I don't see it as a problem of just....revising the rules as necessary and adding a note next to certain points that older items have been grandfathered in/were created previously/this is only the rule moving forward from X date or whatever. That's exactly where we are with the makeup items representing closed eyes??? Like, no, technically items that could be closed eyes were never "allowed" but things slipped through and the approval staff (which I believe still included at this time, not that it matters who did what) finally caught it and had to be like, "Okay, guys, no more." And now it's ridiculously difficult to get certain types of makeup approved in case people go on to use it in a way staff doesn't want it to be used? I guess?

BUT on a personal level, I 100% agree with that once a rule is broken, it should just be removed. I don't know what the plans look like for bringing in a second staff member to help with the CW queue again in the future, but I think it would be better just to have an extra person to bounce thoughts off of and so less things slip through the cracks. That would potentially make this an actually viable solution

oh man the thought of items that were previously accepted being removed because they want to enforce a rule that's pretty much void at this point makes me, i guess sort of confused.

like i imagine it'd be terrible PR on subeta's behalf. like wow i would not want to be the person(s) that has to comb through the thousands of cws that exist, delete them, and then have to take the probably unpreventable outrage of the cw community after they find out thousands of their beloved items that they paid for went poof. OR-Banning recolors of an item that is already on site ( like any 'damage' has already been done with the initial item, banning recolors of the same item is,,,useless imo. ) and then again taking the heat of the cw community. like all that sounds like a lot of grueling, unneccesary work, and grief.

i imagine an update to the rules to accept items and concepts that have already been accepted and havent found to be problem-causing, would be much more reasonable

Not a CW artist but I was telling my partner this yesterday in light of the new SubQ items that if site items can be published in such unfinished looking quality, why are CW rules put so high and strict? Just looking at those items blurry lines and colors compared to recent accepted CW's is so shocking and almost a bit disgusting (to put into harsher terms) because these are site approved items for everyone to use and they way they were designed would be very difficult to use alongside polished CW items.

I didn't even know Subeta had a rule against Object Heads and still have on site items that are tv sets! They should clearly remove such a rule if they are breaking it themselves. Double Standards aren't fun. And if items are given exceptions, there should be stated ones to clarify why that is because items cant just be denied for one reason and then be accepted because of some underlining unknown one. It's unfair to the submitter as they took so much time drawing or paying someone for this CI design only for that to be denied.

Do the new revised CW Rules in the same way tthe site's current FAQ was done. It was fast and loose to start with and had a couple rounds of feedback on "what detail actualy matters" and internal consistencies. If the threads about it are not readily found, ask around staff to see who did the thing and ask her.

is right. If items that have broken rules have been allowed, and the sky has not fallen, why do we still need those rules?

Why do we need any rules other than the ones that we need for art quality standards (that should also be enforced on staff art) and PG-13 decency*? (And legality/copyright, too, but orange horns being a "derivative work" just because I admitted I want to put them on a grey-skinned avatar is kind of a leap.)

I used to wonder if the rules about facial features were in some way related to the old layering system where all eyes, noses and mouths were on a separate layer from other items, but since that's clearly not a problem for CS and SubQ items, why is it still an issue for CWs?

Why are animal faces that don't look like obvious masks denied, when people can have all the animal butts, ears and paws they want?

Why is it okay to replace a head with a TV set, but not a bowl of noodles?

What horrible thing does someone think will happen if avatars are allowed to close their eyes, when it is actually possible to have no eyes at all?

I'm not even touching the lineart rules except to say that they need to be consistent across the whole site.

I've seen the community told two different things about facial features and why they're not allowed. Not sure what the 'current' reason is though, these are just the ones I remember.

The first thing was something along the lines of: Facial items are very difficult to make and they wanted to leave their quality up to staff, who is experienced making them. (I literally don't understand this, as any artist gains experience over time...)

And later on this was changed to something along the lines of: Because facial features are so small it's really hard to tell if people are copying / tracing / stealing art on them. (I also don't understand this reasoning because people can submit PSDs to show their work, or artists could be limited / it could be an earned privilege to submit facial items as an incentive to stay in the community, and they should have trust in artists who've been here a long time IMHO. I don't know about you but I'm not tryna risk my account over tracing a nose tbh.)

Yeah, submitting PSDs is not that hard. These are not good reasons. If the quality of an item isn't right, it can be denied for that reason, period.

(I just want Valiska Courinna's slitty-pupilled eyes in a format that I know will never be touched by an artist who has decided that "revamp" means "take the item in a completely different direction from what it has been for X years, because I am bored with it." The base eyes she uses work for her, although I have to hide the eyebrows because she's not continually suspicious. But I live with the knowledge they could disappear in a hot second.)

Not too big on CW's myself, but I agree 100% that the rules need to be made a lot more clear. I have friends who are CW people who complain about this a lot, and a few more who have just quit because it's too difficult.

There is literally zero harm in just putting the information out there so we can look at it and save everyone a lot of time and grief. It would not take that much time or effort to revise the rules, and it takes less effort to edit them on the go as things need to be changed.

I also agree with on this one;

If items have broken the rules but are still allowed and the site has not fallen apart, then why are those rules still there? A lot of stuff on Subeta is just so outdated, and it seems like the staff are super hesitant to change anything to fit with the way the site has changed and evolved over the years and it's just leading to stagnation and contributing to the slow, downward death spiral of the site as a whole.

I too am wondering why we can't have a bowl of noodles in place of a head, LMAO.

But yeah, I thought about drawing CWs background myself but backed away once I learned that I had to fit a certain style. And hearing that many CW artists are suffering from confusion about the rules is disheartening.

Hot take? I'm starting to think quite a few CWs look similar to each other.....I don't know if that's because they're done by the same artist or its because of the confusing rules.

own a few CWs and never have submitted one but my two cents watching and reading this whole thing: if a rule is broken once (for an apparent staff member too lol ... looks not great to the common folk), it should not be a rule at all. rules can be edited easily! and if this has been an issue why not .. just rewrite the rules? make them more clear?

a recent thing i've seen is the subq lines not having black line art which is killing me due to the super strict rules CW creators go through with the submission process. why is one group being held to a higher standard than staff?

also having one person being in charge of deny/submission seems unfair in a sense of - we are only getting one POV of what can be sent through on submission ( i understand lack of staff, etc etc ) but saying that it can also help make more guidelines on what is ok and not .. if that makes sense!

Buyer of CWs and not a designer although I've thought about doing it myself sometimes:

Big agree - the rules need to be updated and clarified. It's also not hard to just state that items will be grandfathered in but from here on out other items that got around the rules will no longer be accepted.

Also, please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong but if I'm understanding this correctly: People pay to submit a CW but if the design is rejected they don't get their money back? That seems like such a bad and shady business practice. Especially when it's costing folks around $40 to submit a CW.

If this is true, I feel like people should only be charged if their design is actually approved and uploaded to the site.

Also, it's so baffling that people cannot submit a ticket asking if a concept is acceptable. Users can submit tickets asking if a pet's story or character is acceptable on site, so why can't CW artists do the same? Asking if a concept or idea is ok before you even start making it is not the same thing as asking to have it approved and uploaded to the site.

if an item is rejected you do get your CSC back, but the real cash spent on the CSC is non-refundable.

I see, thank you for clearing that up! Appreciate it. Not as bad as what I was thinking, but still a bummer for folks who've commissioned a specific design only to have it rejected. :(

sorry to butt in but! releasers might also have commissioned an artist to do the cw - so that money used to commission is lost too if the item is completely unacceptable.

, - no, it's not that.

If I spend money on CSC and I get it back for a denied item I can do other things with it, like buy other people's CWs or submit something else.

The problem is that most people who submit CWs do not do the art themselves. I suck at digital art.

draws my thylacines.

and are based on thylacine characters in some stories of mine and an RP that I run. I submitted them, I sell them in my CW shop, but Akita drew them. It cost about $35 to get the drawings done for the CI and the item overlay (the wearable part).

draws most of the clothing items I submit.

Here's an example of how people lose money when items are denied.

I bought a design by of a set of horns: one normal horn and one broken horn. I paid $35 to buy the right to submit the horns and to get them coloured in orange because I wanted to dress up as my fantroll OC, Moraga Ksenet, who has one broken horn. This was a pre-made design for which I only picked the colour. (Which is actually quite common.)

This is the preview I used when I took slots. As you can see, while these horns can be used for Homestuck trolls, they don't look like any of the horns that any of the actual HS characters have. (Moraga is the female troll in the middle of the top row.)

As you can also see, these horns are also perfectly useful for demons and fire elementals and nature spirits!

But they were denied because I submitted them with references showing that they do not represent any specific Homestuck characters, and one of the site's unwritten secret rules is that Homestuck tributes aren't allowed "because Andrew Hussie made a comment about not wanting people to profit off HS derivative works".

That was a long time ago and has since been explicitly clarified on the MS Paint Adventures/Homestuck website. He doesn't want people selling fan-made unlicenced t-shirts, dolls, figurines, and the like and other items that clearly reference his characters and universe, although he doesn't seem to care if people on artists' alley at cons draw his characters. He has no interest in going after people who make orange horns for people to wear in person at cons. That is because he is concerned about copyright, and the "4 changes" tribute rule satisfies the requirements of copyright.

Here is the statement: Homestuck Derivative Works FAQ. This statement is very explicit about the issue of profit and the issue of copyright.

If I wanted to make a Karkat companion and sell it, that would be a different issue. If I made an item directly representing Karkat, Kanaya or another canon troll, you could maybe make a case that I or Subeta would be "profiting" off a derivative work.

But Subeta makes its profits by selling fake currency to people, who can then buy whatever they want with it, even blow it on chance machines. So even that's some hinky logic, provided the 4 changes rule is observed for copyright protection.

As for me profiting from the item: even if 80 people bought my horns and I made 8000 CSC, I can only spend that here. I can't use it to pay my rent or buy food for my dinner or even pay another artist for my next CW.

So who's profiting?

And while artists usually agree to fix designs that get denied because the lineart's off or something else, there's not much they can do about "we don't accept this type of item, even though that's not written out in the rules anywhere."

It's not fair that we can put time and work and money into an item and lose it because nobody bothered to tell us that even though fandom tributes are allowed, there's a secret list of fandoms that are so forbidden you can't even submit an item to use for your own original character you made up from that universe.

Hold up, "Artwork that replaces features and/or edits the avatar base" is not allowed? Since when? I can't help but notice your cat hands, face, and butt seem to break this rule.

What's to figure out, wouldn't having them grandfathered in be the easiest solution? Of course, the fair but harder thing would be to change these goddamn broken, illogical rules.

This infuriates me. Subeta shoots down ideas until THEY release their own shit? They go "Hey, cool idea, we're going deny your stuff until we can get our stuff (most of it for CSC) to market." Unbelievable.

If official items exist on site that break the "standards" and rules set for CWs, those rules should be made void immediately upon said item's release.

no head replacement? well you just released an official sunflower (not even going into the cringeworthyness of a "fuck you" to people that is letting a staff member release tv heads as cws but no one else...) so now you've decided they're acceptable, everyone can make them too. so you can have whatever OBVIOUSLY AND CLEARLY STATED inane rules you want, but when subeta releases its own version of it POOF that rule is gone.

also like. let me get this right. there's a "no body mods" rule but an official category to submit for body mods?? really??

But if the rule changes have been so scattered over time that even the staff member in charge of the CW queue can't keep all of them straight, the rules definitely need a rework.

I would really like to see the rules updated and put in one clear place.

Also I'd like to see the noodle bowl decision changed, and the noodle bowl allowed on site, because I think based on reading this thread that the decision was in error.

Re: grandfathering in items with new rules

Bringing this back bc it’s important. The “new rules” that supposedly should be brought back are rules that were lifted in the past! As has found the posts where staff has stated these changes to the CW rules!

Rules should be made clearer yes, but that does NOT mean retracting what was said in the past in official statements.

Quote by Emyon

You mentioned that the noodles were denied based on the rule: "Artwork replaces features and/or edits the avatar base"
That rule is nowhere to be found. I looked in the rules page, and in all of the FAQ and guides in the forum. If i missed, please direct us to it.</p>
<p>I&;m guessing you&;re quoting a &quot;denial reason&quot; as you said, which would mean that is something you, as staff, can select for denying an item. It&;s not something we, as users, can see.
I&;ll also guess that that denial reason is there because of the old rule &quot;You may not submit any images that edit the avatar base or replace features in any way. This includes repositioning arms or legs, but also restricts drawing original facial features. You may submit clothing that enhances these features such as makeup that works with existing base eyes or lips.&quot; - Pulled this from the subeta wiki, which is outdated.(that is a link)</p>
<p>That rule has since been updated, as seen here: &quot;At this time, we will still not be accepting user-made mouths/lips, noses, and eyes. The rules for base edits have been rewritten on the CW submission page to reflect that this is the only base edit no longer allowed (as long as the other CW rules are followed, of course).&quot; (that is a link)</p>
<p>if facial features are the only base edit not allowed anymore, then object heads are not against the rules, and the &;denial reason&; you can select should not be used for that.</p>
<p>Further, you have said yourself that base edits are allowed, since that is what the &;body mods&; are. (also a link)
And, &quot;Artwork replaces features and/or edits the avatar base&quot; directly contradicts the official submission category &quot;All base edits&quot;, which shows it&;s an obsolete denial reason and it should be changed. I would suggest replacing it with &quot;Artwork replaces facial features&quot;, which is the actual current rule.