But a Jape

“Wanting to earn fake internet points just because it could lead to greater exposure to potential audiences who may consider compensating you for your work? What are you, some sort of narcissist?”

– some Redditor

Look, I get it, I don’t care for most social media either. Before I started my comic, I had practically zero social media presence at all – I still looked at what got popular, I’d read comments, but I never participated in any of the discourse. Having to maintain a social media presence is my least favorite part of being an online creator. But I still acknowledged its value as a platform for independent creators to build an audience.

Which is why all the discussion about the implosion of Twitter irks me when people say “Just stop using it! There’s no value in any social media!” Because personally, I feel like the social media era has probably been the best time for small creators to grow their presence in the world. I’m not aware of any other time in history when so many different types of artists could get their work recognized and earn a living off of it. So when we see a major platform like Twitter falling apart because of Elon Musk’s increasingly fragile ego, I honestly find it to be an overall bad thing.

Yes, there are a lot of problems with Twitter (even before Musk’s purchase) and social media as a whole, but the idea that there is absolutely nothing that has been gained from it just rings to me as ignorance at best or outright dismissive of online creators at worst. Maybe something better will come up with time, but for now, there really isn’t and a lot of people’s livelihoods are/will be severely impacted. Not mine, as a note, since my income from this comic is absolutely miniscule and I’m still in the “needs his day job” period of my career, but I would still like some avenue for this to grow into something bigger.

– James