Sane Inside Insanity by Kris Kitchens (@Spug) https://side7.com/content/VR96Re6O91 Have A Psychotic New Year by Kris Kitchens (@Spug) https://side7.com/content/LNMpQAdD8E Where Is My Mind? by Andrea Paulik (@andrpaul) https://side7.com/content/lar41De094 Here I Come!!!! by Adrian Reece (@Ginsu) https://side7.com/content/E6NrJNQrQa (CW for gore and a severed head) Bloody Meal by Albert McDaniel (@albemcda) https://side7.com/content/jDMWxeg8OQ Death by Arline Young (@arliyoun) https://side7.com/content/VXrALq281n Megaman Trigger (Rokkuman Torika) "What Am I?" by Liz Ramirez (@LizSama) https://side7.com/content/jbMDBXprXD We are the people our parents warned us about by Ashley Tate (@Scryren) https://side7.com/content/z39qq0q9Ro

Oh man, some of these arts were from 22 years ago? I was a wee baby back then. I wonder how the artists are doing.

Looks like I'm not the only one that's gone spelunking.

Side 7 is uniquely small enough, old enough, and consistent enough that going through the whole uploads history is like analyzing the geologic timeline of an ice core sample. It's pretty neat to see the way both art styles specifically and community psyche generally evolve with time and the advent of better digital tools—as well as shifting assumptions about technology itself. Back then, even the kids posting their Disney fanart channeled a certain prestige in having a Gallery; nowadays some professionals seem flippant in how they treat the platforms, as though galleries are an appendage to their Social Media Brand™ (not that the self-cannibalization of sites like dA and Twitter inspire one to dig in).

Truth be told, one of my biggest fears is that as S7 gains traction, some of these older users will swoop back in to wipe their archives as "cringe". I know at least one artist that fell off here in favour of dA, only to later pull the plug entirely, leaving these the only surviving copies.

i had thought of archiving every single profile from the users directory in a web archive XD but that would take me a while

i wasn’t even born yet XD i found a user who is still active in their websites and they post AI art :’)

Presumably one can set up bots to scrape things automatically, though you'd want to consult with BK to make sure it a) can actually be done (some sites use scripts to blacklist bots) and b) won't overload the servers.

I've seen one artist (not here) that was great on their own but now exclusively churns out AI prompts. The techbros are one thing, but Quislings...

@BadKarma While we're on the subject of this old artwork. Hey, BK, I noticed that, when I pulled up these older works, my screen showed that I was logged out even though I remained logged in. I'm sure it's the difference in code between the newer parts of the site and the older stuff that had yet to change when these posts were made. I wasn't planning to comment or anything; I just thought I'd say something.

I'd noticed that too: it's the difference between www.side7.com and plain ol' side7.com. As far as I can tell both roads lead to Rome, but your cookies don't cross over.

Yeah there was one artist I liked but they just post AI now and it has none of the flair they have. It feels like an artist has died or given up when that happens. Sucks.

And yeah may be the cookie header is set differently for www? It should cover the whole domain.

I feel better that I'm archiving even my old edgy art to post on here, I hope the people who used to upload on here years ago are doing good in life now, at least. I really wish some DA artists aren't only just posting to DA and posting to other places online tbh.

2024 Edit: Scryren also doesn’t make art anymore, which is a bummer but I understand, she mostly makes photos from video games she plays now.