My thoughts on the TikToker who is leaking site names.
You might’ve seen this posted in the comments of the latest chapter of a story:
”Someone named (@useru1fxwvksux) in tiktok has posted a video with mangago name visible (including name of other sites as well). I think they are also responsible for the other site rn. Pls dont interact with their platform and lets mass report their account.
Help spread this and let's protect this precious site
https://www.tiktok.com/@useru1fxwvksux?_r=1&_t=ZS-93HuNLJB7CBReport this person on tiktok”
In my opinion the TikToker is acting like she’s morally superior/helping/smoking out evil but bffr.. if these stories weren’t free on a site, the people who read on this site may not read them at all. I don’t think they’re losing paying clients because the ppl on this site are already on a whole different site just to avoid paying.
At least this way, people are discovering it, getting into it, and spreading the word so people can go actually support the authors/artists!!! If people get into it here, potential clients who would’ve not read it if it wasn’t on here, can go support the author if they want to. (They may be more inclined to because they actually care about the story now.)
It’s not ideal but it’s not SUPER unethical. And I KNOWWW that TikToker doesn’t give af about the morals of it or the creators, they just want to be praised and cause drama. “look at all these site users mad at me naming all these sites
omgggg here’s more names.” She does not genuinely careee about the creators lmao.
Creatives SHOULD be getting their money. ..I don’t think these sites are taking insane amounts away..? If you’re going through the trouble of reading on this site and not switching to buying from the creator, I don’t imagine you care enough about the story to be paying for every chapter.. so if it stopped showing up on sites you’d probably just think “ok” in most cases. Exposure as payment is always better than absolutely nothing I guess. As long as these sites aren’t talked about publicly and advertised to the general public and paying customers.
Aka best case scenario: These people wouldn’t pay for your story if it wasn’t here free, so no money lost, but exposure gained. Fan art, people talking about it, sharing it.
I know “paying with exposure” is a very hated thing in the art community (I’m an artist who does commissions, I know.) in this case the creators are getting money from their normal ways and them the stories being on here are more exposure so it’s not a total negative. Exposure to people who’ll spread the word about the story, and who weren’t going to go out a buy it, but now at least they’re spreading he word.
I’ve seen some indie game devs say they’d rather people pirate their game to play it, if it means someone is playing it. And that they’ve pirated games too and they know what it’s like. I don’t think people read on these sites to spite the creatives that worked on these stories. I’m sure in many cases, it’s lead to more attention on the project which ended up financially supporting the creators in some small. It IS morally iffy, but it’s not totally evil to read stories on sites like these.
One indie dev said: “If you can't afford the game, but want to play it yourself, we'd prefer you (safely) pirate it over watching a Youtube playthrough. If the experience means something to you and you have money down the line, you can always buy a copy later, but we'd prefer you have the best first experience possible!”
I know pirating can harm indie/smaller creatives. The way the tiktoker is handling it is just to get attention though. (=・ω・=)
What do you think?