The curse of the long comic

[DokiDokiTsuna]

I think it's mostly Tapas' fault, to be honest. They really make it impossible to navigate long comics. So unless you are so certain this comic is right for you that you're willing to jump in on the first page and read from there, you're going to have to either make a serious attempt to use that ridiculously tiny scroll bar or just give up.

What's worse is that, every time the comic updates, if you click that notification link it'll take you to the most recent page. So if you were on page 544/1,006, now you're on page 1,006/1,006 and SOL, unless you're willing to hit that page-up button about 500 times to get back to where you were.

It's just a huge hassle...I've never seen another webcomic site that actively discourages looking through a comic, as if they don't have any value outside of their newest pages.

[jensrichard77]

I think it's mostly Tapas' fault, to be honest.

Tapas is only creating out of the knowledge we give them.
So dear Tapas @michaelson and @Yoon
Is this something you will take in mind next time you look into improving the site?

[rajillustration]

Personally I love having stuff to read, but it is discouraging when every time that the author updates, it will erase where I last left off and reset my bookmark to the latest update (at least this is my experience on browser). So I have a couple comics in my feed that I am waiting to read because I know I have to catch up all at once or make browser bookmarks to remember where I was.

It's annoying because it feels like a very basic comic function we just don't have.

[TheXtraordinaryX]

Is it against the rules to create a new comic for the next season or part of a long story?

[JRHoch]

There are some comics that I can relate to where I read 40 chapters in a day; others I break into 5-chapter segments until I eventually catch up with the latest episodes.

My problem is finding GOOD things to read. Most webcomics are geared for a younger audience that doesn't see all the plot, character and drawing flaws. I see the flaws. I have this problem with Premium comics just as much as I do with Canvas, etc.

[feardeer]

I'll only sub to things with a big enough archive, honestly. I don't care about being there from the start. It's more important that there's enough material for me to become engaged with the plot and characters. And I very much enjoy binge-reading. Also, the bigger the archive, the more reassurance that the author is in this for the long haul and the story won't disappear into the ether within a year.

[jensrichard77]

Nope. But you might lose some subs

[spadedigsbutts]

I subscribe based on length and if they posted recently...I don’t care about the length of a comic so much as I do accidentally investing a ton of time in reading it only to find out it hasn’t updated in years or it just went on an indefinite hiatus

[nathanKmcwilliams]

I don't know. Some people like to read long series, like me. Some prefer shorter things. I kind of just think it's a matter of preference. But this is from a guy who rereads One Piece on a bi-annual basis xD that series is huuuuge.

[Azifri]

I'm more likely to subscribe to a long comic. I like to have more pages to read, and even if the comic goes on hiatus later, I would still have had a chance to enjoy at least part of the story. Reading a comic that just started and then goes on hiatus is so frustrating because all can get out of it is the premise; that's also the reason why I sometimes subscribe but don't read until the comic has more updates.

I do agree that the scroll bar on Tapas could be improved: it's really difficult/impossible to use when there are many episodes. There is a Spanish webcomic platform called Faneo, that gives you the option to group pages into chapters; it really helps with the organization and presentation of long comics. Tapas could have that option too, just saying ^_^

[rmdooley]

I agree with @DokiDokiTsuna
Tapas navigation is rough for long comics

It would be wonderful if there was a feature that would allow longer comics to be divided into chapters or arcs for easier accessibility rather than being stuck in non-compartmentalized episodes

[skicoak]

It's definitely a weird catch-22... If you don't get featured as a hot/fresh/new strip to attract subscribers , you can just keep grinding until you're now too long for some people to start reading.

Ugh.

[Iris-Grimoire]

At that point, you really need to have the banner link be some sort of archive. In general the advice for a webcomic is to have a proper domain as soon as possible because the hosting site isn't going to stay up(or good, re: Smackjeeves) forever, but of course due to money reasons you can't always get it.

[Kura]

This is my curse that I live with.

Honestly it's really depressing having your readers slowly trickle out as they stop using the site and then not be replaced with new readers because your comic is too long to easily pick up new readers and instead drives a lot away with it's length.

I'm really not sure what to do about it.

And yeah, I would REALLY love to have the ability to divide my stuff in chapters or arcs, not sure if it would help with new readers but it was REALLY help the current binge readers that like to let the pages build up but then not be able to find their damn place when they get back x.x

[Kann]

As someone with long comic, I think I got the curse by now.

I don't think I have preference in the length of a comic. If the long comic is interesting I'll probably binge read it.

I agree with everyone saying how there is no way to track where you finished.

[Rhonder]

I've talked about this before on various topics, but one thing I've decided to try for my series once the second season starts sometime next year is to convert the first episode into a Table of Contents, providing links in the episode description to (hopefully) easily direct people to the different parts. It's nice that Tapas allows both clickable links in said descriptions, as well as seemingly no limit on length? So I think it'll work out okay here. Webtoons on the other hand (no links, short length restriction), I guess I'll have to rely on their built-in bookmark feature lol

[beta1042]

I've started deleting bonus eps cause of this curse. I also wonder if I should combine every 5-10 eps or something to make it look shorter...

@Rhonder that table of contents idea sounds super cool tho

[irene_addler]

I love a good binge-read, but only if I stumble upon the comic when I have time to read it. Remembering that I subscribed to it if I was only browsing for a quick minute and didn't have time to sit and read it totally is a struggle for me. But if I have time to read the whole thing, I'll absolutely do so.

[sekabead]

Oh I feel you. I'm overwhelmed looking at list of episodes of.... one piece...

[xabelmind]

It would be cool to be able to classify our libraries between works completed, on hiatus, reading, reading freshest updates... But us, as readers, decide to classify, not the platform.

An as authors, be able to mesh episodes together once you completed a chapter or arc.

Maybe that last one is too much, but let me dream: so you could clic on "completed chapter", and the episodes inside would convert in one scroll down chapter, and all the comments and likes would also get together under that chapter o-o