I really truly feel like we need to talk about this, especially as someone who has grown up as an artist online.
I’ve absorbed some unhealthy mindsets over the years and have since spent a long time unlearning them, this is definitely one of the most insidious ones.
It’s SO easy to get into a mindset that unless you get x number of notes on your work like all those other creators, what you make isn’t worth anything.
But the truly nasty part about this mindset is you never reach “x number”, because it always gets bigger!
100 notes, 500 notes, 1,000 notes, 10,000 notes… as soon as you get a single post that reaches one of your milestones - you want it to get bigger.
It’s not surprising i mean there’s entire video games where the only reward is the number getting bigger, there’s a sense of validation from seeing that number grow.
But the internet is fickle, you cannot predict what will be picked up and what won’t. This is important to remember, so much of it is based on chance and not on your personal skill.
Like, there’s a constant stream of new content being put up online every second. Having someone see your post at all is honestly amazing if you think about it.
Anyway, it’s so so easy and so unbelievably unhealthy to fall into a mindset of ‘nobody reblogs my work, I can’t create anything good’. But it’s just not true!
Your value as a creator is not determined by a number on your social media page.
It’s determined by you, and what you value in your work. For your own mental health, try not to focus on the numbers.
Focus on the people - your friends, that person who likes and reblogs everything you post, the people who wait excitedly for your next creation. They’re the ones who matter, not the number at the bottom.
It’s not easy, but the less you tie your self worth to a nebulous, unreachable number the better you’ll feel about your work.
I’m sorry but it’s really annoying to see this keep happening on my dash. For those who don’t know,Pixiv is considering shutting down access to western users.
Why?
Because of edits and reposts onto social media sights, such as Tumblr, Facebook, even Twitter. The problem has been here for the past months and I really just get sad seeing everyone reblog edits and reposts of art that’sUNSOURCED.
I’m sorry if I seem bitchy, but this is a critical issue, because not only would this cut off fandom posters, it cuts off any person in the US from accessing Pixiv.
Pixiv artists are already deleting their works and accounts, more and more artists are deleting everything because of this. I have alreadymade a post about this on my main, and so havetwo ofmy friends. You may say we’re throwing a big deal about this, but the thing is- we’re just trying to make sure that us fans and future fans have the art resources.
Things to know:
ZEROCHAN AND WEHEARTIT ARE NOT SOURCES.
I REPEAT. ZEROCHAN AND WEHEARTIT ARE NOT SOURCES.
If you really absolutely don’t know, try the Google Images source thing.
If you ABSOLUTELY HAVE TO REPOST THEIR WORK, ASK THEM FIRST! It won’t hurt you to be polite, and even if they don’t understand english they probably will understand what you’re saying.
I find this very relevant to this blog so I hope you’ll allow me to give another PSA.
I see this happen on my dash sometimes and I’m not gonna lie, I did consider unfollowing the people that reblog unsourced fanarts. Especially more so on those so-called one piece confessions/dirty op confessions whatever. It’s getting ridiculous.
However, it’s my belief that every one of you are wonderful people who respects others, especially those who have worked hard in drawing and writing all the wonderful doujins and fanarts. So I hope I can raise some more awareness to this.
As usual I’m going to illustrate it in an easy way. (read right to left)
What supposed to happen:
What you’re doing when you don’t source:
What you’re making the artist do:
Every artist grow by displaying their work and getting critique. But when their work is spread around without any credit to the artist, AND EVEN MAKES THE OWN ARTIST DELETE IT FROM HIS/HER SITE it lost the purpose and meaning.
What you should do from now on (if you haven’t been doing so):
