Have fanbase + artist/creator relationships been getting worse and worse the last couple of years...

Have fanbase + artist/creator relationships been getting worse and worse the last couple of years? Seems like we went from "It's a good way for them to stay connected" to just pure shit and non-stop harassment (MLP, Homestuck, Steven Universe, Gravity Falls, Zoophobia).

Twitter was a mistake. Plain and simple.

It's difficult to manage etiquette over multiple platforms/websites over the internet. Social media sites can act as an anonymous disconnected bulletin board and their ability and effectiveness to manage reports can vary from site to site. Repercussions for actions can be little to nonexistent if the person in question isn't a complete dumbass.

I think the most efficient way to facilitate this stuff currently would have to be through action on the artist's end. I could see more policies being put in place by corporations contracting out artists and directors on how they can interact in online public spaces under their assumed identity. Not exactly like NDA's but more of guidelines they have to follow.

An audience having direct contact with a creator can teeter into the danger zone for both sides. In the end we can't have nice things.

Creator-fan interactions should be kept to a minimum.

This. It is basically impossible to not sound like a massive cockwagon on Twitter no matter the content or intent of your words.

It isn't just limited to animation. Just look at the horrible mess that is video games PR from both sides.

In general, the customer/worker, consumer/provider and audience/creator is a terriblescene. One end is always antagonizing the other while playing victim and fueling the tensions between them.

I don't entirely blame social media, however - It's only more noticeable now thanks to massive media channels that the internet has opened. I don't think it would have been any better decades ago.

>Gravity Falls
>non-stop harassment
Hirsch hasn't gotten enough hate to even be discouraged. He thrives off the fan interaction.

>inb4 Quintel teaching how to put a baby to sleep

- I can feel potent if I can affect someone with high social status
- a small amount of effort with the help of technology can create a huge effect -- and if they choose to defend themselves, they must always expend more effort than my accusations required
- how you behave and what you say online can always be called inappropriate, because what you say online can be moved to a new context effortlessly, or it is broadcast to many very different contexts at the same time.

Shit's fucked, yo.

this is why so, so many creators have secret twitters

...the problem isn't on the artists' end

Uhh yeah it is there are a million fucking frogposters who like to say fuck niggers and one artist who has everyone watching them. Its easier to control one person than nail jelly to a wall and weed out the "bad" fans.

your solution is on the artists' end; that doesn't mean that's where the problem is

It's the newfound connection between creators and fans that's fortified the already-overblown sense of entitlement that exists in the latter's mind.

It used to be that you had to go to a convention to talk to a creator and get a reply. Now you can just send message upon message to somebody and you're bound to get an answer every now and again. With every response comes a new layer to that entitlement. Soon they start to think that they're not only friends, but a direct influence on the creator. That's when the shit begins.

How does one fix this without just blocking fans out altogether? I'd like to make a comic one day and while I don't anticipate it being huge, I want to try my best to steer away from the "Hussie" path. I'd still like to share my art and stuff with fans if I ever did get a moderate fan base without being harassed on "when's the next update".

Would that just mean I would need to complete the entire comic before I start posting it online to avoid that issue?

The dark side of that relationship has always been around (think Stephen King's Misery which came out in 1987) but I think it's just more explicit and openly displayed now. Technology has definitely contributed. It's like says, you end up with a one vs many scenario now where words can be twisted and removed from their context not to mention how easy it is to preserve "evidence" in the form of screencaps. And with the boundary between private and public life collapsing and blurring, something intended in a private context can have consequences in the public sphere.

I don't think you should completely block out fans. Fans and fandom both have positive aspects. I think it's more a challenge of being aware of what parts of you are on public display and picking your words carefully.

Im an engineer we use 6 sigma.

If you hate racists and want a quick problem solution you could always genocide white people. No way youd be left with offensive annoying "not racist" black people

what are you trying to get across here

First post best post.

Course it's not the artists fault. But the only manageable way to avoid mitigate the fanatics is for the artist to be careful in how they interact with and what they absorb from their fans.

On the individual level you can't control what a fuckton of people do on the internet, nor the sites that house them, but you can control what take from them. It's just more pertinent nowadays because they have a direct channel to you depending on where on the internet you set yourself up at. Reporting and banning can only go so far, and having a fangroup establish "ground rules" among peers just turns into a clusterfuck where everyone is policing one another on whats acceptable.

I feel like a major factor is Tumblr and its bullshit extremist social justice.

Though, I don't lurk very much. It's probably true with Homestuck and SU though.

This has existed before tumblr though. Zutarans and various bat shit insane parts of fandoms that are loud as fuck and far too obsessed with their favorite fiction.

If anything the social justice shit is a side effect of the same groups, since they mostly bitch about fictional characters than real people.

Fanbase + Aritst/creator relationships have always been shit, this isn't anything new. I cannot think of a single work of media that has become better due in part to the creator acknowledging its fanbase.

all that shit migrated from LJ. The drama shit that existed on LJ gained a greater following once people started jumping ship to Tumblr.

Can someone fill me in on what happened, all I heard was a SU member was chased of tumblr but I don't know who (Lauren I assume?), when, or for what reason.

Not that user, but realistically its become a situation where the creator/artist/whomever gets irritated by fans who decide to view it through their own lens. Not having perspective of the creative process, or where the work is intended to go and making their own ideas per what they want from the show. In the case being cited in op, its a kids cartoon that has undoubtedly taken some risky moves in character relationships but understands there is a line in the sand they can't cross that adult fans want them to to fulfill their own projected fantasies onto the work. Per your statement about being overly defensive, I feel like the problem is a need to vent against all the arguments they're presented with not just those directly at hand. Is it the best way to present counter-point, no. But it feels like the case regardless. They end up redressing all the underlying issues they're facing and yes it's wrong because yes they come off as overly defensive. Can there be comfortable natural give and take between creators and fans, absolutely but Twitter isn't the place for that, if only for the simple fact that it's limited and not the intent of what it was created to perform.

A creator on SU responded to the fans wanting their ship not being addressed in the show and the creator over-reacted to said shipping and shut down her Twitter account when it got out of hand.

by what metric is it an overreaction to shut down a Twitter account

I mean, when you make a show for manchildren you have to be prepared for this kind of behavior.

Maybe one day western people will be more like their Asian counterpart and respect creators.

You're not making sense, bub.

It's not a show for man-children it's a show for children

Are you serious? Maybe it's poe's law but you know Japanese fans rip up their copies of their manga when it takes a turn they don't like, right?

the manchildren didn't do this, it was the fat chicks.

>Maybe one day western people will be more like their Asian counterpart and respect creators.

It's always an overreaction because you can fucking make your account private to friends only.