My completely honest review of “Deviant art Eclipse”
Deviantart Eclipse (or the new DA) to me is one of the poorest excuses of a “website revamp” there is. For the most part the sites design is plagiarized, the site puts low quality fetish art before actual artists, and makes the platform virtually unusable.
Being a former user of the site myself (I was active on it for 5 years) I am rather frustrated with how the site is currently being run, and within this post I will tell you why.
DA vs ARTSTATION
This is the new DA profile layout. As you can see they got rid of most profile customization and instead replaced it with the ability to upload a background image.
This is artstation, a similar art sharing website. These profiles are both owned by the same person and if you were not paying attention, you would think it was the same site.
Artstations layout has been like this for the most part, but their redesign happened back in 2016. Deviantart eclipse was launched this year (2020). The two websites are now virtually identical. Dont believe me? Look at the front pages
DA
art station.
Similar right?
The second problem i have with the site (despite the blatant plagiarism) is the overabundance of Fetish art being featured on the site. Now please let me say this now so I dont get hate.
IF YOU HAVE A FETISH OR PRODUCE FETISH ART I DO NOT HAVE A PROBLEM WITH YOU. YOU ARE ENTITLED TO WHAT YOU LIKE AS LONG AS IT IS LEGAL AND DOES NOT HARM CHILDREN,ANIMALS,ETC.
The main problem I have with this overabundance of fetish art is that it out numbers the non-fetish art in the recommended. Along with this, artists who put alot of time/effort into their craft are often drowned out by the sheer number of MS paint edited fetish images. Sure they give you a “see less” option...
But that still will not filter out all fetish art. There are so many different types of fetish are you cannot get rid of it by simply clicking the “see less” feature. You would have to do with with every major type of fetish art there is, and even then there are thousands. My main point with this argument is that due to the algorithmic change, people who dont want to see fetish are are seeing it. And due to just the sheer amount of it, this type of art will continue to dominate the site.
Another issue I have is DAs reluctance to fix bugs, or even give older users the option to switch between eclipse and DA classic. A majority of DA’s response to criticisms aimed at the redesign is just “But look at this other cool stuff the site can do” instead of “we will fix the issue”.
The site is broken.
Some objects on the page are unclickable like some deviations and icons
The notification system is now separated and requires you to click though multiple pages to read every single one
Art is often stretched/compressed to fit the page (which ruins the quality)
All customization options were removed and so were many of the perks of core
core is virtually useless
The badge notifications/page is cluttered and hard to read
The page itself glitches around and lags when scrolling
Badges and actual notifications are now on the same page
It is now virtually impossible to communicate with the staff
The recommendation system often confuses fetish art with normal art, thus recommending varying degrees of fetish images to those who like 1 pinup pic
Icons are hard to click on and often dont work or lead to other pages
Along with many other issues that continue to pop up with each update. There is no more customization, there is no more organization, there is no regard of the user base and its opinions. All DA has become is a broken website sponsored by a somewhat broken website company.
DA was not broken. Wix did not need to “fix” it.
This redesign does not pose any benefit to the artists that use the platform. In fact, it deplatforms artists and puts a spotlight on the people who make MLP scat porn. DA does not listen to its user base and actively ignores all criticism aimed at its site.
Its shit.
Dont use it.