alo, luvs -

As you can see, my page is in the process of being stripped. As soon as I can make sure I have backups of all the files, I'll be gone pretty much entirely. I want to keep track of all the beautiful artwork I have in my favs, though, so I don't want to close out the account.

I'm leaving for a few inter-related reasons: for one, I think I'm getting a little old for this site. A recent da poll put high-school age and younger as the vast majority of the community. This is fine in itself, of course, but the attendant effects that has had on da has made me feel increasingly alienated. I'm tired of opening the main page and seeing manga and fanart dominate the "popular" category; again, I'm not hating on those in the slightest, but it's a community I don't really have much interest in myself.

In addition, in looking at my own uploading history I've noticed that being on da made me drift away from the kind of art that would make me "develop as an artist" or whatever. Things I spent a lot of time on average around 4-10 pageviews. Badly photoshop-filtered self-portraits get hundreds.

That sounds whiny, but I don't mean it in that way. I'm not some great artist that people JUST DON'T UNDERSTAAAAAAND with a gallery full of hidden gems - I'm a beginning artist, and I accept that. But like everyone else I wanted the pageviews and fav counts, and that prompted me to neglect the kind of art that would challenge me, make me something other than a bastion of mediocrity.

That was a long way of saying this: DA is great. I'm not leaving as a way to demand that DA change. It's very successful as is, and I loved it, but what I needed from it changed and I need to find something that fits me better.

Also, I'm applying for real jobs now and don't want anyone connecting real me to the the shit up in here.

kisses and love