pwned-by-twilight wrote:
Yeah, dA does have its share of trolls, sparkledogs, attention whores, etc., but it's still a respectable art site where even big time programmers, cartoonists and such post their work and where I can get my OCT action on! Then the fact most of the comic artists are there makes it hard to knock entirely. It can't be any worse or unorganized than 4chan, can it? *feels a sense of foresight that that last sentence is inviting a lecture*
DA's main problem is that its community is
too organized. All that the badge and favoriting systems do, is that they discourage honest opinions about art. So people suck up to each other and the entire comment system is one giant "you scratch my back, I scratch yours" scenario. People favorite horrible art, because they know that in return their art will get favorited, and that results in even absolutely horrendous art getting 5-20 favorites, at least.
The fact that even the most pathetic attempts at art get praised, in turn, causes the place to be a safehaven for weeaboos, furry fetishists(the kind that genuinely believes being a furry is a "lifestyle"), teenage drama queens, hipsters, yaoi shippers, manpregs, inflations, vore fetishists and, worst of all, fanboys and fangirls. And all of them build their own little communities that circlejerk with each other for months. And so, if anyone ever posts an honest critical opinion, or even an obviously trolling critical opinion(that can be safely ignored) it always results in Internet drama. Even when an opinion is constructive criticism, the person that posts it must fear a ban, because the criticized will get the specific circlejerking community he belongs to, up in arms that there's a "mean troll" that needs reporting.
Yes there are famous people using DA, but those usually have a blog, a homepage, a twitter or whatever, where you can watch their stuff, too. DA is the most popular art site so it's bound to have famous users, but it doesn't mean it is a respectable art site. It just means that in the entire sea of garbage you can, at times, find high quality stuff, but if the vast majority is garbage, then the site, as a whole, is by no means "respectable".
Anyway, feel free to call me a weeaboo, and I probably am for bringing this up, but if you compare DA to Pixiv.net, Pixiv has numerous famous users, too(less than DA, but that's cause it's not in English). But more importantly, Pixiv has a proper rating system,
which is anonymous. So in a scale of 1-10 whether your artwork is good or not,
you will know that the opinions are honest, which is how it should be. Pixiv also has a bloody tag system, how a site like DA cannot have a proper tag system in 2011, is beyond me. Pixiv has a search function that actually works, DA's is attrocious. These all result in DA hosting, in general, a far worse level of artwork than Pixiv, period. That's not to say Pixiv doesn't have it's fair share of garbage, but those always get bad ratings and this is often enough to discourage bad artists to post, until they improve.
And the anonymity of the rating system on Pixiv brings me to my last point. You mentioned 4chan, I like imageboards(big ones anyway), and I like 4chan. That it's unorganized, is part of the fun. Everyone is anonymous(except tripfags obviously), so you get to read a lot of opinions and thoughts you'd never read if you were on an Internet forum or a social network. Sure it's unprotected and you may end up seeing nasty stuff(especially on /b/), but it teaches you to not take the Intenet seriously and that internet arguments and shitstorms are all ulimately pointless, which is something everyone should learn. It's something, I wish I had learned way sooner than I did.
Also when people think 4chan they usually think /b/ which is a somewhat unfair generalization. There's a ton of boards and most of them have their own unique atmosphere. Some of the most fun discussions I've had on the Internet were on /a/, /lit/ and to a lesser extent /jp/.
_________________
Stanisław Lem wrote:
I hadn't known there were so many idiots in the world until I started using the Internet.