Is this Twitter Artist Panic warranted?

[faisalhussein394]

I bet they just twit these nonsense just to get attention. Plus, Elon Musk spend 44 billion just to get twitter and he is not letting it go after all that budget.

If they threaten to leave Twitter, they won't feel any guilt. They can always get replaced by new users so losing them won't affect much.

[darthmongoose]

This is why you shouldn't put all your eggs in one basket. Twitter probably won't immediately implode anyway, but if it did, it'd pay to have other ways to get in touch with people, promote yourself etc.

Honestly I'd welcome the rise of a competing platform. A large portion of my twitter following only care when I make jokes about D&D, another large portion only care when I talk about Homestuck... Twitter hasn't been a good place to build a following as an artist in like ten years, and I barely use it outside of mandatory promotion now, so I mostly feel ambivalent.

[RedLenai]

I believe people is overreacting a bit. I hardly believe that they are going to have something at least similar like the ol' Tumblr purge.
Musk plans to remove certain restrains from Twitter, which I believe is what applies to your racist, xenophobic, Trump-Supporter-kinda-like-user and some people don't actually fear that their accounts or their data is going to be erased totally, but I believe that what scares them is that Twitter is going to become even more of a battlefield, after all is not that death treats, harassment, scams, witch hunts, controvertial debates or fights aren't already happening, but it can become worse, sure.

Still, if I see Twitter Art accounts coming back to Tumblr after Elon's purchase then I just gotta put the sign you know, after all, I'm one of the few clowns that never left the Supernatural/Hell site

Gotta say, this seems like an overreaction to me because, it's not like Twitter is the one and only social media that there is. We have Facebook, Instagram, Reddit, Discord Servers, LinkedIn, Amino, Tumblr, Youtube, TikTok, Twitch, Picarto, Pixiv and several other platforms to communicate and promote our work even if some are less popular than others, including the Tapas Forum, our dashboards here or in Webtoon.

[NickRowler]

I am not really sure how things are going to change going forward but I don’t really like Elon Musk and I am a bit concerned about him doing this for the wrong reason.

It feels like he had a pipe dream and Twitter took the offer because it’s $44 billion, like Avenger End Game made $2.8 billion. You would need about 15 or 16 movies to match. Of course they took the offer.

My two major concerns is…
1) what happens when the pipe dream high wears off and he is stuck with monster of a site and can’t manage it. He wants to make it open source but that might open new issues for the site which already is suffering from bots and hacking.

2) Twitter does manage the trends to keep drama low. Yes they do remove tags but it is something they do for both left and right leaning politics. I guess a lot of people are concerned that without this, things will go into chaos where everyone is just harassing each other. Add that Musk wants have more transparency and less censorship, he might end up removing any protection anyone has. And Twitter may end up like Facebook, being over run by paranoid Karens. Which if that happens, of course people would not want to stay on the site anymore.

[powerplantanimations]

What are these guys talking about?!? Twitter is quite possibly the worst place on the web right now. I mean sure, Elon Musk doesn't exactly give me confidence in the platform. My guess is he's going to turn it into another Reddit which q-o=]pgpgrqopg. Sorry, I just threw up all over my keyboard.

But if these guys are complaining about evil buisnessmen, then they seriously have been out of the loop with what Twitter's been allowing people to get away with. I remember a podcast interview and the people who were already in charge sounded like the most vile disgusting soulless freaks ever.

My hope is this cancel culture nonesense somehow ends. ESPECIALLY in the artist community. I still remember this poor girl who wanted to commit suicide (and almost succeeded) because she got death threats after making a character from Steven Universe a different color. But yeh more competition is what we need.

God Twitter makes my blood boil. I just want to punch a cactus and bite leather. I do find it funny that Tumblr could be revived again.

[NickRowler]

I still remember this poor girl who wanted to commit suicide (and almost succeeded) because she got death threats after making a character from Steven Universe a different color. But yeh more competition is what we need.

That is not really what happened, and it's not 100% a Twitter thing. She posted art on DevientArt and she was a bit out of touch when it came to some of her work, it was not just one picture. She got dogpiled by people pointing out issues with her work and she did apologize and even remove some of the more problematic pieces. The issue is that people became obsessed with her and made hate blogs on Tumblr. The whole hospital visit had nothing to do with the harassment she says and she tells people to stop telling everyone that she almost committed suicide from the harassment.

[powerplantanimations]

Ah I thought it that was Twitter.

[MartaTod]

I don't know what to think about it. On one hand, I get where the fear is coming from. But on the other, every large corporation is owned by rich people who only have their money in mind.

Twitter is the first place I made contacts with other comic artists and creators. And it's so far the only social media with a large user base, where I can have a direct link in the post - which is a big bonus as people don't want to dig around other's profiles for the "link in bio".

Also it's important to realise, as many on social media already said, having a community of artists is fun but we need non-artist readers and followers too. This is why Instagram, Twitter and TikTok work for building a larger audience, while Artfol, DeviantArt, Artstation etc are limiting.

So, I don't think artists are going to permanently leave Twitter. They might be gone for a while and probably return. I will say I would love it if Tumblr got revived because of the blog format. I miss being able to write a longer text post with formating.

[irresponsiblepics]

Personally I hope it all burns to the ground. Facebook,Tik Tok, Twitter, Reddit, Tumblr...google...all of it!
ahem
But no the Twatter artist panic isn't warranted.

[BoomerZ]

Everyone needs to calm down. First of all Elon isn't taking over for 6 months. Second, Nothing is happening to art. You can still do your thing. Elon is not some radical person, he's not even right wing (whatever that means now a days.). He is just the boogey man of the moment. He will have a team that runs the company, just like a team runs Tesla and SpaceX. He will be a guiding person like most owners are. Remember, everyone talking bad about Elon in the media drives his cars. This is Kabuki theater.

[Simplegray_OWO]

Honestly I really don't care nor do I understand it.

From someone just observing it seems likes its kinda exaggerated. Like Elon musk isn't any better or worst then any of the other social media giant ceos. He probably serving what's best for him but like I said that's literally all big tech giants. Twitter sucks already so I don't understand why artist are looking at it as the best platform for artist. Twitter is for news and discussion not art. Even the website isn't even build for artist. Anyway can we please just get a good platform for artist already. Someone please step up. I'm pretty neutral on the whole thing. Whatever happens happens.

[Caro]

I had a pretty good couple years on twitter recently and noticed I and a lot of others were getting pretty big work opportunities with big publishers and animation studios over DMs. So for people whose livelihood depended on those interactions and freelance work it could be a big hit to em since one of the big concerns is potentially taking out the share feature (if I heard correctly, I haven’t been following super close) and that could hurt. But I’m just not sure yet.

This will probably mean a lot more people looking to get agented before time runs out (and a lot of querying also happens on twitter and relies a lot on retweets). I’m waiting to see how it plays out.

I’ve been actively trying to rely on social media less as a whole recently because we already know that no social media is permanent. I think a lot of people are switching to their own newsletters (I have one myself that I uhhh never use). Nobody should put all their eggs in one basket and I feel the same way about Tapas and WT. Everything is completely destroyable and you never know what’s gonna happen and it’s completely out of your control.

I hesitate to make any calls about what art twitter thinks though. I’m just gonna watch it play out.

Best we can do now if you’re trying to stay very online is try to hop on to the next big thing as soon as possible. The first people on new platforms have a crazy huge advantage.

[VibrantFox]

considering ive barely managed to stay afloat on twitter and i find some aspects of it draining im kind of meh on the whole thing

i admit a part of me dreads having to see more far right a-holes feeling confident and coming out the woodworks since one of their guys is on the top but its not like the place isnt already a cesspool of vaguely gestures its just the idea of things getting worse

then with folks threatening to come back ro tumblr i just feel like id hate to see what peace has been established get ruined coz they dont want to deal with the blue bird

like ive already attempted to spread myself out between various platforms but overall i just dont think i have the energy to get stressed out about any of it

i will say i dont think folks are overreacting and if anything some may rightfully be concerned like youre allowed to feel some type of way in this sort of situation. lets not act like people weren't flipping there lids here when it came to the tapas buyout. all i can say is that i hope things pan out and folks are able to find places where they'll feel safe/confident or whatever

[river121693]

I don’t think Twitter will be that different but I don’t think it’s over blown either. Its very rational to panic about the fact that our lines of communications, data, and connection to each other are controlled by some of the richest people in the world because they own the platform. It’s the fact that your art will be passive income for the douchenozzle that is Elon Musk. It’s especially egregious if your work leans left or if you’re of a marginalized group since he has perpetuated alot of dangerous right wing ideologies. The guy also has a history of controlling information for his own gain. Twitter has always been shitty but at least they do the minimal to control fact-checks and hate speech. I think itd only be shittier and more harmful under him.

[MeltingCORE]

I'm scratching my head right now and genuinely having a hard time understanding this. I don't use Twitter because it treats everyone's art as a 24 hour trend and is too fast paced for my taste. But I know many do use it for connections, especially because it's almost like a chat service and people enjoy that. As someone else said, all corporations are owned by some big business man. I mean, we know about the things Elon Musk has done but I really just don't see the site changing drastically. Twitter is Twitter. It's already not a pleasant site and doesn't have the greatest reputation. And just like the news cycle, I'm sure everyone will forget about this in a week. I could be wrong but eh.

[sushy00]

Twitter never worked for me anyways lol

[GumshoeComix]

i doubt the artist side of twitter is even on Elon Musks radar
though I understand peoples want/ need to leave. Ive been wanting to leave that birdsite for years but theres nowhere else to go.

he said he wants twitter to be a private company ???
and 100% free speech which means more leniency on the harassments rules (and I got a strike for saying fuck not long ago so idk I'm iffy on that one)

My BIG concern is that I heard rumors that they might be implementing an ID system where you have to put your real name and picture on your profile and if they do that I'm gone

[fsarbolaez]

My own take on Twitter and Elon:

[crimson_mystery_cake]

from what i understand of it is more that elon is unconcerned with artists putting their names on their own work and that art theft would become more rampant. just from what ive seen elon’s whole goal with twitter is to make the platform more open and more “safe for free speech.” it looks like he wants to unban people who have been previously banned and he wants to try and remove liberal bias. from what i at least understand is that his overall goal for twitter is for there to just be less moderation. i have no certainties on what changes will be made at this time, there’s mostly just been hearsay so its hard to say right now if the freak out on art twitter is warranted.

[system]

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