Chaser said:
It is a useless tag, only people who need feel to use the "original character" on art are usually those under the age of 18 who think everyone is out to steal their characters.

Again, original character is *also* a way of stating that, no, this character is is not from some TV show, it's 'mine'. I have spent much time browsing around. If you are at all a popular artist and you do not say "This is my character" you will have people asking what it's from.

And honestly, I really prefer people state it clearly: I hate when I have to spent 20 minutes searching around for ANY character information... Is it the artist's character? a character from a show? a commission? a friend??????

also, i generally agree in that original character is a useless tag, and should not be used on the site. It should not be aliased away to fan character either.