/ot/ - Off-Topic

>>4883
>Bluesky now has the building blocks for fandom space, so I'm hoping it will grow.
I hope it dies. All tranny-infested twatter clones deserve to die.

>>4950
I simply lack the energy to post my shit on multiple sites. I don't get how other westerners do this, maybe being social media addicted helps. Just hearing about people "maintain" eight different accounts including instashit makes me feel sick.

>>4882
Asian fujos are much less annoying about this because people that want to monetize usually go pro, the average western BNF wants clout but lacks the discipline to actually have it as a real job.

Some interesting preemptive censorship news–pixiv hiding misc NSFW from US/UK users: https://www.pixiv.net/info.php?id=10835

I had my region set to Japan already for some reason I don't even remember, but be sure to check on yours and change if applicable.

where were you when tiktok was kill (in the US)

(does it have a fujo presence? are we going to start seeing fujotok refugees?)

>>5105
Honestly never used the site but I do know there was a fujo presence on it becuase they make micro AMV style videos.

>>5105
I see vid thumbnails sometimes while googling and the hot takes are pretty terrible.
If people start unironically calling bl "mlm" I'll cry.

>>5106
I find it funny that they call them edits, just like how kids call any not necessarily viral funny videos or pics "memes." The language is just so unspecific.

>>5108
I'll take "edit" over "fancam" any day.

>>5108
Yeah it bothers me too, but I also think the term AMV has been poisoned and is associated with being "cringe" so they don't use it which is a shame.

>>5105
Fandom TikTok is nearly all puriteens so that flood is going to be extremely unpleasant.

>>5105
I don't think imageboards will ever have the same audience as TikTok. If anything, the concept of an imageboard is antithetical to a social media platform specifically designed to accrue followers and show your face to the world. It doesn't provide the same dopamine hit if it's just a bunch of randos replying to your post with no 'likes.' I could see a massive immigration to YT, like what happened with Vine. Twitter will probably see an increase, too, but it's already polluted and I think there's probably already a massive overlap. I've never used TikTok because I hate social media, especially when it's focused on broadcasting yourself and trying to get random people to follow you, so maybe my assessment is wrong.

1/2 -

As most of us already know, Twitter has changed how its block function works in addition to preventing users from opting out of its AI training bullshit. Because of this a lot more artists/writers/professionals have made an effort to either crosspost or jump to Bluesky permanently. Since it has been about a week and my feed is no less active, I'm going to make an effort post about getting started there. Most of this isn't new info to this site but it's all over in the Random Thoughts thread.

Sky Follower Bridge (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/sky-follower-bridge/) - this is an addon that you run while on your "Following" page on Twitter that makes finding the same people on Bluesky easier. It's not perfect, however, and will flag "pfp by @artistyouwant" as the bsky page of artistyouwant, so be sure to double check the ones marked "Included handle name in description". This addon is also available for Chrome.

It might seem daunting to do this (I follow about 1k people on Twitter) but keeping the tab open and chipping away at it over the day had me at the bottom of the list quicker than I thought it would. Of those thousand about 400 were on Bluesky and actively posting!

Appealing features:
Block/mute lists. Individually curated lists of people you never, ever want to see posts from. My lists are mostly antis, AI/crypto bros, chuds, and content scrapers. It seems like a hell of a trust exercise to mass block off of what an individual says about other posters, but a quick skim of the profiles in the list will usually tell you if they are on the mark. There have already been some light scuffles about list qualifiers (a person who hates incest but is not an "anti" was butthurt about being on an anti list) but I find that so far they are on the mark. If you are unsure about the validity of a list, muting is the less nuclear option. Mutes are not reflected in the API like blocks are (which you can see on https://clearsky.app/).

>>6742
2/2 -

Block works differently on Bluesky. If you block a user who is in your comments, NO ONE can see what they posted. Comment sections are much more chill and I can't tell if that's because of the site culture of only engaging with stuff you like or if I'm getting to them after blocks have been applied. You can also unlink a quote of your post if you don't want it escaping containment. There is currently a lot less vagueposting and negativity in fandom spaces there because of these features.

If you missed tumblr levels of tagging etiquette, Bluesky is trying to bring it back. Tags are both blockable and followable in the form of "feeds". Feeds are custom lists of posts you can make yourself or subscribe to. For example, if you wanted a feed with nothing but images of a ship, you could give it #shipname and set it to images only. Feed creation/search is kind of jank right now (I use skyfeed to create and bluefeed to browse) but despite this it's my favorite feature. I've found a lot of lists relevant to me made by other people just by word of mouth, so if you don't want to deal with the jank you still have plenty of options.

current cons:
no private accounts
no direct gif upload
you WILL get flashbanged by untagged 3dpd men posting their dicks and balls on the discover feed

Right now it is objectively the best option for general fandom needs (NSFW, tags, feed customization, engagement) so I'm praying more artists make the jump as Twitter continues to circle the drain. I'm hoping we get a few good years out of the site before the other shoe drops (and it will drop).

>>6742
>preventing users from opting out of its AI training bullshit
>either crosspost or jump to Bluesky permanently
Virtue-signalling at its finest. Your art already is used for AI training by scummy companies, no matter where you post it. It's a don't ask, don't tell situation.

>>6744
This. I am still posting more often on BS but this mainly because it's easier to make and switch between accounts there so I talk to artists I rather ignore on twitter since my twitter acc is centered on my main fandom. BUT I am still staying on twitter. Personally I have no issue with the blocking since I never blocked and the AI part is shit but it's everywhere. Google has access to my fanart and google uses AI. AI is everywhere. It's trash, but it millions of artworks every second anyway.

>>6744
ntayrt i have no real issue with the AI training, its a losing battle and ive got no fight to really get mad about some robot taking my gay buttfuck art in their algorithms kek, im more pissed off about the changed to blocks; i post dead dove content and I make it very clear I block whoever is uncomfortable or does not want to see it. I know how antis work, they love to complain about content they hate yet they cling on to the accounts like a bloody leech and take screenshots of their posts so they can turn to their followers and ridicule them like some freak animal.
im sure this isnt a problem to lurkers, but honest to god I hope more fujos jump to bluesky permanently just so my feed isnt riddled day to day with vague shitflinging about getting called out, or another anti vs proship slapfight, its exhausting on all sides and i just want people to post about fandom again.

in comparison to when i made a fandom alt on twitter ages ago and immediately got dogged on by normies who stumbled across my tweet on the fyp for some god forsaken reason, being on bsky has been pretty lenient; i have yet to get a malicious qrt or snarky comment calling me a freak yet.

>>6749
Yeah bluesky is much better in that regard. I only see chill posting so far regardless of the fandom. And the feeds are the best. Though artist HAVE to tag it first to make it appear there and we know from pixiv that Asian fans usually don't do it lmao
Still, the possibility is there. And I like the alt text. People with bad eyesight profit from it but normal ones like me also like to be able to click that to get context for a pretty artwork. Sometimes you don't know the characters it depicts or what's happening and for that alt-text is a nice alternative to image googling and researching what it is about.
The MTL should be better though and I want more users. Otherwise it's better than twitter.

>>6742
>>6743
I'm moving to bluesky slowly but surely and I like how it works so far, it's not too different from twitter. But I'll keep using twitter to lurk because many of the artists I follow said they'll stay there and won't create other social media accounts. Some of them said people already repost their art everywhere or they assume their art was already used for AI training by random people instead of companies so why bother, and since they have a lot followers and use twitter to announce in which cons they'll go I totally get it. I think the biggest issue Asian artists have right now is related to how blocking will become totally useless on twitter soon, unless twitter changes their mind on the matter at the last second. And Western artists are the ones who are more bothered by AI bullshit than by the blocking features changing, at least the ones I follow. I've seen people argue that if Elon changes the blocking features Apple and Google could remove the twitter app from their stores because that would violate their guidelines, and on top of that this could also go against RGDP so maybe we'll get the same bullshit here in the EU than what happened in Brazil for a few weeks. I'm waiting to see what happens in November, either way it will retarded.

Personally now my biggest issue is that I blocked a lot of accounts on twitter because I don't want to see what most of these people post, but there are a few people in there I know irl that I blocked because I don't want them to see what I post. I'm either going to delete a bunch of posts or keep it private. I'm not an artist and don't contribute to anything though so it's not a big loss for anyone and my mutuals follow me on bluesky now.

>no private accounts
>no direct gif upload
I assume these features will be implemented later. I hope so at least.

I'm glad bsky has private likes. It's nice to know if you go on my profile, you won't be able to see all the non-fandom stuff I'm liking.

>>6760
What pissed me off with twitter were the randomly shared likes that appear on every single on of your 1000 or so followers timeline, like what the fuck. Let my like my shit in peace. I am fine with visible likes since people that look at that choose to do so and I don't like anything I am ashamed of. I mean fucked up porn is weird, but again, if someone goes to my like list they shouldn't complain. The public sharing is overstepping boundaries though and I never understood why twitter even implemented that "function".

I actually wish BS had visible likes since I found a lot of good artists thanks to the likes since people are more likely to like than retweet. I hope they will implement this, at least with the option to toggle it off.

>>6765
The best they got right now is the "Popular with Friends" feed (https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:z72i7hdynmk6r22z27h6tvur/feed/with-friends). I was the also sort who liked to go through artist's likes to find more stuff I would like, so I hope a public/private toggle happens.

>>6760
I wish it was a toggle because on the contrary i like having followers go through my likes since i scarce retweet posts since they bump out posts I make. It was an option on twitter but you had to pay for the option (because ofc it does..) but now they purged the option entirely which fucking sucks.
also not to instill paranoia but keep in mind that there are plugins that can view public likes on bluesky (greysky comes to mind, its mobile only though) so if you have some skeletons in your likes and an intolerant following try and be mindful of that.

>>6800
This. I mostly like and rarely retweet. Besides the reason you mentioned it's also because I don't want to spam my followers with shit that isn't related to the main fandom the acc is about. I like a lot of art. But don't want to be the guy that retweets like 50 things at once so with a like list those interested could still look what else I like and maybe find things for them.

Now you can only spread others' stuff by retweeting it, I hate it.

>>6801
There is a feed that only shows you original posts from your following and excludes reposts. It's called OnlyPosts.

Related somewhat, but Bluesky was brought by a cryptocurrency company. I wonder if this can scare the artists away?
https://bsky.social/about/blog/10-24-2024-series-a

>>6807
We can never have nice things…

>>6807
Honestly I stopped giving a shit. It's all doomed no matter where you go. The modern internet is trash and your art will be fed to AI regardless so you might as well give up and use the website that's the most comfortable one to you.

Personally I wish people would move to BS for no other reason that this place making acc switching easy. I am into two fandoms I obsess over but my twitter acc is so inherently associated with the first one that I don't want to turn it into a multi-fandom thing and people would probably overlook it anyway thanks to algorithms associating me with the other. I usually get 1000 or so likes per pic, but when I recently drew one for another fandom I got 1 (one), not joking. Not even the account holding the fandom event I tagged it with noticed it. My suspicion is that most people use phones and no add-ons so they are dependent on algorithms and algorithms sort me out since I am followed by fans of another series.

>>6809
Wait, you can switch accounts now?

>>6809
I've seen a lot of Asian artists say the exact same thing, that since their art is already reposted everywhere as soon as they post on pixiv or danbooru they might as well stay on twitter and just post less often. However, I see that one of the artists I follow is starting to hesitate and is considering making a bluesky account. I'm waiting to see how it will go.

>>6811
Yeah, twitter gutting the block feature will be the real killer because it's going to be so much harder to avoid all the vile shit that gets posted there. I've already seen so many people comment that a site that doesn't reward ragebaiters by boosting them feels so much better.

>>6811
Yeah. 1/3 or so of the artist of one of my fandoms (a more recent one) are moving to BS or at least posting on both places. 1/2 of the older fandom moves back to tumblr but I fucking hate tumblr so I won't follow. At best I will dump my art there but I won't engage and reblog anything. It's also only the western ones that love it, the Asians never considered tumblr relevant or attractive.

TBH tumblr is too US-centric for me and no matter how many are telling me otherwise, unless I am moving out of my bubble I never encountered fandom polices on twitter, especially not for my own fandoms. But tumblr? Horror. Even the users I otherwise respect make long-posts where they try to explain why fans liking a certain ship or character are dumb and why it destroys the characters (no it fucking doesn't, sis, you are just into these specific dudes and want to silence everybody else). I even distance myself from such people if they spew hatred against fans of a character I don't even like. I just categorically hate policing and it's a huge red flag for a fandom space.

>>6816
>the Asians never considered tumblr relevant or attractive.
It wasn't as relevant as twitter and pixiv 10 years ago but I was already following a lot of Japanese artists there at the time. But many of them deleted their tumblr accounts or stopped posting a long time ago to be more active on twitter and that's why I went to twitter the first time in like 2014 or 2015. One of them is Kotteri because she was posting her JJBA fanarts at the time and now she's barely posting her art on twitter, maybe because she became a fulltime artist and is drawing several series in a row right now. I've seen others saying they'll move to other Japanese websites instead of bluesky, and I haven't seen many Korean artists I follow move so far. And speaking of which, I'm seeing a second artist I really like considering moving to bluesky even if she doesn't really care because she wants to follow people who have moved there already. I think this will keep happening little by little.

>>6817
LMAO it was also JJBA for me. Back then there were more on tumblr that's true. And yes it was exactly around 2014 when I noticed more and more getting active on twitter and posting pics they don't upload on tumblr or pixiv. I know it was 2014 because I was also saving a ton of Kill la Kill fanart back then and this and JJBA artists favoring twitter forced me to go there and they never came back.
The translation tool is probably another good reason to stay there. I see Asian artists I like talking to each other in different languages because each of them translates the reply of the other with google TL kek

I remember Kotteri. She also drew Golden Kamuy later. Herzspalter was another JJBA artists I remember being mainly active on twitter at some point. Funny what a huge overlap JJBA artists have with Golden Kamuy and Transformers. Well probably not surprising, but still funny. Happens a lot that I get into a new series with big beefy dudes and fujo fanservice, search for art and recognize art styles or want to follow an artist for it and realise that I already followed them for drawing one of the other series before lmao

>>6817
>Kotteri
I remember her art, even if I follow her on Twitter it makes me sad that her Tumblr was deleted. Do you know if her JJBA fanart is anywhere? I loved the way she drew facial expressions and I'll forever beat myself up for not saving her art.

>>6819
Her art is also on twitter but you won't find it on her profile directly because she posted a lot of things and only the 500 first posts should be visible on her media tab. I don't know if Nitter can help you with that.

>>6821
Guess I'll have to scroll a lot to see if I find anything not archived anywhere. If not I just saw Danbooru has some of her art so I'm glad it wasn't lost.

I think I just doomed myself. Does anybody know you to even log into twitter again after logging out? I wanted to change something, I generated a Back-Up code AND downloaded the Authenticator App to be double safe. Turns out neither works??
I guess nothing related to twitter functions anymore. The only viable two-way authentication would be the SMS but lol of course that's only for premium users. I have no idea why the back up code doesn't work considering that I just generated it and of course did I never use it before. All attempts to log in via the app also fail since the codes it is sending me are wrong? Why?

I wish there was the option to just say NO to Security and be free again. I don't any security. I just want a simple log-in/log-out function. I fucking hate everything

>>6807
Unironically the only way we're ever going to have a safe space for artists is if the artists themselves make their own pixiv inspired art site. cohost while not having an exclusive focus on art is the closest thing we've had to that but even then it was ran by antis and died quickly.

If you anything you cared about is still on livejournal you'd better save it (kink memes, old conversations). The tl;dr of the situation is that it's in a tenuous state of access by non-Russians and while it probably won't amount to anything (nothing ever happens) I thought I'd post here as a reminder.
>>6834
Tegaki seems promising, but it's getting slammed by demand.
https://automaton-media.com/en/news/japan-gets-new-pixiv-like-social-media-platform-for-artists-that-strictly-bans-ai-generated-images-creators-can-authenticate-work-as-hand-drawn/

>>12698
>If you anything you cared about is still on livejournal you'd better save it
There are some LJ doujin scan groups that were very users-only or "use the password" (for DJ downloads, given only to users) and the admins are completely dead and unresponsive….
I can't even begin to imagine all the other blogs that are privated forever or hard to search. It's so sad what happened to LJ.

>>12700
>LJ doujin scan groups that were very users-only or "use the password"
Some of that could have ended up on aarinfantasy or in the personal collection of an older fujo you might be able to flag down there. If there is anything in particular in those locked tombs you are looking for, that's where I would start.

>>12698
>If you anything you cared about is still on livejournal you'd better save it (kink memes, old conversations).
Damn. Is there efficient way to download entire journals, comments and all? I have some kink memes I need to rescue

>>12704
Somebody made an archival tool (LJ Archivr 2026) but it's 20 smakaroos on Gumroad. Probably worth it if you have a lot of work to do, but I have no personal experience with it.

>>12705
oooh thank you, I'll look it up. Most of them I've seem will only do your own journal, and unfortunately, I'm after old comms that have been dead for a decade+ and never moved over to Dreamwidth.

>>12698
Source? I can't find any news about it.

>>12709
https://ru-news.livejournal.com/80899.html

Once again: nothing ever happens, but it's always good practice to have personal copies of things you might care to look at again one day.

>>12711
>inb4 bought by China
I hope everyone who had any presence there has already migrated.

>>12713
Anybody who was even remotely active back when strikethrough happened and the following decade of troubles migrated to dreamwidth and/or Ao3. IMO the only things that are in danger are inactive accounts/communities with images/fics that were never put anywhere else and kinkmemes with mostly anon/anon account writers.

China buying it would be very funny. It's been a Russian asset for so long I don't think it would have any viability as a vector for whatever propaganda they'd use it for, although typing this does remind me of the people who were shipping the Russian and Chinese guy in those posters over in /rps/ lmao

>>12715
>>12711
your taking this way to lightly, the freedom we have is tenacious and it's naive to think it's something that can be maintained