#this is inelegant but god im so furious all the time

[shinesurge]

i got a fucking webtoon ad on youtube and their Thing now is "read before you stream!" because they've reached the point they're just blatantly using webcomics as like pregame for what i can only assume will be shitty half-baked "anime" video content and i am so FUCKING tired y'all. this is not what webcomics were supposed to be this is just more mainstream shit where producers are profiting off of overworked artists and totally disrespecting comics as a complete form of art on its own

i actually met a new comic person at momocon a few weeks ago who talked at length about their deal with webtoon, they were so /excited/ about having had to delay their launch for nearly a year because they were in arguments about rights. They were SO pleased they'd managed to keep "a fair amount" of the rights to their own fucking work, there's an anime in the works (for a comic project that has been forced to sit on a shelf and collect dust) AND they didn't even have anything at their table because they aren't allowed to sell their own work. this is what we're bringing people up to think is success?? being THANKFUL for the opportunity to hand your baby over to a company that encourages horrible limiting art practices and pays peanuts?? we don't need to do this anymore!! you ALREADY made the thing on your OWN we do not NEED people who only see comics as an ad revenue machine!!

the webtoon original schedule is so untenable for so little money there's Drama going around rn about people hiring uncredited assistants and underpaying THEM. they want this insane amount of overproduced work but still want to act like this is Indie Comics uwu so the partners have to keep quiet about the fact that this is just more of the same mainstream bullshit. DC is even posting official comics there now this space is not for us jfc

like yall know we made webcomics to get away from literally this shit right. how is it we're all mad about what disney and the big two do but webtoon coming into this specific scene and disrupting an entire generation this thoroughly doesn't even register. webtoon isn't a comics platform it's an ad platform that's somehow convinced a movement that carved out it's own platform twenty years ago that we need it

#this is inelegant but god im so furious all the time #fucking hell #i cannot express to yall how fucking bleak that conversation was this is where we're at now