Hey, guys, just letting you know that Tapas isn't letting me upload the page today. I'll keep trying, but I might need to worry about uploading at a different time. If you wanna see it now, then you can find it here: https://www.webtoons.com/en/challenge/starpup/starlight-grove-page-36/viewer?title_no=84715&episode_no=144
So, hey, been a while! I had a question for people who are subscribed. I currently run a Sonic themed ask blog over on tumblr, and I was actually wondering if anyone might be interested seeing that brought over here. It's an AU to an obscure character from a spinoff series, but I've put a lot of love into him, and I figured maybe it'd be a fun idea to introduce him here. It might serve as a nice little thing to look into while I'm still getting my feet back under me with Starpup (which, I swear, I will be getting back into by the start of next month)
Technically I'm not sure if this is allowed, so I'm going to look into it, but in case it is, what are all of your thoughts?
I'll also be dragging a Sonic/Undertale based comic thing I'm doing for fun here, but that one updates extremely sporadically. Whenever I feel like working on it, essentially
Hey, ya'll, just letting you know that a Starpup server on Discord has been created. So if you wanna join, you can find it here: https://discord.gg/H2xF6PJ
So, in light of recent events concerning the Tapas backlash, I feel it's fair to warn you there is entirely the possibility that I might end up pulling Starpup off of here. Right now, I'm reserving judgement to wait and see what other info comes to light and to see how things pan out. I'll keep you informed if I make the decision to move.
Also, updates will continue as normal until the decision is made, so don't fret over getting to see more in the time between here and there.
Essentially Tapas slid in their ToS a clause that essentially said if you wanted to license your comic in any way, like merchandising, publishing, selling the rights, etc, then you had to approach them to give them a 30 day time frame to make a deal offer on your work. Kinda like giving them the first right to make a competitive offer off of your comic. That's what I'm getting from all of this, anyway. It really alarmed a lot of artists because it sounded like they were taking the rights away from your work. It was a pretty shady move to slide it in, but I don't think they meant they were taking the rights to your work, and I personally didn't mind the idea of having to approach them before deciding to license my work.
But now I'm seeing claims that Tapas used to be branded as a company called ComicPanda, which from what I hear dabbled in bad business practices by essentially stealing from various artists. I don't know what to make of that, but currently everything is abuzz and I'm waiting to see if any new information comes out that might challenge these claims, cuz we don't exactly know the full story. But if they keep dabbling in shady practices, then there's a good chance I'll be moving to another platform.
This is all info I've discussed with my friends as I didn't quite understand it myself until they helped explain it to me, so I might be a little off here. But from what I can tell, that's the gist of the entire scenario so far.
Luckily, they already removed it out of the ToS https://twitter.com/tapas_app/status/865364752112812032
Honestly, I can see how they had no bad intentions, as in preventing creators from getting "scammed" from some publishers. Yet being forced to let them interfere within publishing deals is clearly not the way to go and it really limits the creator's publishing rights. The concerns are absolutely understandable.
It's good that they instantly listened to the community, but I wish they'll be more clear about changes in that concern and not just adding it in the ToS and only present it in a lawyer-ish language. Or simply think twice about eventual consequences. It really messes with the trust of the community, mine included.
I did hear about them yanking the clause out, which is good. I also know that any time there is any ToS change, hysteria is usually to follow. But they could have went about this a lot better, absolutely. And I am worried about the info that's coming to light, but as said before, I will reserve judgement until I can hopefully get the full story. I don't know both sides of the argument, so putting myself in a panic over this isn't beneficial to me or anyone for that matter.
I will say, though, that whether I end up moving or not in the future, these actions have made me consider putting Starpup up on LINE webtoon. But that's an effort for another day.