Feedback regarding UP 2.7 changes

First, a frank summary: Everything regarding this policy change has been an utter disaster. From poor implementation, to unclear documentation, to outright untruthful and contradictory communication from staff, I have never in my decade-long use of this site been more fearful for its future. I am also terrified that despite this policy change being clearly overwhelmingly unpopular, our feedback will go unheeded; this stems from an almost complete lack of transparency demonstrated by the administration thus far.

Anything I say regarding the policy itself has been elaborated upon in greater detail by better writers than I. However, for the sake of leaving good feedback, I'll write up my own key points.

1.) UP 2.7 now directly alienates a large swath of the fandom.

One week ago, my Totodile fursona wasn't a problem. I draw him on-model because that's what Totodile looks like; they're just a funny little alligator guy. And that's the norm for the Pokemon fandom! The vast majority of Pokemon artists that draw Eevee on-model are doing it because that's what Eevee looks like, not because their proportions are supposedly childlike. We are being asked by staff to "age up" characters that do not meaningfully age, meaning drawing them incorrectly, or to change our artstyles completely.

2.) UP 2.7 cannot be refined into something that only affects the loophole it aims to close due to the inherent subjectivity of language.

There is no one specific set of words that will close the "1000-year-old vampire" loophole without harming uninvolved artists. Simple proportional analysis cannot be meaningfully applied to fantasy creatures, and the policy explicitly ignores context inherent to the Pokemon and Digimon source material, such as Pokemon evolution not being tied to age, or the "Rookie" Digimon category including Renamon. And ultimately, the final say will always hinge on the personal opinion of the moderator dealing with a given instance.

3.) UP 2.7 will have a financial impact on artists.

Because UP 2.7 now casts such a wide net, many artists (Myself included) are worried that they'll lose income either from a user exodus or their content no longer being allowed. While there are competitors to FurAffinity with better features and policy, FA has a large and well-established userbase and community that is now at risk. It takes time and effort to build up a userbase and to lose that is a terrifying prospect.

4.) Staff communication has been very poor throughout all of this.

We were not told how or why this change came about, or where the supposed feedback was obtained, or even what the guidelines for enforcement were. We were told a visual guide was in the works and that there would not be outright species bans; But only a day later an update was pushed with no visual guide and actual species bans. Frankly, it's been frustrating and has ruined a lot of the goodwill I and many other artists have had for FurAffinity's staff. It is clear that this update was less than half-baked, and *much* more thought should have been put into this.

My recommendations are thus:

1.) Walk back the policy update entirely as it stands.
2.) Implement a blacklist and a community tagging system. E.G. User-generated tags that are displayed alongside the uploader's own tags.
3.) Enforce a minimum number of tags that must be applied to an upload. Levy appropriate punishments for users that sidestep this rule with junk or filler tags.
4.) Judge potentially offending art on more metrics than body proportion. This includes additional context present in the image and the uploader's prior uploads.
5.) Restrict users under 18 from sending or receiving notes.

Thank you for reading, and I hope you will seriously consider the community's feedback thus far.