Which change if may I ask?

FA is indeed cool place because of being same

Just in general I guess, but many things...social medias always changing, places like Deviantart getting ruined, new apps popping up..FA stays stable and the same xD

Very true :)

ah this; yes. Cara popped up recently too. I'm glad there is new cool place

FA still needs recommendation system.

Nearly everybody I've found on FA, I've found through DA.

This is the reason FA is getting more and more silent. Fresh blood is having trouble.

I find most new artists by searching other people's faves, or looking at art appreciator accounts.

Me too. But that's active searching and people are lazy. Recommendation system is a passive search. Besides, to get faved artist must first to be found.
Look at this guy for example
https://www.furaffinity.net/user/pipix/
I think he deserves more tan 31 watcher in five months.

It is quite comforting.

I remember back in the day pretty much cursing its utter inability to change, not to mention its massive instability. But here we are, many years hence, and you're right, it's kinda reassuring...

I still wish they'd provide an API though.

Right? After DeviantArt died, FurAffinity is my top social media. It's simple and reliable. And no AI stuff allowed, so you know you're meeting human artists. :) (*It's fucking sad we have to be called "human artists" now, that's what industry -change- can do.)

Gotta be honest, I think we are never going to get a social media again the way it used to be, even the newer ones won't magically fill the holes made by the older ones crumbling down.
I'm really glad for FA and I always love checking this place.

In this age, some stability is rare and so so soothing.

For better AND for worse, the only constant is change.

Change is a constant thing, but yeah, I think changes are far quicker nowadays.

That's because (as I tend to put it), everyone just 'has' to have the newest, bestest, shiniest thing out there, on the market, etc. But, the older stuff isn't bad either ..it's just a bit harder to find.

Or, it is just obsolete.

I've ruminated over this a lot lately, the AI stuff and algorithms really took a lot of joy away from social media and I read that even Instagram is going to implement new type of ads that you *have to* watch before you can keep scrolling. If that happens, I'm deleting the app - thankfully it's not a major part of my freelancing anyway :)

Whatt, I haven't heard that about IG yet...that really sucks -_-

I haven’t had any of those mandatory ads yet but I read the article a few days ago. Just like blogs these days, all the popular apps seem to become ad filled garbage :/

That sounds absolutely awful!! As if putting ads in between posts when you're scrolling through someone's page/profile wasn't bad enough -__-

Too much greed. My husband always says ''they don't want just a lot of money, they want ALL OF the money''

Haha basically, and disguised as providing a service for the "common good."

I went back to tlkfaa last year like an absolute madwoman (and even there it's a little bit different)

FA has some problems, but the folks running it haven't lost sight of what it is...an art gallery.

I have seen a lot of journals complaining that it's not enough like a social media platform like twitter. "Hmm, this online gallery is okay, but you know what it really needs? No gallery function at all, and 1000x more of other people's uninformed opinions thinly veiled as fun facts. I also want people to have to mindlessly scroll on their phone for 45 minutes just to see the last five images I've produced."

I don't understand that at all.

No seriously, fuck that

People have that option, the art + twitter, in furrynetwork. That site, however, is quite dead. If people wanted that sort of thing THAT bad, they should have made more of an effort to make it relevant outside of FOMO.

I WOULD like more of a connection on FA to interact with other users, but then I'm reminded that FA also has telegram and discord groups. I had wished they had an on site chat like Sofurry had, but I can see that getting immediately out of hand.

Overall, while FA could use some improvements, it's nice to have its stability, and nice knowing that the staff values human made artwork over AI trash.

People did liked FN initially but it flopped cause all the devs just dropped the ball for a loooong time. But also a major problem was that it had no scope and decisive direction - people just voted what they wanted on the forum. And perhaps the devs didn't really like how much people desired it to not be like twitter, most requested features was to ditch the timeline and remove infinite scroll XD

Weasyl had/has similar issues. That site irritated me, because it had a LOT of potential, but when your director basically abandons the site and you seemingly have one staff member.....it don't look good. Their last site communication was 3yrs ago

Yeah, to me Weasyl also bugged out and I couldn't login for the first two years, I had a friend manage my account in hopes they'd fix the problem. When it was finally fixed the site was already dead. But I know they also had some sketchy moderation problems regarding suggestive artwork (FA has suffered similar issues - which site hasn't - BUT they have quickly kicked out the problematic moderators that had too sensitive trigger finger for banning users).

New SoFurry if it ever completes does look super promising for it's aesthetic and features, I'm also glad they're taking time and not rushing into hype though. However I'm not sure if new sites in this old format of having a closed userspace & run by one/few admin(s) is going to work anymore, it's a base for too many potential problems and dangers, do we really want to risk so much into hands of a few people? Also it's not really fair a single entity needs to host everything, it's expensive, the fandom is no longer 40k people, it's probably more like one million.). Sites do need to start using something like activity pub in the future instead of trying to hoard their own entire audience, it's much more convenient if you have just one account somewhere and can follow creators from across platforms.

In a similar fashion many people/groups have already done sorta similar integrations for FA (although probably mostly without their permission), but FA can already be essentially viewed through telegram, tor, most artwork also mirrored to e6 which enables really convenient browsing options. That is likely a big reason why FA is still thriving (convenient to artists because it does not change and also convenient to their followers for so many different viewing opportunities, everyone can have something they enjoy to use). But switching to a proper way of cross-platform sharing would also respect image & artist rights better, because it'd be forwarding the literal original post and not just some parts of it.

Personally, I do like the closed off space that FA, Sofurry, and other artsites are. They serve the intended userbase, and helps create and maintain a hub. Having an art gallery on media like Twitter or Discord or whatever other social media platform doesn't work, because there's no way to host a gallery/portfolio. Cara is doing that to an extent, blending social media with a portfolio option (it looks like a twitter x instagram cross), but Cara has its own issues right now. and it doesn't seem like it's a casual art posting site like, say FA is. I can upload finished pieces, or I can upload complete trash sketches and it's fine.

It's nice to have a hub to go to that can host an art gallery, but is also very welcoming to casual users that just want to check out art. I think that the external Discord and Telegram options are good, though they could use some more advertisement by staff on the main site. That's likely the best option as far as mingling with others outside of a forum type platform like this. I believe hubs are important, and have a place still in the greater online ocean. Another thing that's good with this is the hub itself taking a stand against AI "art". I know that FA bans it, and I believe Weasyl was/is? I'm not sure of the other big furry sites. I'm only 100% aware of FA, and then Cara, which is not explicitly a furry audience. An important thing with having hub sites like FA banning AI "art" sends a message to not only artists (come here! We bar AI "art" from the site!), but to other hub sites themselves (see this? Ban AI "art"! Artists will come to you and set up an account and use your site! The artists will attract more users!)

The problem with closed spaces is that people do not want to join new ones (it's exhausting to rebuild your audience, your account and who you follow, all over again, cumulative with all your peers not really wanting to do so either), unless it's a "all inclusive" format that already has "everyone in it", which inevitably leads to people flocking to predatory big corporate platforms that violate user security and image rights for artists, and at a certain threshold of users they will implement even more exploitative measures, with no end to it until the platform dies out. Big corporate platforms can exist because they make money from exploiting the users, the users are the product they sell to other companies. The only alternative to a big closed-platform where users aren't exploited and can pay their hosting is a paid platform, but we already know that will not work out.

Cara is intended to be a closed party for artists to network and find work opportunities, like art station was, it's not intended to be a place where people can follow you. It is not for individual artists making a living from having an active online following, because the site is not intended for follower-types (they know it'd be impossible to attract that sort of people, and they know they do not have resources to host a massive platform either). Time will tell if Cara manages to pay their hosting bills with just artists being active on it, it seems a little desperate atm.

With FA I think it's better to say that we (the users and artists) are simply incredibly lucky that this place is alive. But I do not believe the reasons behind justify that it's a good thing: The owner is crazy passionate to keep this place alive, he values FA over his own health and everything in the world - that's not a fair burden (and what then when he truly burns out?). Also the external options to view FA have been done without consent of FA and it's users, some of the options are and have been malicious (tor hosts everything not respecting that some pieces might had a good reason to have been deleted), most of FA is also reposted to e6 which was scraped to train AI, also some artists really don't want their content reuploaded without all of it's related information elsewhere even if it is for the benefit of being more seen.

Building an actually open way to share posts would be much more ethical, also that would mean the original post retains it's rights entirely and can still be followed and shared around, it cannot be subjected to closed-space terms of service (like forced opt-in to AI training or forced website watermarks or reprocessing that some sites do).

Statistically speaking, if you have something at least functional, when you go to change it, you're more likely to do so for the worse. Change is not a virtue, adaptability and flexibility are.

A very deep: Yeah.

Although I would not consider it earth-shaking if FA implemented a video player option less than 15 years out of date, and perhaps better formatting for stories.

No no, it needs more random social media shit and overcomplicated menus everywhere so it can look "updated" like the latest renovation fashion that will be dated in 2 years

T__T

I'm thankful that FA has remained stable, too. I miss the days when dA was kind of the natural home that people went to after sort of "graduating" from TLKFAA. After dA I went to IG, but that's changed now, too.

Yeah... I guess we should give credit where credit is due - with all the crazy changes going around, FA doesn't really change.