That's pretty much what I've been facing with most of the collaborations i've been a part of X3 people droping out half way through and leaving everyone to deal with it
but just like finding a good table top group, you can't quit no matter how many bad players you have to suffer through, the end result is always worth it. Tho that's my bias. I guess I'm just used to bad eggs cause of group projects at schools and the horrible depression crippling dnd game ^^;;
Jealousy is a disease among creators, so 99.99% of the creators who have "made it" distanced themselves from the community. I tried to help a few people to monetize their content but didn't apply my advice so I stopped doing it.
As for the new UI and visibility on Tapas...
Here are some stats I can share with you guys:
Monthly
Daily
PS: Tapas has never promoted my series and I turned off comments.
I still think it's a bit early for judgement, especially with the site redesign having just occurred a few days ago. Holiday season and the new year are notorious times for low engagement across all sectors of the entertainment internet like Youtube. People prep for the holidays/finals and then take time to recover from their exhaustion in January and February. I think a clearer picture will be painted once May comes leading into the summer months.
Correlation does not equal causation and all that.
So far I haven't seen too much of a difference except that my novels are gaining more views than usual, especially my novel that's been complete since Nov.
Still too early to say of course but that last bit surprises me. 
I meant to post the daily*** dashboard was still laggy to load.
I forgot to add that the UI change didn't really bother my series' stats.
The stuff about the artists being unreliable reminds me of secret santas I've had in some places. Some people really be out there just looking for free gifts and hoping no one notices when they don't deliver - everyone does, causes a mess, etc etc. I only do it in really small groups now otherwise you're lucky to get a thank you or even some confirmation it was recieved. From events to Zines, it really takes someone ready for 5 delays from the same person or people randomly ghosting the group without any confirmation they're participating or not.
I mean, most sites don't do stuff like that at all. Tapas would be the exception if they did something like that. Sites are always going to want to enhance and update their sites... just sometimes they fuck up and have to listen to the feedback to fix major issues that occur from the change. But having the ability to just switch back and forth is unrealistic.
That said if they at least had the option of a dark mode for Tapas, that would be
@LordVincent
Oh, is that why I haven't noticed you around here nowadays? I used to see you everywhere and I just assumed you got busy with life. Kind of terrible that that's the reason you've been absent; that you feel unwelcome.
Something I'm seeing mentioned a lot is about having to become distanced from your audience as you grow in popularity. Is this because it's harder to respond to comments and messages when they start piling up to unmanageable heights? It is other things too? Is someone able to maintain some semblance of connection through, say, announcements, development journals, things like that?
I kinda pride myself in being personable with the few (precious) readers I do have, and I wouldn't want this to disappear. I love communicating with my audience.
Well I got busy with life too, but I often find myself deciding against writing advice or giving my opinion here because I just don't have the energy to deal with the potential backlash; I need that energy for other stuff most of the time.
As for audience distancing, I do still add little authors notes on my updates to give people a small idea of what's on my mind or what's going on in life. I avoid letting it be too personal these days unless it touches on a topic that may be relevant to reader's lives. For example I may talk of experiences with dysphoria, discrimination and spiritual/paranormal stuff (all within the realm of the things I also write about) - but I won't tell people about family drama nor go into details about my romantic life.
As for responding to reader comments... I wouldn't have time for anything else if I still did that actively. I used to be one of those people that thought creators who didn't reply to comments were just cold, but having experienced an overflowing inbox firsthand... there's only so much time in the day and I have a life outside of my work!! I do read comments on my most recent update and reply once in a while if I have something to say. But that's as far as I can go.
Being too active with your fanbase when you're at a certain level can actually be dangerous. Being an online business, webcomic artists are already at higher risk of people with certain obsessive personality traits thinking they have an intimate relationship with you. This can turn volatile, just look up a few stalker cases and you will know what the development can look like.
I have a friend who ran into a very weird situation with a person, not quite stalker level but still obsessive and toxic. The person asked to be their friend, spammed them with messages, got angry when they didn't reply "fast enough" and would get very agressive when things didn't go their way. As for myself, I was sexually harrassed by a dude for 3 months straight, and someone once went apeshit in the comments all over my comic because I politely said no when they asked me to date them...
Holy crap, you good? I hope that harassment stopped, all the best wishes for you.
The thought of creepy, obsessive readers legitimately didn't strike me as a possibility. (Probably because I never had that interaction.) Those kinds of situations are what my nightmares are made up of. Thanks--really--for the insight; I'm all the more wiser for it.
Winter fest, right in the middle of summer for me. I didn't get involved because it was irrelevant to me.
Kind of like they wanted me to get involved in thanksgiving themed events. I don't even know what thanksgiving is about.
I just wanted to say that this has been a fascinating thread to read. Thank you to everyone who shared their thoughts~
I don't really have much to say about visibility. As a reader, tapas has always been kinda confusing and even more so with the whole premium and non-premium thing. Other comic sites tend to really separate the two, but as a creator I can see why that might feel like you're being shoved aside if you're not premium.
It's a delicate issue. It's in their interest to foster growth of smaller creators, but they also need to make money (people reading premium comics on aggregating sites isn't helping). Personally, I want what's good for the site overall because I think that would result in more readers and opportunities for everyone. I also really don't want Webtoon to become the only available comic platform that offers an audience.
People get to premium and popular by making content that audiences want to see and I don't hold it against them. I do understand the frustration of smaller creators, of course, considering I am one, but there's really no point in being jealous; frankly, I am way too busy in real life these days to be a premium writer, and even if I could solely rely on premium writer income, it would be a bad idea considering how unstable that career would be, anyway (never rely on internet income, folks). However, I absolutely think that Tapas could do a better job advertising smaller novels/comics without sacrificing their popular stuff with a simple design change.
I'mma go ahead and give Tapas a lot of praise here, too, because I owe the site what little popularity I have on here. They've featured my weird little stories like 4 times and they randomly featured my story in a collection recently which was really nice and unexpected. My work would probably go unnoticed on any other site, so I owe Tapas a lot, especially since I don't know how to market/don't want to try to market anymore. It's nice that Tapas throws me a bone every now and again because holy moly, trying to advertise on the forums and on other sites is extremely exhausting and not worth it, in my opinion, which is kinda why I stopped trying. Honestly, there's nothing more frustrating than having someone say they'll read your story and then never doing it. XD
That would be an awful business decision by Tapas though. To give essentially prime real estate to a work that had such niche appeal. I think you need to look into some other’s points about what work needs to work when featured as well. I’m featured regularly, and I can tell you that not all featured spots are made equal, and not all works benefit the same from it.
This can also happen if a series explodes suddenly then nothing happens after too. Struggling with this now in one of my series.
I do this all the time but... only with users I know have quality work and who I know aren’t going on the forums and running their mouths. I guess as I grew larger, I started protecting my platform more as every recommendation is part of my own reputation now.
