I have been a deviant artist for five years now, it that time my art has improved a lot, but deviant art itself seems to have gone further and further down hill.
Two years ago it became perfectly ok to upload traces and manga scans.
Now I know some of you are fine with tracing, some of you do great things with traces and so long as the person whose art you traced is ok with it then it's not that big of a deal (though in my opinion you will never learn anything from tracing and your art will never improve from just drawing over the top of someone elses), but how exactly is scaning manga an art?
Today it has been decided that traces and "dolls" (traced bases made from drawing over the top of anime and manga scans, screencaps and art, often without the permission of the artist and distributed for anybody to use) shall now have their own sections and that it is now fine to trace without asking permission of the original artist.
I cannot and will not support art theft, which is why I have decided to no longer upload to deviant art.
Furthermore if, within seven days I am still as angered as I am now I will start removing the art I currently have uploaded (leaving anything that is currently in a contest).
At this time I have no plans to actually leave deviant art, I have a lot of friends on here and plan on continuing to follow their art.

Sigss xxx