It's okay. I was confused more than anything else like - huh my previous post wasn't very defensive, I hope. xD

I'm glad your opinion changed. I know I will avoid pinged only as well from now on (if I intend to release more stuff, which idk). It's good we're all having this talk in the open even if it is under less than stellar circumstances.

I feel like the releaser/creator thread had the best of intentions from users and I'm sure staff didn't want to spite buyers, it just came across that way when staff posted. =___=; /cringe

I've read several of the comments here, though not all of them so I apologize if someone already made these points.

In regards to privates, exclusives, and friend only items - I agree it sucks to see an item you want and can afford but can't have it because it's one batch only or private. However, I understand why this exists. Collecting and releasing customs is an expensive hobby. Commissioners will buy a design for either real money or large amounts of csc. For something like a wig, you are paying $50 -$70 usd or 7,000 - 8,000 csc. This is just the price for the design from the artist. Each new color usually costs another $5-$6 or 700-800 csc. On top of that, you still need to pay subeta to get the wig on site, which is another 5k csc or 1,600 csc if you release direct to cash shop.

The point I'm trying to make here is, every item you see on site cost the commissioner a lot of money upfront that they will be lucky to break even. They are buying these items because they want them or because their friends want them. If you release an infinite number or large number of copies, people won't want to buy them from you or your shop for regular price because they figure enough people will have a copy they can just buy it for cheaper later. Too many copies and now you've sunk even more money and are stuck with multiple copies you can't get rid of. So why make items single batch or private if you know you are losing money on it? One reason as many have mentioned is because the item is special or a gift to friends. Another reason is because people were slotting on limited batch items and then instantly reselling them for more than slot price. Users were trying to make a quick buck at the expense of others. Or people would slot on items just to trade them for something else because they know the item is popular, taking away the chance of someone that really wanted that item. When you make an item private, you are selling it to people you trust won't make a quick buck off of you and are guaranteeing a friend can slot on the item if they want it.

Private items is not an elitist idea. People who commission items either do it because they want that item or they want it for their friends. They are willing to sell to complete strangers once all of their friends have claimed or if they have extras they don't care about. If you really want something then buy the design and you can do whatever you want with it. Being mad at the way others chose to spend their own money is silly.

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I think it would be a good idea for there to be some type of standard for gaining interests on customs. Maybe in the custom wear section of the cash shop or on the forums, there can be a section for which users are taking slots and what items they are taking slots on. A search feature that can be filtered by wardrobe layer or user would be helpful if this idea is put in the cash shop. Once you click on the item, it can tell you how many slots are still open or if the item is reserved for certain forum groups.

Can I just say, thank you.

This is exactly what we've been trying to communicate, but it seems like everyone quite adamant that the existence of 1 batch or private items = elitism.

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And yes, those are all great ideas. It's unfortunate that the staff has yet to reveal (publicly and conclusively) what they've got in the works, which isn't doing much to help the situation. As long as they don't say anything, we're sadly left to our own devices.

I'm sorry I've been absent--but I see you. ❤️

Question about releases/batch limits: even if you specify, say, 2-3 batches max, you don't actually have to fill all of them, right? So you could push batches through if and only if they fill all the way? E.g. if there's only interest enough for one full batch, then only 1 batch gets released, but if there ends up being more, you might fill 2 batches and don't have the problem of false promises.

I've seen occasional instances in the past where the first post just has a running count of unfilled batches with the thought that if they ever filled, they would get pushed through.

But maybe that's inconvenient to the seller and/or purchasers? I don't know how often having CSC "tied up" in a potential purchase is a problem. And there's also far's story about perhaps people viewing too many available slots as a bit of a disincentive to buy the item. I don't buy often so I'm not sure about the mentality of frequent buyers.

Also, yes please for databases, including item statuses if possible. Yeah, of course you can ask on the boards, but there's something nice to be said for a site not having to "outsource" info that users could really benefit from.

Nope, it's not necessary to fill every single batch you announce.

Like and I have also said in the past, perception of a large number of batches does decrease incentive to slot. More copies just means more chances of obtaining them in the future, therefore not necessary to buy now.

CSC doesn't get "used" until the releaser submits the CW into the system. Even then, the buyer would have to click the "pay" button, and not everyone pays the moment they see the notification.

Thanks for the clarification. It's sad that 2 or 3 batches seems to sometimes be enough to decrease incentive to slot.

No problem!

I've had decent enough results with 2, but 3 is very iffy. It's also hard to gauge general interest on items as is...

Do I like this style? Do I like the length/bangs/curls? Do I like the color/ombre/fade/streaks?

xD Needless to say, we already have a headache thinking about if people will like the combinations we choose.

I used to think when privates first became a thing that people were doing it just to make more money, but after speaking with a lot of different releasers and being involved with the cw market for so long, I realized quickly that is not the case with most people.

I agree with what many are saying. The way cws are introduced is messy. There are multiple boards to slot for things on and commissioners usually have multiple slotting boards because one is too old or one has too many posts or they are doing a joint commission and need a new board for that. I've joined around 30 different ping groups and most things are lost in a sea of ping notifications. Sometimes the only time I realize an item exists is when updates the released custom wears list. Staff really needs to have some standardized slotting method in place.

It does feel like if we are to address the issue of "ease of access" and visibility of CWs, they might have to move towards a system like that.

I definitely understand why people release privates, and you are totally fine to release them for your own reasons. Don't feel bad about leaving some people out: it was your choice to release the item privately for special reasons and it isn't in my place to butt my way into getting the item. There are so many CWs on this site that I'm not really bothered.

After joining a bunch of ping groups for CWs, I've learned that there are a lot of items that are available to the public that are really pretty! I think the perception that the CW community as a whole is insular, exclusive, and that the prettiest items are privates is something that certainly exists for most who aren't a part of it. But now I know that CWs aren't just private.

I'd love to find that happy medium too! I think that showing to people that there are a lot of pretty CWs out there that are public, that it is easier than you think to slot in a shop, is part of it. Also, improving the CW shop interface so that people can buy CWs without having to go through the forum process if they don't want would be good. It would also act as a form of advertising because people would be able to see multiple pieces from the same releaser.

I'm really glad to hear that you're finding your way around!

Your posts earlier on this board really helped, along with the excellent FAQ that was just released. It helped me to figure out the process as well as dispelled some of the myths that I had about CWs, so thank you very much :)

Hi! Pinging you specifically because you mentioned ping groups, sorry if you've already seen this!

Since I don't think I've posted this here yet and it seems relevant: PING GROUP DIRECTORY! This exists now. c:

You keep harping on the same example of a popular item being a single batch with half the slots filled by the time a public ping appears. Since I look at all the public pings, I can see exactly what item and its recolors has been released like that. Find more examples if you don't want people to assume that's exactly what you're talking about.

Sellers are LITERALLY telling you: --Most threads have current item(s) within the first 3 posts on the page (and release is posted on the post with pings 95% of the time as well). If a thread is confusing, dropping a comment to the OP can maybe help them realize it's organized better. Yes, it's the releasers responsibility to make things clear, but some people may not realize their thread is not clear. Most releasers aren't here on this thread so you cannot assume they all have seen this and they can't fix something they don't know is a problem. --I would like someone to explain how a board that has an intro post with rules (generally: don't be rude, pay within x time frame) followed by a post with the latest release is confusing. None of us can control every releaser, if someone's board is confusing ask them to make it clearer. My board is pretty clear. --We have 0 control over how the CW Shops are displayed. I very clearly link to my shop in my intro forum post. If you have suggestions then make a suggestion thread to Staff, we can't do a damn thing about them and so far they aren't listening to our suggestions either. --We again, have no control over the basic organization of CW Shops. Things are organized on the back end alphabetically (in the area we see to manage available number/prices/passwords). Within the shops, they're displayed oldest to newest from the top down. I too have trouble figuring out where things are if their ID doesn't actually make them the newest item in my shop. Again, ask Staff in suggestions to make this different, because they're not listening to us. --Again, the best way to see new items is to join ping groups. I'm sorry you don't like it, but you have to join them to be pinged. There's no way around it. Forums are where slotting happens. Some people ping their public groups first, some people ping all the groups at the same time, but there's no way for us to reach people who are unwilling to join ping groups. There's no alternate method beyond submitting it all direct to shop and that is impossible for most people because of the high cost. And even then you'd have to run across it elsewhere to even know about it.

Civil discussion implies you actually hear the other side too. We her you, our response is, we're sorry you feel that way, maybe an explanation of how the process and cost works will help mitigate some of the misconceptions you have. The only suggestions offered prior were "you should have mandatory minimums on public offerings and not be allowed to slot privates, you have to do those yourself."

But we heard your feedback. We tried to make things to help. I sat down and spent hours meticulously typing out a guide with links and explanations. We're working on getting screenshots for people who do better with visuals. There's a brand new ping groups directory with additional explanations and links to a number of own public groups as well as the individual public groups for a lot of people.

We're doing what we can, but you're never going to be able to dictate how many batches people offer. Even if you could get every releaser responding here to agree, there are hundreds of people who submit CWs. The rest of your concerns have been addressed to the best of the ability of the individuals who are taking the time to respond, but you keep acting like we're ignoring you and not doing it. At this point, you're discouraging discussion and compromise by continued attacks and insistence that we capitulate to all of the demands made.

❤️

To answer, I often say 1-2, 2-3 depending on interest. The problem comes when that/those additional batches don't fill. Now you've got people who are expecting a copy that may never come, holding their CSC indefinitely aside for it. And if you keep those items up while releasing new items, the release posts start to get messy and unclear.

An alternative is to use the CW Shops, but after you have more than a page full of items, it starts to get extremely difficult to load and manage. I'll do screenshots of the back end of that to show folks why it's not necessarily practical to move all unfilled batches there. We cannot, at this time, permanently remove items from there. Once they're in, they always appear on our management page, even if there are 0 copies left. We have asked repeatedly for a way to remove them that would just retire them permanently and we still haven't gotten that.

Ahh, thanks so much for linking me! It's so helpful that all the public ping groups are in one place. Thanks so much for putting it together!

So if I can ask everyone, what changes would you like to see in the CW market? It seemed like price was a concern for both buyers and CW releasers/artists, the cw shop layout could be improved and maybe more clarification on the process & ping groups. I'll try to edit my first post with any ideas for those that cannot read through the whole thread. I couldn't say if the changes are possible, but it'll be helpful to find the ideas all in one area.

Personally. I would like to see that the CW shops be updated to mimic the way you can look up items in the pawn shop. Also too, I think it'd help if when you search for an item in Search Shiop, that a locked CW would have an icon on the search before trying to find the item in the CW shop itself.

That would be an amazing idea. Not all locked CWs are private/unavailable, sometimes releasers just want a buyer to ask them first, but a little lock icon would be a good way to not get anyone's hopes up.

There are some users that don't mind asking about locked items. But for those that do mind, it could be a way for them to know ahead of time! I myself have seen CWs in SS, and then have find the item itself in the CW shop, only to eventually find that the item was locked. lol

Hey hey, I'm sorry to butt into your conversation, but I wanted to say I agree with you on almost all points, and I hope some of the FAQs and other introductions some of the users in the cw community are putting together will be helpful in informing and clarifying things for newcomers. Even if they haven't been active on this thread, the CW community IS listening and IS doing what they can to enact positive changes. Thankfully, staff is trying to come up with some new features that will hopefully help on the functionality end, too. 's suggestion of making the CW Shops viewable/searchable like the Pawn Shop would be sooo awesome, for real. But we'll just have to wait and see what staff ends up coding for us.

I did, however, want to mention something about your last bullet point, about the struggle against batches that are already capped. I personally would prefer if all cws were unlimited releases, but unfortunately the higher batch an item is, the less the "resale" value is. It's been that way since I started doing CWs about 4 years ago, and it's only gotten worse as people find it harder to sell items in the r200 forums/through trades. A lot of buyers want to feel like they're putting their hard-earned CSC toward something valuable, and if there's 30+ copies of something, I guess it doesn't seem as special any more? So, if a seller tries to say "unlimited batches" in their sales post, it may inhibit being able to fill even ONE batch, sad to say. However, a lot of people (myself included) try to gage interest on new CWs in a discussion thread or among friends, and base their batches off that interest - or say something more tentative like "1-2 batches, depending on interest" when they actually release the CW for slots. Does that make sense? If you have any ideas on how to combat these issues, I for one would love to hear them.

I will say, I've gotten a lot of ideas for ways to help and to change up my own thread, and thank you and all the others for being so passionate about trying to make changes. I hope we can find some compromises that will make the cw market better and more fun for everyone.

This! You don't need to raise my hopes up/and or trick me. I have feelings Subeta - don't be coy. That's something I would really like to see happening :c

As for the price, was very clear about it: they will not be lowering the cost of submission. (from what I've gathered - tell me if I'm wrong). So unless we all band together, I cannot see this happening and therefore, prices will still be between $4 to $7 per items value :c But let's see what staff will do about this!

I kid you not, I've seen people AFRAID of slotting on 3 batches+ items. I was like "wtf why?" and you know what came up? How am I going to resell it if there are 30 copies onsite? and you know where this copy ends? In the Pawn Shop. So while I, THE ELITIST have gotten my CSC - this person doesn't. This person here, my faithful customer, just lost some cash. The market is soo damn shaky and unpredictable (just like the price of CSC) that if people aren't willing to spend now (with or without the pawn shop), they won't do it even if the entire community bend backward. If people are afraid and suffer from anxiety, THEY ARE VALID but there is nothing we can do about how they feel. What each and every single one of us can do is to make things easier as much as we can. We can't break a structure created by Subeta.

All I'm seeing is buyers finding slotting and the forums unfriendly. As a releaser, I find the entire process unfriendly. I've said it. That's it.