There are so many things I could say towards this but I'm worried they'd get me banned from the site

Try to keep it professional and not an attack on anyone or thing. I wish to know.

Well it's directed at the admin so...

So other than bad choices of admin, there isn't anything here you would change? What in your eyes specifically makes a great admin?

A person who responds to the needs of others on the site. There a many who accuse Dragoneer of being extremely biased; whether or not this is true I can't determine, but I have heard of many incidents where someone turned to him for help and were either ignored or they themselves were banned even though they had done nothing wrong.

Beyond that the site seems to experience very frequent crashes and 404's, and has deteriorated to the point it becomes slower and slower every week; attempting to access notes for example takes a ridiculously long time and I know my internet's not the cause of it because I access notes from various computers sometimes; they can't ALL have bad internet.

So, in my opinion, I would change the admin, giving it multiple people who can respond to the needs of the users, maintain the site reliably, and are not biased towards or against certain users on the site.

History of Comments oneself have made and..uh...a complete change of staff...just for the hell of it.

I agree with this!

Journal, shout, image comments? For how long a period, reasonably.

Everything! SF has unlimited shouts afaik without any problems and E621 def. has unlimited comment history without any problems

A more comprehensive, and UPDATED, search system, how long has it been since the search has been updated?

What specifically would make the search function better, any ideas? Does it not fins what you are looking for? Can you give me an example?

The current search system can easily miss pictures or the like simply because the words that match the picture are not used in the keywords, description or the title.

So a search that goes after the title, tags and descriptions?

something like that.

A (near) perfect filter than can be set personally, rather than making everyone else unable to see what I hate... I can just not have to see it XDD (Though I suppose if I stopped camping out on the front page I could avoid this too...)

Or are we speaking realistically?

I am speaking supremely realistically. Perhaps a filter on certain tags? If you " -pony" you don't see any art with a pony tag?

That or being able to have stream not show up in my "inbox" at all... XD The problem with the "tags" system is half the damn time no one uses it, or misspell things, etc, etc... and at the same time forcing someone to select all the elements in whatever they're submitting could cause issues in itself...

Capital idea. Probably maybe set things up so people can filter out certain types of adult artwork. Like the more "hardcore" fetishes can be blocked by a person if they choose it sort of similar to how the option to show adult content vs show clean only type stuff works. I don't intend on many real limits when I start doing art for other people and would be quite nice to be able to keep it all in one gallery and just have the person browsing filter out what they don't wish to see.

Be able to watch someone's art without watching their journals as well.

Folders in galleries in arrange things all neatly.

OMG This. So a watch for art and a friend for journals/art/updates?

Well I generally want to watch people's journals if I watch them for like, commission openings and stuff, but there are a few people who post really great art that I like to watch but post really infuriating vague journals or passive aggressive shit and stuff, generally act like terrible or immature people.. and it's a real drag to see negative journals in the inbox every day even if I just delete them.

I want to get rid of the drop downs, and make folders possible.

Maybe stick a chat system for friends?

I don't want to change anything, I just want it to work. Not taking 10-30mins to access my mail would be awesome. Actual work thumbnails. Updated "critter lists" when posting different things. A search engine that is customizable beyond what it is now. Those are only some of my wants.

and I should mention that I know they are limited on what they can do, I'm not ripping on them, they do what they can *nods*

Your comment broke the one above yours for some reason, yet another thing to add to the list!

odd, they all look fine to me... *grrs at it*

Serious reply: Being able to go through journals/comments/watches/etc the same way you can do with submissions.

Non-serious reply: New management.

I don't understand how that would work, could you explain it a bit more? Like journals have thumbnails or all journals from a single person in one entry instead of a thousand different notifications?

Put it this way.

Say you have 500 journals (or comments or whatever) on your alerts. Only a certain number are viewable, you can only view older ones once you delete the newer ones. This indicates that they're still there on your alerts, however unviewable until the aforementioned is done.

What I'd like is the ability to go through these comments/journals as if they were pages without having to delete newer ones. Especially since unlike submissions there is no way to re-order them as oldest first.

You just blew my mind away with nacho sundae's... I'm in complete support of this! <3

An improvement on the site? How about we start all over and build it back up from scratch... cause honestly there are so many things wrong that it makes my head spin. For instance... if an artist blocks you for whatever reason, you can no longer fav their art...

Wtf?

I always love finding new artists I have never seen before, then when I go to fav bomb their gallery I find I'm blocked lol. This is just one of many, many things I could mention that's wrong with FA. Alas, I now have nacho sundae's on my mind and must make this happen irl. >.> <.< FOR SCIENCE!

<3<3<3<3<3<3

I actually approve of the new change, though I can see how it would be a bit annoying. What are the other things that make your head spin?

why do people open bottled water and pour it in glasses... this seems like such a waste of time and precious plastic....

Oh! You mean on FA?

You approve of that change? can I ask why? It's a pointless update that doesn't do anything at all except prevent fav spam (Which can get someone banned for doing). They didn't need something to prevent that sort of thing... They could have honestly built in something to prevent people from removing their whole galleries and re uploading them just to try and get more attention (would have been just as pointless heh)

But another thing about FA that makes my head spin...

The fact you can't have the option to block journals alone from people who are known for spamming them... Wouldn't that be a better improvement? Answer: Yes.

How about the fact they don't have every known animal species in the search system or how about the fact we have just a fav feature but not a rating system of any kind?

People like it but we don't know how much they like it to grade our work proper.

Those are things that could happen that would be a massive improvement to this site. You're asking for something currently wrong with it that drives me insane.

How about the fact that art liberties are 'censored' just because this servers sponsors don't want to see it... While other sites allow all kinds of artistic freedoms without questioning what they are about. If they are seen as something they weren't meant to be it causes unwanted drama, art removals and threats of being banned if it keeps up from our lovely group of admins. <3

Don't get me wrong, I love FA... but its got quite a few problems.

As for why I agree with the 'no fav' policy is that when I ban someone, I want nothing to do with them and I don't really want to see their name popping up in my notifications nor should they be able to still have easy access to my account nor my artwork. Sure they can save it and go around it, but for me it is more of a principle of the thing, a ban meaning 'leave me alone.'

So not having every single known species be searchable bothers you? Do you mean when you are trying to list the species in an upload?

No, I mean when artists do art for a species that isn't on the list it must go under 'other'... for instance 'Penguin' isn't in the list. I know an artist that does a lot of cute Penguin artwork. It's something of a pet peeve, like your banning someone meaning they can't even show you they appreciate your artwork. :P

Just because you don't get along with someone doesn't mean they can't show you love for your artwork. Honestly I think its a lose for the artist for having such a thing... considering these people can still watch you, doesn't stop them from taking your art and putting it in a folder to show off to others and give you some new watchers either. :P Which I will honestly say, I do often. ^.=.^

But yes, fun times on FA. Who knows, maybe one day we can start posting journals about things we love about FA. <3 ^.=.~

-keyword blocking in search
-fix the thumbnail views
-folders
-choose to watch only art or journals, or watch for both art and journals
-fix the security holes and bugs

All pretty much basic things that would make the site better.

I'd love all that, but for me it'd be even better if Auction journal/images were in a section of their own that you could choose to not follow.
I never bother with auctions, so it's just spam to me.

Oh, stream images/journals as well.

Being able to post stories and have them available to be read on the web page, and not having to be downloaded to be read.

I have to post my stories as pics, just so that ppl can actually read the story when they open the page. How off putting is it to have to download something before being able to read it? I know some people manage to do this but I have never had much success. I once managed to post a story with the text visible but every single comma, apostaphy, full stop, question mark, exclamation point, etc... was changed to a '<?>' symbol making it painful and nearly impossible to read.

So more writing friendly, gotcha.

the only thing I'd want is more non-fatal vore's but I think that doesn't apply to this scenario.

A toggle: Disable viewing journals. Sometimes they're a bit too distracting and off topic. Or disable seeing specific people's journals.

-basic tune-ups.

-folders for art

-make it so when you make a journal, you have to pick a category before you post it (i.e. business/commission related, meme, personal, vent/rant, questions/help, etc, etc) so when you go through journals, you select what type you'd like to see. I think it would make things better for everyone. so important things that may apply to your interests (say you're interest in commission specials, or commission status update journals) so they're aren't getting lost in the piles of other things, or if you wanna go look at some memes, or whatever, keeps things organized to what you're looking for. perhaps the ability to sort by poster within such categories. I know so many people that just nuke journals because they're such a mess to look through.

-as an person who commissions a lot, I like to make sure the artist gets as much of the attention as possible, maybe add a box in the submit option that you put the artists name and a link to their submission of it, then on when it's posted, above the piece will be a decently visible info display box that makes it super clear who the artist was. since I think a lot of people fav stuff without realizing I DIDNT MAKE THIS!!!

I have other ideas, but those are more opinionated then anything really helpful to the site.

One thing to change?

Make those "Streaming <x>" artworks absolutely forbidden. >_>

Posting a journal about it is fine. Posting the same piece of art over and over again is not. Doing both is even more not <_<

/likely unpopular opinion

Be able to flag pieces as 'Wanting Critique' and then having the ability to flag one's post as a Critique, with like a red border or something of that nature. Submissioner approved, though, so can't just flag a post on something not allowing it.

But, maybe that's not something quite fitting for the site. :p

I would Have the art ratings more... well Strict. Its really annoying when I find Adult artwork in the Mature or even general categories.

What would your rating system look like, what is mature and what is adult?
Have nips or bulge, mature but if dick or vag its adult?

Gender specific Parts with "fleshy bits" would be strictly adult for me and I do Not want to see that ever lol

Mature, Would just be a Sheath since its covered in fur and doesnt show anything "fleshy"

and what you said.

The only problem with that is showing fleshy bits isn't strictly adult in nature. In the grand scheme of the art world it's actually mature art. It's when there's an erection or bodily fluids is when it becomes adult in nature. Might work for those with sheaths but not every character out there has a sheath. ^_-

The three Rating categories still seem very much blurred, however.

Not really. What it is is a lot of people merely not understanding what's actually mature and what's blatantly porn. The problem is people mis-categorizing adult as mature. Because the 3 system works in the sense for those that want happy clean "wholesome" art, the other more darker and mature themes such as extreme violence, drug use, artistic nudes, etc. and then adult for the porn. You'd be surprised at how often people really are squeamish with even just the mature themes yet have no problems looking at porn OR just want the happy clean stuff. Thus we have the 3 category system in that aspect.

Maybe. But I found a number of porn pics in the midst of art I searched through on FA with a mature rating.

Yup. That's my point exactly. It's people miscategorizing porn as mature. :) Couple that up with little to no enforcement on it, there ya go.

Definitely a major code update. Get something more modern. Better transparency support in the thumbnails, gallery folders, the search function to NOT be limited by 2,000 results. Makes it harder to find older art if the keyword is a common one. A bit more professionalism and less biasness among site administration. Posting YCH/Adoptables to another tab and leaving them out of the submissions section would be quite nice. The YCH spam is getting a tad old and crazy how many of those notices I'm deleting these days. Having a separate section for business related postings would be fantastic. Plus if I'm looking for a YCH or adopt I can check the proper category.

Weasyl's overall site design is quite nice, getting to set your own banner, folders and what not and even characters is slick and FA I feel would benefit greatly from providing similar options. Gives someone the opportunity to personalize their page here a bit more. Oh and for the love of god... a dark grey or black background option.

A feature that auto removes faves that got taken down and stay X'd out.

Or at the very, very least leaves the title/name of the pic or a cached thumbnail that sticks around for something like 30 days so we can re-locate the art since often they are removed by an artist for reorganizing purposes such as moving to another gallery.

Eh that would be nice to but I don't want to sift through all the faves I have which like 60 pages or so I think? just to find all those artists to refave I'd prefer the auto delete over it

That's the great thing about "options" :) Just this site seems to have a hard time providing them.

Indeed

Mentioned probably 100 times. Folders~ A way to specifically organize particular art and split up the gallery so it doesn't get to congested.

Maybe group journals by categories?
Example by color or something of that sort in messages? Maybe just split up?

Example
Advertisement journals?

Another message sort for streaming? Like Weasyl has almost?

Keyword filters so people can stop crying just because they saw something that isn't in there taste? XD


Random spewing of ideas.

The biggest three: Ability to watch art without getting journals. Ability to favorite journals. Folders.

Better note system. Nuff said.

If I could change one thing... I would allow for folders in the gallery.

If I could change other things:

Comment chain improvements (make it so it is easier to follow a conversation)
.....comment voting system
Incorporating the IRC chat and the forums into the site and prettied up so they are more functional/accesible
A "comments box" where improvements and complaints can be submitted
ability to watch for journals, watch for art, and watch for commission postings
an open market where people could post their commission offerings
.... which includes a review page for people who purchased commissions through the market to review the commissioner
a page where you can view all the ads at once

Fool proof age system. No furs under the age 18 allowed.

Such as?

A unified message list, rather than having journals and submissions on seemingly different pages.

An updated search engine. The one we currently have is pretty clunky.

Get rid of the dumb emoticons. Hardly anyone uses them. They're wasting space in the reply section.

Generally the site works okay for me (barring occasional prolonged downtime, uploading submissions being shonky, etc..) but there are a few things I think would make it better.

A personal comments history would be lovely. I can't really imagine any sane database implementation they may have running that would make this difficult, but I've not built any heavy-use art sites either.

I'm a huge fan of tags, but lots of submissions don't have any or they're incomplete. A way for users to propose tags (perhaps from a pre-made list to avoid proposing "shit_art" or whatever) would be neat. Probably with an artist veto button, or even the ability to disable the capability on a given image or gallery-wide basis.

A tag blacklist that also works in the recent submissions notifications. Combined with the above, this would also partially address other issues like people wanting to filter out streaming announcements, YCH auctions, etc.

Expanding the allowed search fields to include the artist.

A direct way to link the works of others in your gallery (e.g. "Artist Bob made this image for me" ensures they chose an actual member on the site, automatically links to the artist page and actual submission (if available), stores only one copy of the image on the server, changes the copyright notice under the image, etc...) The cost:benefit on this one may be too high to bother with.

It's inconceivable we (still) can't remove favorite entries where the submission has been removed.

I would give the comments and shouts an overhaul. God, it's annoying to reply to shouts.

I'd also give FA a modern redesign. Now it looks like a site with design statement from 2001

The option for watchers of an artist to add tags to works given some artists dont tag at all...

I think it would be nice if we had two separate tag setups for images. The ones placed by the user which onl they can edit, and a separate list that anyone with an account can edit. This combined with a filter system of black-list and priority tags, in which you can also select User vs Public lists, would greatly improve the search functionality.

Black List: Duh, if its on here you never see these images.
Priority Tags: If an image you search also has tags on your priority list they show up first also displaying what tag(s) from the list brought them forward. This way if I place hermaphrodite on my priority list and I search for tentacle then all of the tentacle images will show up, but hermaphrodite tagged images will show up first. And if scat is on my BlackList no images with scat tag will show up even if they are hermaphrodite or tentacle.

The Journals.... Do delete the Journals I have.... to delete 100 journals for cleanup on here takes an hour
because they don't have those multi-click things like they do for notifications.
I sat there trying to figure out how to keep the journals I wanted without accidentally deleting them.
I taped paper to the screen. It was the only way.
And I still didn't finish my journal clean up, because it took too long.
The page refreshes EVERY TIME I click DELETE. oh gosh, just aweful.

And I see about everyone has multiple accounts just to organize their art.
'Here's my Commissions account, My personal account, My Fanart account, etc.'