Webnovel.Forum

Over and over, Webnovel goes out of it's way to chase people away from the platform, because they don't pay enough money. Every single time, Webnovel claims it's an improvement and ignores complaints.

First we had premium, people were worried it would become a permanent paywall. No, Webnovel said, chapters unlock for free over time! Until suddenly they didn't. We had various reductions in rewards, which made people worried that reading for free would become much harder. No, Webnovel said, we add in new rewards as a replacement! The new rewards were just much worse than the old ones, and this repeated several times now. People aren't welcome here unless they pay up.

How long will they keep lying about their intentions while pretending to improve things? How long will they hide behind people like @CKtalon who seem to willingly ignore the issues? How long will this continue before the platform is dead?

It's been made pretty obvious, the Webnovel staff doesn't care about readers or writers or editors, they only care about short term profit. If it fails, the only product that really gets harmed are the novels themselves and they will just relaunch the site under a new name.

I can’t agree more... any older user to webnovel can see it... from the poaching of novels being independently translated and translators to at the time Qidian, the initially known as premium use of SS to unlock chapters, tho translators wildly denying novels would go premium, to they going, to all translated novels going premium, to seeing ads to unlock or get discounts in chapters, to some original works being “contracted”, to implement of rewards, implement of TGIFs (instead of mass releases done by translators wanting votes), to reducing rewards, to the failure of subscription, privilege and all those small and not so small changes... all said under the guise to “pay more and support authors and translators”. It’s not believable at all. Not anymore.
I came here from “pirate”, from reading TKA on GravityTales and only got to know Qidian because of the massive fight over the novels and translators. Than I choose to support Qidian. If there’s an official channel to access intelectual property 90% of the time I will use it.
The other 10%? Is when the “official channel” start to take the users as fools. That is quite common in western grounds. I don’t know how exactly it works on China and other asian countries but here? If you start to overprice and try to coerce us to pay more without giving benefits of equal value. Welp, say hello to piracy. Be it music, films, series, games, softwares and obviously books (ebooks and novels included) there’s a lot of ways to get it outside the ”official channel”.
I feel Webnovel is recently forgetting that english (speaking/reading) wise, using its services are an option and not really a necessity.
The Japanese manga industry tried, big companies like sony, warner, disney, microsoft and many others tried... even the US govt tried to pass laws “against piracy” in vain... I don’t believe Webnovel would be able to do what none of them were able to and have a “monopoly” over its intelectual property. When you try to charge more without equivalent benefits you push the users to piracy.
I will still use webnovel. But will not defend it as before. I used to think using pirate when there’s this fine official channel here was a lack of righteousness. But not anymore... not when webnovel keep disregarding readers and trying to come up with ways to force ur to spend more 3x at least per year. Instead of keeping its users webnovel keeps pushing them away. This will not work long term...
I’m more and more disappointed in Webnovel...

Steve3000 plus the weekly reward being 1 fast pass... just wow.. very comparable with the previous 50SS... even the reduces 20SS was better.... webnovel this year has been... disappointment after disappointment.
The only good thing we got was the limited time free reading... and they did try to take it back a couple of times too... u.u”

Yeah, the new rewards suck

QI is really good!
Really GOOD at making things WORSE from the BAD.
...
*Shake my head

Nizze ads, half-premium, premium, subscription, privilege, fast pass/membership and all those reduce of ss in betweens... I can’t really complain now because after all the changes QI have made, I’m still a free user through and through lmao.

I’m just getting sad now that you mention all of it... It all started with watching ads and now... sigh

It’s a good thing that I’m only reading 1 novel now here. Currently just reading KR and JP outside...

Matirion agreed ... Really disappointing

Steve3000

burntpotato im also a free user and would never pay for it. i dont really mind buying a book but that amount you would have to pay to read some of these novels are way too much. im currently reading 4 novels on this site and its just impossible now to do so. you might get away with 2 novels but anymore is impossible to read now as a free user. as Nizze said, its fully time to transition to other sites that have their translations

It really is ridiculous. I'm literally down to 1-2 novels to read.

burntpotato honestly I’ve lost count of how many novels I stopped reading because of lack of SS... I’m also a free user. I refuse to spend money on this app for one reason. I am not buying the novels. I’m buying access to them. And if one day Webnovel decides to shut down the app or site I won’t have those novels. I’ve been there already on a game that shut down and the feeling of having spent money on something and suddenly losing it like that is not nice.
So I feel unsure about spending on Webnovel, even more so with how the disregard users. After all those novels are not books that I’ll have forever. Heck, is not even like ebooks that you download and have the pdf for yourself...
So yeah... I get paying for access like Netflix and Spotfy... but that’s not really how Webnovel works right? Is more like having access to them and then paying per episode watched or music listened... well overpaying for them in Webnovel’s case... so yeah will keep being a free user and supporting my fave novel... but cant guarantee I’ll keep using it as much as before... there's other ways to pass time besides novels...

Best way to give web novel/quidian the middle finger is to drop them. They seem to be dead set on making people do this anyways. Been a loyal free reader for years and been through all the transitions they shoved down my throat. But enough is enough. Gonna probably drop them when my stones run out and my passes dry up. Moving to a new platform then. Unfortunately most original stories are not on it yet. Slowly they will get the collection though.

And I suppose no one here spared a thought for the authors that have been churning out content for everyone?

I assume they can feed themselves on facebook likes and comments as well?

I enjoy reading this topic.. hahaha

Everybody knew from the beginning that the aggressive economic spirit of Q did not bode well for the future. When everything is said and done it, the question remaining is "Should I abandon ship?"
My answer would seem to be "Yes"

Draekai dude... really? From someone who’s here for almost t 2 yrs...
1- They don’t really give a about authors. Want to know how I know? For 2 years they are saying the same thing. We are trying to make you guys pay more so we are able to pay authors and translators. Every time. Every change. Also who are you kidding? The authors main revenue comes from the Chinese version.
2- As I said, the older users came here exactly out of respect for the authors. Because this is the “official channel”. We came for this. Stayed for this. But webnovel’s not helping us much. And if free readers are really worthless as compared with paying ones, as you said in other post, then why are you worried if they use webnovel or not?
3- Try reading the other posts in this thread. Maybe than you’ll get what we are complaining about.

This pay thing not only here even ww become the same u have to pay for complete novel pretty much money money for every thing poor users can't read any more , the new fast pass useless when u earn 30, 40 SS every day was better so thing goes from bad to worse for free users

This pay thing not only here even ww become the same u have to pay for complete novel pretty much money money for every thing poor users can't read any more , the new fast pass useless when u earn 30, 40 SS every day was better so thing goes from bad to worse for free users