Same here. Besides gag comics being a good starting point when getting into writing and drawing characters, even if Webtoon did express interest in turning it into an original, they wouldn't be able to request for me to create a longer-form comic without looking incredibly tone-deaf about the structure of daily comic strips.
To be frank...I really don't think it is a ridiculous standard. These aggregate sites are running a business for paying customers. They also give people a platform to host stuff on for free.
It's not like they're asking the small creators to do this.
For the bigger creators, they're employing people that willingly signed a contract to produce webcomics at the competitive rate.
Yes it does set a standard. But as an amateur, not signed into a contract, small creator I'm not beholden to that standard. If I want to grow my audience, I will have to do all the work, promoting, etc. Am I a fan of the tactics Tapas and Webtoon use sometimes? No I'm not. But I don't expect them to act out of character for what they are.
After all, I'm on here for free. I didn't sign anything saying I'd make X pages for X deadline. I own my responsibility to produce my work at my own pace.
I see what you mean, but I think the issue is that general webtoon readers aren't aware enough of the differences between original series, which often have entire teams behind them, and independent creators who usually work solo.
As a result, they are so spoiled by the long, weekly updates that they become impatient when reading series which don't update as frequently with as much content. This wasn't as much of an issue before the vertical scroll became popular since most webcomics were used to updating a page's worth of material a few times a week with hiatuses when needed.
I think in general the mass population of entertainment consumers is just spoiled rotten by media catering to them. This has been going on for years, there's an exess of entertainment for people to pick from, so they naturally demand more.
It's not necessarily one group of readers, it's a culture of consumers that's been nurtured over the last several decades to get exactly what they want, when they want.
It is impossimble to grow on webtoons. I've been on there almost 3 years still under 60 subscribers. What bugs me is they want your webtoon to have a ton of subscribers you get a small subs, then someone unsubscribes. Please try not to unscribe it hurts us creators we all do care about who subscribes, likes comment our hard work. Anyone else agrees.
Oh I forgot this one realy gets me is comics on webtoons just started they have 1 or 6 episodes and all ready they have 200k or 1.m subscribers with in a few months out on webtoons, and it gets better a lot of the webtoons canvas ones have one page promo not art, story, or not even long scroll or color. And they have already 6k subscribers.
Fundamentally this is how capitalism works, the need for companies to extract as much profit with as little investment as possible, without regard for any ethical costs. What Webtoon is doing is what happens across every industry that can get away with it— that’s the really horrifying part.
I don't see a future in Webtoons and Tapas unless you're the top percentage, y'know?
Personally, I've been thinking lately I want to step back, regress the formula a bit. Back in the early days of webcomics, the strongest comics didn't need Keenspot or whatever to host, they had their own sites. And webcomics got big because of webrings. Not social media, not Tapas or Webtoons, but websites. Webcomic websites, with links to other webcomics. Forums existed, not discord!
Ideally, I want to create a new community of webcomics. Maybe its just delusions of grandeur, fantasizing about being revolutionary, but, you're never gonna change the world if you never try.
Here's what I'm thinking: Get 4 other comickers on board for one site, that releases 5 different strips M-F. IE Artist A releases on Monday, B on Tuesday, etc. Not even the same comic, everyone just doing their own comic (preferably like-minded), just hosted on the same site to corral people to. From there, you've already got a team onboard with the power of 5x what you'd have by yourself. Create a community based off these artists, add forums, talk it out, and people will WANT to join this community, as long as people are able to find out about it.
Its just, we can't win if we play their game. We have to flip the table.
I agree with this whole-heartedly. Catering to consumers is important for a business, but I fear societies have gone down a toxic rabbit hole that dictates to them without considering those with which the consumers are actually purchasing the product from. There's a lot of take and not much give. It's heavily focused on what we want right now rather than being sensible and patient.
What I'd like to know how some of webtoons gets tons of subscribers overnight. Let's
say comics start after yours, they don't have social media, and there up on canvas uploaded about half of what episodes you have let's say you have 39 episodes only 58 subs, they have 11 episodes terrible one page art or just random promo art and there sub count is 1k to 500k all of a sudden how.
Sounds like bots or an army of "trained to sub" kids.
Or a paid karma farm. You know, those places with a lot of accounts and phones in some basement, ready to offer their services for a price.
Are specific examples of this allowed? I'd be really interested to see a comic that only consists of promo art 
Sometimes it's a reboot and they tell all their followers to come to the new version. So they get a bunch of subs right off the bat.
Other times, I'm not sure.
some instances of sudden growth can be a consequence of quality or prior followings on other websites or from previous works
of course it doesn't dismiss the fact that growing on any platform can be a challenge again leading to those really high working requirements and standards but thats why theres been this whole wave of creators getting vocal about the current environment and whatnot
as for what things can be done to fix it is still kind of up in the air but thats the point of people speaking up now
This may work for people who draw comics as a full time job but it's almost impossible for someone with other job or school
closed Aug 8, '22
