maybe your story's fine and your art is good, but you still hang around the same amount of subs and you don't really know how to break out and it feels like the site isn't really helping you, in a general sense.

[snowy]

So what other sites would you recommend for all of us who aren't doing the romance thing and would still like to build an audience ?

Asking for a lot of friends (and me).

[snailienz]

I feel this way too. Back when it was in the "indie hayday" i was too busy and stressed to be making a comic. I chose to come here because of the reputation and it's slowly become apparent that's not what they want anymore, sadly.