itch.io

This is great! (20% chance is as good as things got for me...)

Respectfully, I don't think this is true or a good perspective on the situation.

These sites aren't hosting copies made by LLMs. It's always just Wigglypaint from itch.io re-uploaded. The likelihood of a kid with an LLM "accidentally" generating Wigglypaint down to the pixel, every line of code and also the entire Decker software behind it 1:1... it's not reasonable. And I don't think this is a high schooler's misunderstanding either: 

1) Some of these sites' owners are easily identified as adults. 

2) Some of the sites claim, incorrectly, to be made by Internet Janitor or the "Wigglypaint team". 

3) Tons of them are monetized: apps, referral links to other services, ads and offers of partnerships.

And furthermore, sidestepping any software technicalities: Most of them stole art from the artists here on itch.io to fill up their galleries. One of the apps even used these stolen artworks from itch in their promotional screenshots until more artists bought the app and they could use newly submitted work instead.

I just want to be very clear that these larger deceptive sites are not just run by some confused kid.

Friends on Stilts. 🤔 There's something there. But really, all of this is great.

Your art and writing are so pretty. Well done.

This is so beautiful!

Thank you. The pure pirate sites are definitely the easiest to put in a box. Pure scam, pure deception. The threw a fake page up and then moved on. Okay.

It's the ones who keep building on their scams that get to me. And the site that bugs me the most is the one where they're not anonymous at all and they've connected their real reputations to their art theft. It baffles the mind. 

My mind, anyway.

And I'd rather have my mind baffled by MindApe. :) Thank you for reading and commenting. It means a lot.

I've had very mixed results with telling people directly. :') And I really do try to be polite about it because they didn't know. There are signs that something is wrong inside Jigglypaint but they're buried enough that someone just buying an app and drawing in it probably wouldn't notice the issues themselves.

Thank you very much for reading, Flocon! And good to see you.

I definitely count you among the community here. :') And likewise. Thank you.

Hell yeah.

Oh, oof.

Yeah, it really does. And thank you so much for checking it out!

I get exactly what you mean. :') Thank you very much for reading.

In the beginning I really wondered if I would find someone who gave permission... It wasn't impossible that one of the people running a site with a smaller gallery could have contacted people with an official looking email address or something. But. Well.

(Thank you for printing it out! I'm honored that it found a place in your zine collection.)

Thank you for your support through everything, Millie. ❤️

Having your own photos in this makes it that much more impactful, I think.

Y'KNOW... I did assume they liked dampness because of the terrariums they're sold in. I've learned a lot!

This is whimsical and splendid and also suprisingly educational! Very well done.

This is so very resonant to a lot of things I've been feeling in my own work. :') Thank you for making it.

Your art is so cool!

Wishlisted! This is really exciting.

I've been playing with this a little and I think I still haven't got the hang of it, but it's really interesting!

Hey BoopySnoop, sorry to bother you. 

I've found a bunch of your wigglypaint artwork inside of the "Jigglypaint" app, posted by the app's owner and I wanted to check if they ever asked for your permission.

Hi tank6461919, I'm not sure if you'll receive this message but I've found your work on some fake websites pretending to be wigglypaint and inside of the Jigglypaint app. I wanted to know if anyone ever claiming to be wigglypaint asked for your permission to put your artwork on other sites?

Hey ronnie_T-T, I'm sorry to bother you but is there some way I could contact you? I found your artwork inside of the Jigglypaint app posted there by the app's owner and I'd like to check whether or not he asked you for permission.

Hey LilyHIlls, I'm sorry to bother you but is there some way I could contact you? A bunch of fake wigglypaint websites have your artwork on them and I'd like to check whether or not they asked you for permission.

Your art absolutely rocks.

This is so cute. I love it.

Hello! I remember your posts and it's so nice to see your work!

Thank you very much for your kind words. Knowing that things I've made have helped people makes it all worth it.

The extra drawing is very cool.

I played through a couple times to see the different paths through the dialog (and the different cards).

This was really interesting and well done.

I can relate a lot to this. Really beautiful artwork.

It's a lot to take up there on the satellite, and it's a really good zine.

Your art style is so cool. I love The Misunderstood.

Lovely and detailed.

I noticed some interesting things that I didn't see the first time when I was flipping back through the pages. Really cool.

I'm really curious about this one! I think I'll need the tutorial card to really get my head around it, but I'm definitely interested in checking it out when that's ready.

No, it's pretty much all scummy.

I get that it's popular with young teens for the social media aspect and the fact that their school firewalls don't seem to block the site. I don't blame kids for using it when so much of the web is not built with them in mind.

But the person running the site is absolutely scummy.

The paid subscription costs $49 per year if you want access to Decker's other built in patterns and colors (which are free), color palettes they took off of lospec (which are free) and a tiny, tiny amount of cloud storage (which people probably already have for free).

The site uses generative AI all over the place including the AI-generated fake "pixel art" that they use as highlight images on the color palettes which just seems extra insulting to the real pixel artists they took the color palettes from. They even promoted an AI service as the top banner on the website before they got their subscription system set up.

And they don't allow users in the social media area to post the name "internetjanitor". The automated review that happens when people post there will not let the creator of wigglypaint's username be posted on their site.

I don't think they want to be a fun, honest social media site for wigglypaint enjoyers. I wish they did. I think they want to fool people and make sure that their community stays fooled so they can keep making money off of young artists.

*Nods nods* You have to love.

What a glimpse into the Yu-gi-oh of yesteryear!

I think the black screen is because there's a new kind of image encoding that keeps the file size lower when a project has lots of color images like this one does.

It should open normally in a newer version of Decker. But if it doesn't, please let me know!

P.S. You're welcome! It was fun to find your site on there.

Salt and Vinegar Vanilla Treat sounds plausibly nice to me. 🤔 Hmmm.