A lot of people rely on The Artz to make a living, YCH sell pretty easily compared to other stuff.
They still get to draw something that interested them, commissioner gets their character in on it.

Aye but... there's a lot of YCH reminders from people who obviously aren't relying on art to make a living. Because, if we're honest, they're years behind the people who do. Reminders for reminders for pocket-money pieces that probably won't sell kind of dominates my screen some days and it's a little frustrating when it feels like there isn't a single finished piece on the page. Which could be FA's failure to adapt to the times and let things be tagged for easy finding.

Perhaps! Perhaps it’s become a decent tool for people to learn and still make something off their work, IDK. I ain’t judging.

A YCH is a way to draw something you enjoy and not get evicted for not being able to pay rent all at the same time. It's pretty great.

I mean, I do get that - I have and will use YCHs again in future because they're a very valid sales option, the artist gets to draw what they want to draw, and the buyer has the confidence of seeing some of the work up front.

Buuuuuuuut... there's a lot of reminder reminder reminder posts... and a lot of artists who... maybe aren't really ready to be making money... And some days it feels like it's drowning out the actual finished pieces. Browsing FA to find new artists is hard when it's 75% YCH sketches.

Just my 2p. Arguably it's the site design needs to change to partition such things and make them easier to find/ignore depending on what you want.

Okay, but that wasn't what your journal says. All it said was 'does no-one just draw as a hobby anymore?' which came across as pretty privileged and tone deaf to folks just trying to survive, especially at a time when bunches more people in already ridiculously low paid and underappreciated service jobs are suddenly out of work.

Don't blame the people for trying to live. Blame our system of economics for making it so that folks can't have the financial security to create what they want on their own terms.

You won't find anyone disliking them here - they've all already been driven off by the rabid fans.

Oh don't worry, we're still here. We're just too tired to argue against it anymore. >_>

SO melodramatic.

All the better to take your money with

I draw lots of pics for free!

Good. That's how you know you actually love the drawing rather than the side hustle :)

Wow. What a BS statement. Like I said in my other post-drawing for enjoyment vs making money are both equally as valid. Plus many people love drawing for money. It doesn't make them less valid as an artist. You're not only being condescending it's a sign of a superiority complex. You're not any better than people who post YCH's so get off that high horse.

Well, I draw, but I certainly don't enjoy it.

I do share the dislike for all the YCH ads posted and reposted ad nauseam, though.

One of the other problems is caused by social pressures.
If an artist does not sell or make money off of their art, then lots of people will consider them "not good enough and not worth the watch"
Which is why artists who sell their arts for freekin high prices are a heck of a lot more popular than those who sell for lower discounts or even draw for free.
Very few people actually like my works, because I am trying to be fair.

This isn't true at all in my experience.

Plus you've got over 4700 followers. That's a pretty decent amount and a lot more than 'very few'.

My account has been open ever since FA started in 2004 and has over 3000 art submissions , so the only thing I have to brag about there is the longevity.
4700 accounts +Watching is very misleading, as over the years many of those accounts had been abandoned by people who either switch accounts, make multiples, or were mass "watch bot" accounts.
The actual number of active users is actually very comparatively low, based on the amount of activity and low numbers that occurs on each of my submissions.

If my account had 4700 +Watchers and was only two years old, then THAT would be impressive and means I would have a lot more active users watching me. But you look at other accounts that have been around as long as min and see they have 20K or even 30K +Watchers.

I am a relative 'nobody' in this place because I only "draw for fun" , and have not been trying to appeal to the masses.

ô/

I'm not surprised. Millions of people are adhering to stay-at-home orders and are looking for alternative means of income until their non-essential service jobs reopen.

Sure, people still draw just for the fun of it. But not having food, electricity or a roof over your head is no fun at all.

YCHs are a good way to draw what you want, then sell it.
Also with Covid-19 messing up the economies, it's a safer/quicker way to try to make some money during it.

I very much appreciate your artsing. A ray of light in the 70% advertisements for YCH on the site.

I think a filter would be good anyways (not just for YCH's, but also for other tags).
The YCH's and reminders here make me go insane.

This really. A tag for it and FA actually partitioning its browse page by type would be great. Sometimes people will want to find YCHs and that's fine! But sometimes you'd like to see some finished art...

I actually think Reposts of YCHs should be against AUP. Post it once, if it doesn't sell, put up a reminder JOURNAL, not another art post.

I honestly thought they were... but maybe that has fallen off the TOS. I was sure way back when I joined that there was a clause about no reminders and don't flood the site with the same picture over and over.

It used to be against the AUP, but the admin had no real way to enforce it without proof that there was a violation.
Each time an artist would repost their ad, they delete the previous one, and there was no way to refer to the previous at all. And the mods suggested using some kind of third-party programs to "snapshot" a webpage to use as proof just in case the violator does it again, but that just ends up being more of a hassle than it is worth.

"The love of money is the source of all evil..."
I usually take biblical quotes with a big pinch of salt, but I've yet to find anything to disprove that one.

Did you mean to reply to my comment?
Because that seems to be very unrelated to what I was talking about.

YCHs are a sales tactic, greedy fuckers took it too far, I feel like it's related.

No, what I was talking about had nothing to do with 'greed', either.
I think you are talking to the wrong person.

Well you could say "greedy for attention" but you're right, I'm just... I was just ranting. Don't mind me. ^^;

I think currently they're under the same (totally unenforced) rules as stream notifications. YOu're only allowed to have one up per instance at a given time. So people just delete and repost when it's off the front page in their given target theme.

But then, the acquisition a few years back has not helped, especially regarding the huge volume of generic Second Life screencaps.

It's like... Guys. Seriously. If I wanted to see bland off-the-shelf characters poseballing on ancient furniture, I'd just log in. It'd still be annoying but at least it would be at full resolution with usable lighting.

I draw purely for a hobby and because I enjoy it.

Some say that if you're good at something, don't do it for free.
I say if you enjoy something, try not to involve money in it. It'll drive you mad.
But that comes from a guy who wishes he picked up a paintbrush instead of a writing pen from time to time, given how comparatively easy it is... and who has a deep dislike for greedy fuckers. >_>

oh it happens - but a lot of artists here do draw for a living.

but ya, YCH spam is a problem.

Art has ALWAYS been as much a commercial pursuit as it has something people did for enjoyment. The fact is we live in a world where money in a requirement. It's been like that for thousands of years. As long as we need money to survive people are going to try and make it via something they're good at. Either as their main source of income or some extra cash. It doesn't make their doing it less worthy than their doing it for enjoyment.

If you don't like YCH posts ignore them or unfollow people who do a lot of them. I wouldn't gripe about them, though. You never know when you're going to end up in a situation where the ability to post them becomes a necessity.

Sadly if everyone did as you say, there would be no Patreon. in the end it's business. obviously you still have the ability to refuse to pay for a YCH. most people here give the excuse of drawing for a living but. VERY RARE are the ones that don't work and draw. so in my opinion that argument don't stand. that being said it's whatever.

It must work for some people. It seems that there is a lot of it. I think it makes you look desperate, so I choose not to do it.

I've never been much of a follower, so I won't jump on every fandom trend. I think when it stops working, artists will stop doing it.

The reason for the saturation level of YCH reminders is because once a piece of art is finished, it generally only gets posted once by everyone involved. So when someone posts a YCH, you might get five, ten or more reminders, where you generally only get the finished piece posted two or three times. Similarly, recolor clones contribute to the saturation because you get the original post, plus five or ten YCH reminders, plus twenty or thirty near-identical pictures of a butt with some spooge on it with a flat-colored background.

YCHs are a way for artists to draw something they sorta want to draw but have someone else offset the cost of the time it takes to do so. To me they're a little 'meh' for the most part, and I definitely agree with the saturation problem, but they make the most sense from the perspective of optimization.

"All the better to steal your money with, my dear."