The core issue of Tapastic

[Kayke]

The forums is definitely mainly creators, but I doubt that's true of the site proper. I know when I check my subscribers list it's mainly readers with no series of their own.

[Jrej]

I feel the opposite of @Kaykedrawsthings
I noticed that most of the active readers on my series have one of their own.
But it could be that readers don't tend to comment as much.

I do hope the site opens up to more readers. Including books to the library was a smart move in that direction in my opinion.
I trust Tapastic to make the right decisions about this. They've done pretty good so far!

[60Six]

The vaaaast majority of my subscribers are only readers. If I had to guess, I'd estimate only 10-15% of my readers have series, and that number gets even smaller when you exclude the inactive series and ones that are just using them as a place to sketch dump.
I feel like maybe the SITE is perhaps more creator heavy (However, even then I still think there are more readers), but when it comes to the app, readers FAR outweigh creators. I think a lot of people on here underestimate the power and sheer number of people using the app, versus the site. The site does get traffic of course, but here is a personal experience just for comparison:
My comic has managed to get on the top two rows of the popular section maybe 3 or 4 times in it's two years on Tapas. Each of those times, during the hours that it was smack dab on the top of the front page of the website, I got maybe roughly around 10K pageviews and maybe 50 or so new subs for that day.
One day I got a daily snack, an app only feature. I got 30k pageviews and 500 new subs. Nowww, I never did manage to get through thanking every single one of those people for the sub, but just a very easy click through them showed that nearly every single one of these 500 people that came entirely from the app, were readers only.

Take a look at Tapas' #1 premium series, They Say I was Born a King's Daughter. This is a series that you can ONLY read on the app, an application that's proven to be vastly reader majority. That is 40k people that are reading this series only on the app.
Now heck. Let's look at the creator's page, where I guess every creator of Tapastic is eventually listed, whether inactive or not.
According to this page, there are only roughly only 31k creators on Tapas. So now, unless EVERY single other creator on here is subscribed to They Say I was a King's Daughter and I've just seriously been missing out on something, I think I can definitely say that readers outnumber creators.

With that said, I think a lot of people also don't realize how many of their readers are from the app. All of those people you see with a hundred "thank you" images on their wall but not a single post or response? MOST likely an app-only reader, who isn't even aware they have a wall. The creator community on Tapas is very tight-nit and personal (and it's what I love it for). I recognize nearly everyone on these forums and that's what I love about Tapas, however I think a lot of times we kind of forget or don't realize that we're just one small bubble that is creating a lot of cool content for an ocean of readers that's a lot bigger than our little bubble.

[mintycanoodles]

sometimes it does feel like there's a disconnect between the forum community and site community. kind of like we creators are all hanging backstage at our collective show. but no, i don't think the site itself is mainly creators, it's probably definitely mostly readers. and i think also we creators hang around the site and forums a lot more than readers do, chillin here backstage.

[punkarsenic]

hmm... id say the forums at least are 99% creators. and the creators want to be factored into the conversation (some fairly, some to an unreasonable degree, maybe). tapastic is predominantly creator, i guess (or were the loudest, anyway) - most profiles are paired with a comic - but not nearly as much or as loudly as the forums.

that aside, i think its complicated. tapastic, alongside webtoons, could really be the future of indie comics and give a lot of creators the tools they need to succeed in writing the stories they want, the way they want. a lot of people had a great deal of faith and optimism in tapastic - i know i was elated when i found somewhere decent i could post my work. so maybe, as tapas grows more and more inclined to published, paid, commissioned work, people are starting to feel betrayed.

tapas definitely wants to be mainly for readers, i mean, thats where the money is. creators are skint and have high standards. theres definitely a conflict of interest there, but i wouldnt say its as simple as 'the creators are too whiny' or 'tapas is a capitalist traitor.' honestly, i cant get my head around it

[keii4ii]

tapas definitely wants to be mainly for readers

To be honest, being great for readers is great for us creators as well. I wouldn't be terribly interested in mirroring on a site that nobody reads on. There's definitely some balancing act involved, though; if I have to jump through a bajillion flaming hoops every time I want to update my comic, that's not a great place either, no matter how many readers are using it.

[punkarsenic]

To be honest, being great for readers is great for us creators as well.

thats true. id hate for tapas to be just creators reading other creators, because then youre not opening up the medium to new people, which is really important. that said, sometimes it seems like tapas favours the read-only element of the site, with handpicked work they make proper bank from. fair enough, but its a shame when it leads to very good new comics being suffocated, and takes away the validity of the webcomic route vs pitching your idea to a publisher. its definitely a balancing act, but for tapas, i have no idea how to balance it.

[PotooGryphon]

Mmhmm, there's a big disconnect between app only readers and creators on the site. There's not really a way for creators to communicate with app readers other than comic episodes or in an episode's comment section.

And I think because of that app only readers can get over looked or forgotten by creators and we focus on the community that responds back through the site.

Tapas/tic is really focusing and catering to this app audience since it's significantly bigger than the site only readers and they make money from app purchases and such.

Only solution I can see to bridge to two communities is for the app and the site to share features. Bring tipping/coins/keys to the site and bring notifications/messaging to the app. Which, thankfully, it appears this is on their roadmap to accomplish.

[60Six]

Yeah, agreed. You know, one of the things that's always made Tapas > Webtoons (For me) is the ability to communicate easily with my readers. I've probably missed a dozens of comments on Webtoons because I have no freaking way to know when I've gotten them, unless I just monitor every single episode I upload. I've had people approach me much more personally through private messages on Tapas, whether it was to just send me some nice words, ask for advice, or send gift art. That's something that will never happen on Webtoons. Creators are just flat out easier for readers to reach out to on Tapas.
Unnlleess we're talking about the app. :/ Then it's pretty much exactly like Webtoons, in terms of linking readers and creators. And that's kind of what disappoints me the most, because the biggest source of my readers has no EASY way to communicate with me, other than commenting on pages (Which, at least I get notifications for those on the site, unlike Webtoon). I get that the app is suppose to be geared more towards readers, but I really don't understand why it doesn't have any sort of notification system yet or any way to communicate outside of commenting on pages. Like heck, even the Deviantart app let's you check messages (or at least, when I used it years ago it did), and while the VAST majority of Deviantart is creators, I do know there ARE some people on there that are purely on there to watch and commission people, and those people probably find the fact that they can send and receive messages on the app pretty handy.
I wonder just how many missed opportunities there are out there. Like how many publishers or clients looking to hire artists have passed up an artist looking for work because they didn't even know the artist was looking for work because they don't see wall posts, or how many people have wanted to approach an artist about work but didn't because there's no way to contact them other than commenting on a page. Or heck, how many readers have just wanted to send a really nice message to an artist, but are too shy to post things publicly so they just never say it because there's no private message option (And I do get PMs like this from time to time, there are a lot of people out there that are just way too shy to post anything publicly). HECK! How many times have just READERS seen each other in comments frequently, saw they had a lot in common, and wished they knew how to contact each other to talk more?

Edit: And now that I think about it, how did you even handle that tipping contest that you held a while ago? What did you do if someone who was app-only had won it? Like, I would love to do some tipping contests later, but I have no idea what I'm gonna do if an app-only reader wins and I have no way to privately ask for their address to mail them a prize. I guess I can just tell them to e-mail me, but gosh, wouldn't it be so much more convenient if I could just send them a PM?

[shaylafarley5]

I thought that too, it seems like Webtoon is more for creators, the more you create the more views they get and the more you get paid

[Redsheis]

As a young upstart comic site I am disappointed in Tapastic, that they are bowing down to the standard of today's family friendly environment. If we are to move forward in the industry of comics that can change social standards. Sights like these 10 years from now can make an impact on what we view is safe content.

I don't really know about you but I think its silly that it's ok to show death and violence in comics but its really bad to show love making. And when it comes to the no gore; I find it hard to picture that a bunch of red on a 2D image computer screen is unacceptable( but I don't really know what their standards of gore is)

I think that Tapastic should allow people to make explicit stuff if they want they already have the filter. If Tapastic is worried about their image then they should only promote the stuff they want to see on there sight. That does encourage artist to follow their standard if they want to get featured. I really think you guys are shooting yourself in the foot telling people to read explicit content somewhere else. Those are potential readers and creators~

[AffectedMind]

As a young upstart comic site I am disappointed in Tapastic, that they are bowing down to the standard of today's family friendly environment.

But all the BL comics.... XD

[Redsheis]

^^ I am referring to the Mature content boundaries section: (Violence primarily intended to be shocking, sensational or disrespectful is not ok, nor is sex or nudity primarily intended to titillate or arouse. Sexually explicit content or pornography is not allowed. Don’t post content that is predominantly sexual in nature, or intended primarily as an aid to sexual gratification. There are already plenty of other places to find that content online.)

[AffectedMind]

Well yea, but Bloodroot on the front page has soft core porn in it, so it's weird. Definitely not family friendly

[LordVincent]

It's all censored and I've been in direct contact with tapas staff due to a few reports.
Basically, rule goes: No erect penises, no wet vaginas, no penetration.
Censor that and you're good to go.

Also, Bloodroot is primarily a story comic. It's not 600 pages of gay sex. So it follows that part of the guidelines too.

Tapas isn't as harsh on sexual content as smackjeeves is. I have little to no complaints when it comes to how tapas runs their business, primarily because I understand very well that they need to follow certain guidelines to be on Appstore.

[Redsheis]

I had forgotten about there business image... Ya they would need to do that so they can continue their app partnership. Makes sense. Thanks for clarifying that up for me JohnVincent. I now see why do that.

[PotooGryphon]

Moderator Note: In order to clean up the thread and get it back on topic several posts have been deleted. fyi

[GoldenPlume]

I had forgotten about there business image

Ad revenue alone isn't enough to keep Tapas going due to fixed overhead expenses of server costs, rent, utilities, and payroll in San Francisco where the minimum wage is $13 and set to move to $15 by 2018. Not to mention that everyone at Tapas is mid-level or highly skilled labor, so they're being paid much better than that. Assuming 13 full time employees earning a blended rate of $30/hour (including benefits and payroll taxes) at a 40 hour work week, that's $15,600/week for payroll. There's no way that ads can do that or the 15% cut on tipping. So the company HAS TO publish premium content. Since books are far easier and much faster to produce than art (400 hours for the average 80k novel vs. 1600 hours for a 160 page manga) it makes complete sense for Tapas to go into the book business full bore.

Being on the app store makes it very convenient to sell content. However the app stores have restrictions on certain kinds of content and if Tapas carries that content then it could be removed from the app store. So its not Tapas that is dictating what kind of content is here but Apple and Google.

In addition, Tapas also has to have some sort of a business image. If the site becomes known as catering heavily to gore and porn, they would lose a significant amount of their readership and possibly some creators. A large portion of its readership are the teenage demographic. Some parents censor what their children participate in.

We had to look many parents in the eyes the last time we were at a comic convention volunteer tabling and tell them that "Yes, Tapas is safe". Hopefully that never has to change.

[AffectedMind]

(post withdrawn by author, will be automatically deleted in 24 hours unless flagged)

[Potoh]

For those who don’t intent to make premium content/ want to put their content behind a pay wall:

There have been some things that bother me regarding the image Tapas is creating and the way new and older creators of free content are being treated.
Tapas started out as a great host for independent webcomic creators. Open community, open minded staff, everyone is welcome… Those aspects haven’t changed much, but there are things that keep adding up which have been bothering me for some time now.

1) There seem to be no clear guidelines for the spotlight. They just seemed to be picked randomly. Some of the previous series haven’t even uploaded in months. Plus a spotlight where drug abuse is romanticized? No offense but personally I get a bad vibe from that. Pretty art doesn’t make it okay.

2) Why are there extra banners for certain series? Not that they don’t deserve the attention but the banners never change. What are the criteria?

3) The shirt banners – how about some variety? Not 3 banners for 1 series. There sure are a couple other creators who’d like to offer shirts, too.

4) Trending – what’s the algorithm? Because sometimes series turn up that are in no way active. Just curious.

5) The Top 10 comics? They may be the top premium comics. But there are free series who beat them easily in popularity. That’s false advertisement imo. And also a slap in the face for the real top 10. They carry the largest audience and pull in LOTS of new readers to Tapas with their free content. Tips and ad rev can’t make up for that.

6) Lots of comic hosts allow to include Patreon directly. Not just a link. I guess that would cause some conflict with tipping? I’m just trying to understand the decision that was made here. If artists could include Patreon, they wouldn’t have to come across as pushy with constantly reminding their audience to pledge.

7) This sounds harsh, but I don’t see much new quality content popping up lately. The site has been flooded with low quality comics from creators who expect to make quick $ with tipping and ad rev.
Maybe some quality management should be considered. Dunno how honestly, without alienating people who just start out their comic career. I know Tapas wants to be open to everyone, but something needs to be done imo.

It feels like Tapas’s been changing in a direction I won't be able to identify with in the future. It’s audience, the new type of popular content. I could go to webtoons, smackjeeves, make my own site. Sure. But Let’s take a ride on the assumption train first.

My audience is fairly small. It probably wouldn’t hurt as much to start over somewhere else if I needed to. It would take lots of work, but no big loss. Most of the big names have their audience outside Tapas. They could probably get back up somehow and don’t depend on Tapas desperately.
And those in the middle? I feel like they are the actual core of Tapas. This site is their home base. They are just a few steps from breaking through and becoming independent. But they are also kinda trapped. Because when they move, only some of the audience follows. They’d would have to start basically from scratch. But even then, they’d take a big chunk of Tapas’ audience with them. The audience which helped to establish Tapas and make them grow.
It feels like Tapas has abandoned them. For quite some time noe it’s been all about premium content. Of course Tapas needs to earn money. They are a business after all and as such have bills to pay. I totally get that.
But the way creators seem to be ignored don’t sit well with me. Tapas is not sending a good message to them imo. Tapas wants to become more professional but why does it feel like they neglect the creators who want to become professionals with free to read content as well?

I feel conflicted. The community is chill, the tipping feature is awesome. The staff listens to feedback and acts on it. Great basics. I want Tapas to work out for creators of free content again. That’s why I make the effort to write all this.

Will Tapas go back to supporting the non-premiums too, in regard of marketing? Or are premiums and books going to be in favour and nobody cares anymore about those who create free content?

People like me, who work to become established professionals and try to built a pleasant and sustainable audience, need this kind of information. Because the way it’s now I’m forced to look for alternatives. Some bigger creators already left and I know from a couple others that they consider that step too. I’m not talking about mirroring my series. I’m talking about leaving. Because Tapas’ environment is heavily changing and I’m not comfortable with it.

Tapas wouldn’t probably have to care about losing a couple of (small) series but what if gradually everyone is walking away?

How about pushing different genres more? And featuring good stories that stick, and not just offering a quick fix to a fluctuating trend? Encourage people to create good content! Disclose the guidelines for the spotlight /extra-banners/staff picks so people have some more tips on what to improve!

If you want to be professional your image has to be professional. I get that it's hard sometimes but this weird vibe has been there for a while now – I’m sure that’s not Tapas’ intention. But this is how I feel about the site.

In any case, thank you for reading my thoughts and assumptions. I know it’s a lot to take in, but I hope to get a response from @Staff.