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QUESTION: Where do you find talent?
Posted 9 years agoHarken to me, my subjects!
OOC today
I'm looking for talent for a few really big projects, but I find myself at a loss for where to start. I'm curious if I have any followers that are like film majors or know something about producing, who would know where I could go to contract out high-quality animation (2D and 3D), 3D model design, rigging, texturing... stuff like that? And at the same time, I don't want to break the bank. I can't pay like Hollywood prices.
Thoughts on this? Please NOTE ME (not comments) if you have suggestions. (I still want to keep my plans a little bit secret)
Thanks :)
~ Etheras
OOC today
I'm looking for talent for a few really big projects, but I find myself at a loss for where to start. I'm curious if I have any followers that are like film majors or know something about producing, who would know where I could go to contract out high-quality animation (2D and 3D), 3D model design, rigging, texturing... stuff like that? And at the same time, I don't want to break the bank. I can't pay like Hollywood prices.
Thoughts on this? Please NOTE ME (not comments) if you have suggestions. (I still want to keep my plans a little bit secret)
Thanks :)
~ Etheras
POLL: Who are your favorite equine OC's?
Posted 9 years agoHarken to me, my subjects!
Perhaps I am asking you to help me assemble a shopping list. Or maybe I'd just like to admire some handsome/pretty equines. But in any case : which equine OCs do you like the best, and what do you like about them? I'm interested to know.
Comments below, and thanks!
~ Lord Etheras
Perhaps I am asking you to help me assemble a shopping list. Or maybe I'd just like to admire some handsome/pretty equines. But in any case : which equine OCs do you like the best, and what do you like about them? I'm interested to know.
Comments below, and thanks!
~ Lord Etheras
ANNOUNCEMENT: On Telegram
Posted 9 years agoHarken, my subjects!
TL;DR: I'm [at]etheras on Telegram. Feel free to add!
I tried Telegram years ago, and I think its just awful. So awful in-fact that I left Telegram within the first couple hours. (Although it took several days before they would actually let me leave. Despite their claims of account deletion being easy, they give you quite the runaround).
However, last night I have (reluctantly) accepted that Telegram seems to be the "next big thing". So I re-joined last night. If you're interested in adding me, I'm [at]etheras
And I'm sure that most of you are not wondering why I hate the shit out of Telegram, but for those of you who want to hear fennecs complaining, I'll lay out in detail their many failings.
1. Their vaunted anonymity is nonsense. Anyone with your number in their contact list can find out all kinds of stuff about you through Telegram without your consent or even your knowledge. Furthermore (and this was what caused me to quit), because your profile is attached to your phone number, there's no way to multi-profile without multiple phones. I use my regular phone number for both RL and Furry stuff, but I want to keep my real life and furry life separate. With Telegram, there's no way to hide a secret life. Either you have to let your RL friends, family, co-workers that you're a furry, or you must give away your real identity to furs.
2. The UI is terrible. I get that they're trying for a really minimalist UI, but there are certain conventions established by the industry that UI designers re-use to make it intuitive, and those things are pretty-much thrown out the window. Like in the Web client Settings > Edit changes your name. (Lol wut?) Settings > then Clicking on your avatar zooms into your avatar (rather than changing it). To leave a group chat you have to go up to the title and click that, then select from a dropdown. If these guys had any js/css prowess, they'd have put it on a context click on the group rather than falling through to the browser default context click.
3. A lot of the emotes are huge an obnoxious
4. ANOTHER IM client? I just got through migrating all my friends on to Skype or Steam. I want fewer IM clients, not more.
Anyway, I probably won't be on Telegram much (because I strongly dislike it, and there's no way I'm ever installing it on my phone) but I'll pop on from time to time if anyone wants to chat up The Galactic Overlord.
Cheers,
~ Lord Etheras
TL;DR: I'm [at]etheras on Telegram. Feel free to add!
I tried Telegram years ago, and I think its just awful. So awful in-fact that I left Telegram within the first couple hours. (Although it took several days before they would actually let me leave. Despite their claims of account deletion being easy, they give you quite the runaround).
However, last night I have (reluctantly) accepted that Telegram seems to be the "next big thing". So I re-joined last night. If you're interested in adding me, I'm [at]etheras
And I'm sure that most of you are not wondering why I hate the shit out of Telegram, but for those of you who want to hear fennecs complaining, I'll lay out in detail their many failings.
1. Their vaunted anonymity is nonsense. Anyone with your number in their contact list can find out all kinds of stuff about you through Telegram without your consent or even your knowledge. Furthermore (and this was what caused me to quit), because your profile is attached to your phone number, there's no way to multi-profile without multiple phones. I use my regular phone number for both RL and Furry stuff, but I want to keep my real life and furry life separate. With Telegram, there's no way to hide a secret life. Either you have to let your RL friends, family, co-workers that you're a furry, or you must give away your real identity to furs.
2. The UI is terrible. I get that they're trying for a really minimalist UI, but there are certain conventions established by the industry that UI designers re-use to make it intuitive, and those things are pretty-much thrown out the window. Like in the Web client Settings > Edit changes your name. (Lol wut?) Settings > then Clicking on your avatar zooms into your avatar (rather than changing it). To leave a group chat you have to go up to the title and click that, then select from a dropdown. If these guys had any js/css prowess, they'd have put it on a context click on the group rather than falling through to the browser default context click.
3. A lot of the emotes are huge an obnoxious
4. ANOTHER IM client? I just got through migrating all my friends on to Skype or Steam. I want fewer IM clients, not more.
Anyway, I probably won't be on Telegram much (because I strongly dislike it, and there's no way I'm ever installing it on my phone) but I'll pop on from time to time if anyone wants to chat up The Galactic Overlord.
Cheers,
~ Lord Etheras
UPDATE: Dereliction of Fennec
Posted 9 years agoHarken, my subjects.
I must apologize for not being around as much as usual. It must be difficult to not have your great and iconic leader around to look-up to. The truth is that several of my secret projects have been consuming my time. I really shouldn't let it bite into my furry time, but it never seems like I have enough time to do new things and still maintain my online presence.
Anyway - did you miss me? I'll have to double-up over the next few weeks to catch up.
As for secret projects, I will start trying to recruit talent for them in the next month or two. I suspect that most of you don't care at this point because I've been so vague about the details, but hopefully once I can say more, people will get excited. :)
Glad to be back for a bit. Did u miss me? ^.^
~ Lord Etheras
I must apologize for not being around as much as usual. It must be difficult to not have your great and iconic leader around to look-up to. The truth is that several of my secret projects have been consuming my time. I really shouldn't let it bite into my furry time, but it never seems like I have enough time to do new things and still maintain my online presence.
Anyway - did you miss me? I'll have to double-up over the next few weeks to catch up.
As for secret projects, I will start trying to recruit talent for them in the next month or two. I suspect that most of you don't care at this point because I've been so vague about the details, but hopefully once I can say more, people will get excited. :)
Glad to be back for a bit. Did u miss me? ^.^
~ Lord Etheras
ANSWER: Deprecating Adult Holidays
Posted 9 years agoHarken to me, my subjects!
I have pondered more extensively on the topic of adult holidays, and whether they really fit the illustrious persona of Etheras. A couple weeks ago I posted a journal asking the the question more-generally: what would you think if I stopped promoting adult holidays.
The results were generally very supportive. It seemed like many subjects wanted to see them continued, but were understanding that I wanted to stop.
Because of this, and my own feelings towards the matter, I am going to deprecate adult holidays on this profile. I might pick them up again at some other day as Jaspian. But honestly, I feel like they're consuming too much time, effort, and money, that I can use towards other (super-secret large-scale) projects that haven't been getting the love that they need.
Anyway, thanks for reading. Sorry if you really liked the adult holidays idea! Feel free to continue them on your own. I will support you in this. :) But I don't want Etheras to be the "nexus" of them anymore.
~ Prince Etheras
I have pondered more extensively on the topic of adult holidays, and whether they really fit the illustrious persona of Etheras. A couple weeks ago I posted a journal asking the the question more-generally: what would you think if I stopped promoting adult holidays.
The results were generally very supportive. It seemed like many subjects wanted to see them continued, but were understanding that I wanted to stop.
Because of this, and my own feelings towards the matter, I am going to deprecate adult holidays on this profile. I might pick them up again at some other day as Jaspian. But honestly, I feel like they're consuming too much time, effort, and money, that I can use towards other (super-secret large-scale) projects that haven't been getting the love that they need.
Anyway, thanks for reading. Sorry if you really liked the adult holidays idea! Feel free to continue them on your own. I will support you in this. :) But I don't want Etheras to be the "nexus" of them anymore.
~ Prince Etheras
Returning Etheras to his Roots
Posted 10 years agoHarken, my subjects.
OOC
As I'm sure many of you have noticed, there has been a significant change in tone in my submissions, journals, and twitter feed. You may have noticed that its a lot more IC lately. A bit more snarky, self-aggrandizing, and not talking about the real-world news or my real-world life. There's a reason for this: I wanted to get a feel for how Etheras fans would react to a returning of Etheras to his original form: the galactic tyrant prince. And I feel like the reaction has been pretty positive.
For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, let's take a trip way-way back into the ancient times of 4+ years ago. My sole character was a lonely fennec named Jaspian, whom I was having some troubles with, both because I was getting bored of playing a character based on myself, and because of some other minor design problems. From this, I decided to make a character who wouldn't be "me", but rather a character that I wanted to play-as. I wanted him to be villainous, so I could play out things that I would never do myself. I wanted to play ICly as "someone else". So I made Etheras... a truly naughty fennec.
Then Etheras sort-of took over. I liked playing him so much that Jaspian fell by the wayside. And something interesting started to happen... rather than attributes of Etheras influencing Jaspian, the opposite started to occur. Part of my RL personality began to influence Etheras. I've decided to end this "bleed" between the two characters' personalities, and keep them more distinct and individual - and that's why I recently begun the process of rebooting Jaspian. And... likewise... rebooting Etheras - but to be more like his original design rather than something new.
Anyway - I hope you guys like it, and aren't totally freaked out by an eviller Etheras. If you are... Well, there's still a lot of art in my upload pipeline of Etheras being softer and less wicked. And hopefully by the time that pipeline runs out, I'll have Jaspian 2.0 designed for all your less-wicked fennec needs. In the meantime, I'm going to have a lot of fun as a villain.
Thanks for reading!
~ Lord Etheras
OOC
As I'm sure many of you have noticed, there has been a significant change in tone in my submissions, journals, and twitter feed. You may have noticed that its a lot more IC lately. A bit more snarky, self-aggrandizing, and not talking about the real-world news or my real-world life. There's a reason for this: I wanted to get a feel for how Etheras fans would react to a returning of Etheras to his original form: the galactic tyrant prince. And I feel like the reaction has been pretty positive.
For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, let's take a trip way-way back into the ancient times of 4+ years ago. My sole character was a lonely fennec named Jaspian, whom I was having some troubles with, both because I was getting bored of playing a character based on myself, and because of some other minor design problems. From this, I decided to make a character who wouldn't be "me", but rather a character that I wanted to play-as. I wanted him to be villainous, so I could play out things that I would never do myself. I wanted to play ICly as "someone else". So I made Etheras... a truly naughty fennec.
Then Etheras sort-of took over. I liked playing him so much that Jaspian fell by the wayside. And something interesting started to happen... rather than attributes of Etheras influencing Jaspian, the opposite started to occur. Part of my RL personality began to influence Etheras. I've decided to end this "bleed" between the two characters' personalities, and keep them more distinct and individual - and that's why I recently begun the process of rebooting Jaspian. And... likewise... rebooting Etheras - but to be more like his original design rather than something new.
Anyway - I hope you guys like it, and aren't totally freaked out by an eviller Etheras. If you are... Well, there's still a lot of art in my upload pipeline of Etheras being softer and less wicked. And hopefully by the time that pipeline runs out, I'll have Jaspian 2.0 designed for all your less-wicked fennec needs. In the meantime, I'm going to have a lot of fun as a villain.
Thanks for reading!
~ Lord Etheras
QUESTION: Deprecate Adult Holidays?
Posted 10 years agoHarken to me, my subjects!
OOC
For a number of years I've been proposing and contributing-to a number of "adult holidays". These are days when participants do certain naughty things with their partner, and I usually upload some artwork on that day (and the preceding week) of Etheras participating in those acts. These involve days like Rimming Day, Girls On Top Day, Pegging Day, (etc).
While these holidays have been a feature of this profile almost from the start, I am considering no longer doing them. There are a couple reasons why I want to do this...
First - I think that it makes Etheras seem one-dimensional to be so nymphomaniacal. Etheras is now pretty fleshed-out, and although its clear that he's a sexual creature, it isn't the sole focus of his life.
Second - Actually its a lot of stress and work to queue up 3-4 images for each day and save them up to the adult holiday.
Third - I intentionally skipped Rimming Day this past year as an experiment to see what the reaction would be if I opted not to the do the adult holidays, and what happened? Hardly anyone noticed.
So I'd like to ask you all: how would you feel if I simply stopped doing these holidays? I would still have Etheras being rimmed, pegged, and with girls on top, it just would be year-round rather than on prescribed occasions. Opinions down in the comments section!
Hope to hear from ya,
~ Lord Etheras
OOC
For a number of years I've been proposing and contributing-to a number of "adult holidays". These are days when participants do certain naughty things with their partner, and I usually upload some artwork on that day (and the preceding week) of Etheras participating in those acts. These involve days like Rimming Day, Girls On Top Day, Pegging Day, (etc).
While these holidays have been a feature of this profile almost from the start, I am considering no longer doing them. There are a couple reasons why I want to do this...
First - I think that it makes Etheras seem one-dimensional to be so nymphomaniacal. Etheras is now pretty fleshed-out, and although its clear that he's a sexual creature, it isn't the sole focus of his life.
Second - Actually its a lot of stress and work to queue up 3-4 images for each day and save them up to the adult holiday.
Third - I intentionally skipped Rimming Day this past year as an experiment to see what the reaction would be if I opted not to the do the adult holidays, and what happened? Hardly anyone noticed.
So I'd like to ask you all: how would you feel if I simply stopped doing these holidays? I would still have Etheras being rimmed, pegged, and with girls on top, it just would be year-round rather than on prescribed occasions. Opinions down in the comments section!
Hope to hear from ya,
~ Lord Etheras
4 Years of Etheras
Posted 10 years agoHarken to me, my subjects.
OOC
Its been an astonishing 4 years since my introduction of Etheras to the furry world. And what an astonishing time its been! Having been embraced by all of you, Etheras is possibly the most recognizable fennec character in the world. And we're only getting started!
So thank you all for your dedication, admiration, and support. I love you all, and I hope that you will continue to enjoy those things that I have planned for this year.
Thanks again, and I hope you have a wonderful 2016!
~ Etheras's player
OOC
Its been an astonishing 4 years since my introduction of Etheras to the furry world. And what an astonishing time its been! Having been embraced by all of you, Etheras is possibly the most recognizable fennec character in the world. And we're only getting started!
So thank you all for your dedication, admiration, and support. I love you all, and I hope that you will continue to enjoy those things that I have planned for this year.
Thanks again, and I hope you have a wonderful 2016!
~ Etheras's player
INFO: 2015 In Review
Posted 10 years agoHarken, my subjects!
Some reflections on 2015 from your adorable imperious prince. Its been an interesting year.
ETHERAS CHARACTER ACHIEVEMENTS
.. lots of new artwork.
.. started task of shifting Etheras in a new direction: more to his original concept.
.. found some new artists, replaced a few old ones.
.. conquered some people.
.. subjugated some stuff.
.. crossed the 100K pageviews milestone.
.. crossed the 50K faves milestone.
.. first comic uploaded ("May The Best Man Win"). Its in my gallery!
ETHERAS PLAYER ACHIEVEMENTS
.. revived original fennec character Jaspian. More to come on this!
.. published first (non-furry) video game to Steam. This has been a bit of a stealth release because I'm not entirely happy with how it turned out. Second one should be better.
.. co-hosted third annual FurryCon™ in Rochester NY. Themed "Game of Con Chairs", I think it was even better than last year. Next year's should be even better, but its in a holding pattern at the moment as Soron has some logistical issues to work out for a really big (and impressive) change that we have planned.
.. continued to take measures to cut down on character theft. Steps are being taken to hopefully make character theft a thing of the past.
.. resumed ConCast and had a very successful season 2, but will be retiring from the show due to time constraints. (It consumes a lot of time, and I have other projects that are more important to me).
.. posted a bunch of new journals, which are increasingly IC. Response has been mostly positive.
.. first really professional quality song produced, called "Rock Drop". Still needs polishing before a general release.
IN THE WORLD
.. the increasing capability of ISIS to conduct operations abroad is highly disturbing to me. I'm not hawkish iRL, but they have demonstrated a willingness and capability to strike The West, and I think its time to take them out, even if it means direct military operations.
.. the political landscape in the United States is troubling. I fear our choices will come down to: a blustering bigot former reality TV star unable to articulate plans - versus - a lying felon who attempted to destroy evidence to cover up her own incompetence. And this person will lead the world's most powerful military and economy? Gonna be a tough 4 years.
.. Tesla Motors enables first "autopilot" street-legal automobiles.
.. Tesla "Ludicrous" mode puts Model-S in 4th place (0-60 in 2.8s) for fastest accelerating stock street-legal automobiles.
.. Tesla releases Model-X, which seems even more compelling than Model-S.
.. Microsoft Surfacebook redefines mobile computing with a series of new innovations in an industry recently starved for new ideas.
.. Major setback for SpaceX as one of their rockets disintegrates during ascent.
.. SpaceX and Blue Origin demonstrate orbital and space class reusable boosters.
UNREACHED ACHIEVEMENTS
.. did not complete the novel that I spoke of last year. Hardly even started it, in fact.
.. music was made, but not released.
WHAT TO EXPECT IN 2016
.. the release of at least 1 major video game title (non-furry). Possibly as many as 3.
.. development of several new Etheras comics. They might not be published in 2016, however.
.. launch of www.etheras.com (I know, I know. Its taking forever)
.. publishing of new music
.. PERHAPS publishing of an Etheras novel. I will definitely work on it, but it might not make it to presses before the end of the year
.. and of course, lots of new artwork featuring Etheras with horses and zebras!!!
Should be an exciting year! Hope you'll stay with me ^.^
Thanks,
~ Lord Etheras
Some reflections on 2015 from your adorable imperious prince. Its been an interesting year.
ETHERAS CHARACTER ACHIEVEMENTS
.. lots of new artwork.
.. started task of shifting Etheras in a new direction: more to his original concept.
.. found some new artists, replaced a few old ones.
.. conquered some people.
.. subjugated some stuff.
.. crossed the 100K pageviews milestone.
.. crossed the 50K faves milestone.
.. first comic uploaded ("May The Best Man Win"). Its in my gallery!
ETHERAS PLAYER ACHIEVEMENTS
.. revived original fennec character Jaspian. More to come on this!
.. published first (non-furry) video game to Steam. This has been a bit of a stealth release because I'm not entirely happy with how it turned out. Second one should be better.
.. co-hosted third annual FurryCon™ in Rochester NY. Themed "Game of Con Chairs", I think it was even better than last year. Next year's should be even better, but its in a holding pattern at the moment as Soron has some logistical issues to work out for a really big (and impressive) change that we have planned.
.. continued to take measures to cut down on character theft. Steps are being taken to hopefully make character theft a thing of the past.
.. resumed ConCast and had a very successful season 2, but will be retiring from the show due to time constraints. (It consumes a lot of time, and I have other projects that are more important to me).
.. posted a bunch of new journals, which are increasingly IC. Response has been mostly positive.
.. first really professional quality song produced, called "Rock Drop". Still needs polishing before a general release.
IN THE WORLD
.. the increasing capability of ISIS to conduct operations abroad is highly disturbing to me. I'm not hawkish iRL, but they have demonstrated a willingness and capability to strike The West, and I think its time to take them out, even if it means direct military operations.
.. the political landscape in the United States is troubling. I fear our choices will come down to: a blustering bigot former reality TV star unable to articulate plans - versus - a lying felon who attempted to destroy evidence to cover up her own incompetence. And this person will lead the world's most powerful military and economy? Gonna be a tough 4 years.
.. Tesla Motors enables first "autopilot" street-legal automobiles.
.. Tesla "Ludicrous" mode puts Model-S in 4th place (0-60 in 2.8s) for fastest accelerating stock street-legal automobiles.
.. Tesla releases Model-X, which seems even more compelling than Model-S.
.. Microsoft Surfacebook redefines mobile computing with a series of new innovations in an industry recently starved for new ideas.
.. Major setback for SpaceX as one of their rockets disintegrates during ascent.
.. SpaceX and Blue Origin demonstrate orbital and space class reusable boosters.
UNREACHED ACHIEVEMENTS
.. did not complete the novel that I spoke of last year. Hardly even started it, in fact.
.. music was made, but not released.
WHAT TO EXPECT IN 2016
.. the release of at least 1 major video game title (non-furry). Possibly as many as 3.
.. development of several new Etheras comics. They might not be published in 2016, however.
.. launch of www.etheras.com (I know, I know. Its taking forever)
.. publishing of new music
.. PERHAPS publishing of an Etheras novel. I will definitely work on it, but it might not make it to presses before the end of the year
.. and of course, lots of new artwork featuring Etheras with horses and zebras!!!
Should be an exciting year! Hope you'll stay with me ^.^
Thanks,
~ Lord Etheras
Christmas Wishlist (2015)
Posted 10 years agoHarken, my subjects.
Another productive year is coming to a close, and much progress has been made towards my conquest of the Universe. And yet, Christmas approaches. Here's a helpful gift-buying guide for an overlord who has (almost) everything.
1. Custom stuff is always good. If your fennec ruler has everything, have something made that never existed before.
2. Equines. With a bow. Note: they must be willing and eager to please.
3. Technology, especially that which can be used to enhance my fleet. (Read as: bigger guns)
4. Location of the Insurgency's base. I want this pretty badly.
5. Outfits. Something sexy yet imperious. During negotiations, I want my opponent not knowing whether they want to fuck me or fear me.
6. A breakthrough in mass mind control and interrogation techniques.
7. Zero-G coffee maker that actually tastes right for my flagship.
8. Can never go wrong with jewelry. I like fine gold and platinum chains. Gems optional.
9. Holiday cheer. In the rush to get everything done, plus the whole ongoing conquest thing, its hard to actually get in the mood.
10. The universe worshiping me as their god and prince.
Gifts should be sent to Bureau of Public Affection, Attn: Loyalty Evaluation Department for processing at the Fennecropolis. Joke gifts are welcome, but will be answered in kind. Note: reply joke usually involves secret police.
Happy Holidays!
Lord Etheras
Another productive year is coming to a close, and much progress has been made towards my conquest of the Universe. And yet, Christmas approaches. Here's a helpful gift-buying guide for an overlord who has (almost) everything.
1. Custom stuff is always good. If your fennec ruler has everything, have something made that never existed before.
2. Equines. With a bow. Note: they must be willing and eager to please.
3. Technology, especially that which can be used to enhance my fleet. (Read as: bigger guns)
4. Location of the Insurgency's base. I want this pretty badly.
5. Outfits. Something sexy yet imperious. During negotiations, I want my opponent not knowing whether they want to fuck me or fear me.
6. A breakthrough in mass mind control and interrogation techniques.
7. Zero-G coffee maker that actually tastes right for my flagship.
8. Can never go wrong with jewelry. I like fine gold and platinum chains. Gems optional.
9. Holiday cheer. In the rush to get everything done, plus the whole ongoing conquest thing, its hard to actually get in the mood.
10. The universe worshiping me as their god and prince.
Gifts should be sent to Bureau of Public Affection, Attn: Loyalty Evaluation Department for processing at the Fennecropolis. Joke gifts are welcome, but will be answered in kind. Note: reply joke usually involves secret police.
Happy Holidays!
Lord Etheras
JASPIAN: The Return
Posted 10 years agoHarken, my subjects!
I have a special announcement to make. Some of your might have already noticed, Jaspian the Fennec, half-brother to your sovereign prince (me, of course), has returned. Having disappeared for several years, many of us thought him lost or dead. But word has reached my large and perky ears that he has again resurfaced!
You can watch him over at
Jaspian ... but be wary. Do not believe the lies he says about me. <.<
He's a tricky one...
OOC
I forgot to announce this earlier on this profile, so I thought it might be a good time to mention it! I've decided to revive Jaspian. Actually... I never really intended to abandon him, so "revive" might be the wrong word. Etheras was created to be an RP and IC character, and Jaspian was always supposed to remain my fursona. Sadly that separation was somewhat lost over the past couple years, but I want to re-impose it going forward... to set up for some future plans. Mwahahaha!
Anyway - I will be posting all Etheras IC or IC-themed stuff here from now on, and post all the stuff about real-me over on Jaspian. So if you just like the Etheras character, watch here. If you are more curious about my real-life enterprises, the Jaspian profile is more for you. But there shouldn't be much crossover, so you won't get spammed with duplicates if you decide to watch both.
I'll probably go into more detail on this in another journal soon. In the meantime, check out the Jaspian page. I've posted some new stuff there. I'm also looking for ideas for an "reboot" to his look. Anyway, its all over there so please check it out. Thanks!
~ Etheras
TLDR; - I'm restarting my original character Jaspian, Check him out at Jaspian. But I'll probably continue to play Etheras more.
I have a special announcement to make. Some of your might have already noticed, Jaspian the Fennec, half-brother to your sovereign prince (me, of course), has returned. Having disappeared for several years, many of us thought him lost or dead. But word has reached my large and perky ears that he has again resurfaced!
You can watch him over at
Jaspian ... but be wary. Do not believe the lies he says about me. <.<He's a tricky one...
OOC
I forgot to announce this earlier on this profile, so I thought it might be a good time to mention it! I've decided to revive Jaspian. Actually... I never really intended to abandon him, so "revive" might be the wrong word. Etheras was created to be an RP and IC character, and Jaspian was always supposed to remain my fursona. Sadly that separation was somewhat lost over the past couple years, but I want to re-impose it going forward... to set up for some future plans. Mwahahaha!
Anyway - I will be posting all Etheras IC or IC-themed stuff here from now on, and post all the stuff about real-me over on Jaspian. So if you just like the Etheras character, watch here. If you are more curious about my real-life enterprises, the Jaspian profile is more for you. But there shouldn't be much crossover, so you won't get spammed with duplicates if you decide to watch both.
I'll probably go into more detail on this in another journal soon. In the meantime, check out the Jaspian page. I've posted some new stuff there. I'm also looking for ideas for an "reboot" to his look. Anyway, its all over there so please check it out. Thanks!
~ Etheras
TLDR; - I'm restarting my original character Jaspian, Check him out at
Jaspian. But I'll probably continue to play Etheras more. HAPPY THANKSGIVING! (and vore)
Posted 10 years agoHarken, my subjects.
Just wanted to wish you all a happy and safe Thanksgiving, for those of you who celebrate it. And also to remind you that I have an AH profile for all my yuckier (not my word!) kinks, over at:
BadFennec
... where I usually post some vore arts on Thanksgiving... like I just did. Yup.
If you're not into that stuff... well, that's why I made separate profiles. :)
Anyway have a Happy Thanksgiving and a nice start to your holiday season. That's an order.
~ Etheras
Just wanted to wish you all a happy and safe Thanksgiving, for those of you who celebrate it. And also to remind you that I have an AH profile for all my yuckier (not my word!) kinks, over at:
BadFennec... where I usually post some vore arts on Thanksgiving... like I just did. Yup.
If you're not into that stuff... well, that's why I made separate profiles. :)
Anyway have a Happy Thanksgiving and a nice start to your holiday season. That's an order.
~ Etheras
QUESTION: Etheras Halloween Costumes 2016
Posted 10 years agoGreetings, my subjects.
I trust that you all carried out a happy, safe, and awesome Halloween, per my explicit instructions. The time has come to plot next year's royal Halloween costume for next year. But in all sincerity, the most obvious outfits have already graced your prince's divine body. And so we are left unsure what to wear for next year's Halloween.
I don't want to do anything that's uncharacteristic of my royal fashion-sense. So no Frankenstein or Zombies or anything like that. It needs to be something sexy but still Halloweeny. But at the same time, like... a witch or ghost... is a little bit boring. At the same time, I already don other costumes for other times of year, like Fairy for Saint Patrick's Day, and "Bunny" for Easter.
Or should I start recycling old outfits?
Suggestions in the comments section, if you please. You have the royal ear.
Etheras Halloween Costumes to-date recap:
2015 (Angel) : Angelic, Good Boy, Happy Halloween, Heavenly
2014 (Devil) : Wickedness, Date with The Devil
2013 (Pirate) : Pirate Booty, Plundering Pirate Booty, Classy Pirate
2012 (Naughty Nurse} : Heeellloooo Nurse! (part1), Heeellloooo Nurse! (part2), Heeellloooo Nurse! (part3), Heeellloooo Nurse! (part4)
~ Lord Etheras
I trust that you all carried out a happy, safe, and awesome Halloween, per my explicit instructions. The time has come to plot next year's royal Halloween costume for next year. But in all sincerity, the most obvious outfits have already graced your prince's divine body. And so we are left unsure what to wear for next year's Halloween.
I don't want to do anything that's uncharacteristic of my royal fashion-sense. So no Frankenstein or Zombies or anything like that. It needs to be something sexy but still Halloweeny. But at the same time, like... a witch or ghost... is a little bit boring. At the same time, I already don other costumes for other times of year, like Fairy for Saint Patrick's Day, and "Bunny" for Easter.
Or should I start recycling old outfits?
Suggestions in the comments section, if you please. You have the royal ear.
Etheras Halloween Costumes to-date recap:
2015 (Angel) : Angelic, Good Boy, Happy Halloween, Heavenly
2014 (Devil) : Wickedness, Date with The Devil
2013 (Pirate) : Pirate Booty, Plundering Pirate Booty, Classy Pirate
2012 (Naughty Nurse} : Heeellloooo Nurse! (part1), Heeellloooo Nurse! (part2), Heeellloooo Nurse! (part3), Heeellloooo Nurse! (part4)
~ Lord Etheras
HOLIDAY: Happy Pegging Day! (also: Peggy Sue?)
Posted 10 years agoGreetings, my subjects...
... and Happy Pegging Day! I hope that you have enjoyed the recent stream of themed artwork on this profile. If its not your thing; don't worry, its over now, and I return to my usual equine-on-fennec action (until next year)!
Here's a refresher of this year's Pegging Week / Pegging Day artwork:
Royal Treatment
Conga Line Etheras
Cream Filled
Just Relax Baby
Which one do you like the best, and why?
I have been quite happy to see a lot of pegging art going up this past week. I'd like to think that a lot of it is thanks to this holiday, but its probably not true. Even so - some of it is! A few furs have mentioned privately (and a couple publicly) that they are commissioning art or posting pegging art for pegging week. To those: thank you for spreading the word and trying to make this a thing with me. But I have noticed that a few posters, putting up their themed art for pegging week didn't mention pegging week. If we want to spread this idea, I do recommend mentioning it in the body of the artwork that you post, so that others can learn about it! Pegging Day is the last Saturday of September every year, and the preceding week is "Pegging Week".
Anyway, please share your thoughts below. Link your pegging pictures, or share a pegging story. Lets discuss! What do you like / dislike about pegging? Do you have any ideas for pegging-related festivities? Did you implement them this year? And if so: how did it go?
Interested to hear what my subjects have to say. The royal ears are perked!
~ Lord Etheras
(PS: Am thinking of changing Peggy Sue's species to a Peg-a-sissy . Its like a Pegasus, but with a strapon and goes after femboys. Thoughts?)
... and Happy Pegging Day! I hope that you have enjoyed the recent stream of themed artwork on this profile. If its not your thing; don't worry, its over now, and I return to my usual equine-on-fennec action (until next year)!
Here's a refresher of this year's Pegging Week / Pegging Day artwork:
Royal Treatment
Conga Line Etheras
Cream Filled
Just Relax Baby
Which one do you like the best, and why?
I have been quite happy to see a lot of pegging art going up this past week. I'd like to think that a lot of it is thanks to this holiday, but its probably not true. Even so - some of it is! A few furs have mentioned privately (and a couple publicly) that they are commissioning art or posting pegging art for pegging week. To those: thank you for spreading the word and trying to make this a thing with me. But I have noticed that a few posters, putting up their themed art for pegging week didn't mention pegging week. If we want to spread this idea, I do recommend mentioning it in the body of the artwork that you post, so that others can learn about it! Pegging Day is the last Saturday of September every year, and the preceding week is "Pegging Week".
Anyway, please share your thoughts below. Link your pegging pictures, or share a pegging story. Lets discuss! What do you like / dislike about pegging? Do you have any ideas for pegging-related festivities? Did you implement them this year? And if so: how did it go?
Interested to hear what my subjects have to say. The royal ears are perked!
~ Lord Etheras
(PS: Am thinking of changing Peggy Sue's species to a Peg-a-sissy . Its like a Pegasus, but with a strapon and goes after femboys. Thoughts?)
HOLIDAY: Pegging Week Begins!
Posted 10 years agoGreetings, my subjects.
Today is the first day of Pegging Week. This is the unofficial holiday for girls and boys to switch roles and for the boys to be girls for a bit (If you're into that!).
If you are participating in pegging week and want to show off some art or stories, please feel free to post links below! Or if you just want to discuss pegging... what you find appealing or unappealing about it... funny stories (etc), plans for pegging week events... also post below!
I will be posting pegging artwork from throughout the year over the course of the next week. I do hope you all will enjoy a fennec prince being used as a princess by mares for a little bit. ;)
Thanks for reading!
~ Etheras
Today is the first day of Pegging Week. This is the unofficial holiday for girls and boys to switch roles and for the boys to be girls for a bit (If you're into that!).
If you are participating in pegging week and want to show off some art or stories, please feel free to post links below! Or if you just want to discuss pegging... what you find appealing or unappealing about it... funny stories (etc), plans for pegging week events... also post below!
I will be posting pegging artwork from throughout the year over the course of the next week. I do hope you all will enjoy a fennec prince being used as a princess by mares for a little bit. ;)
Thanks for reading!
~ Etheras
DISCUSSION: Is Furry Going Straight?
Posted 10 years agoGood day, my subjects.
I've noticed a trend over recent years where more and more artwork is being produced involving straight couples. The number of YCHs involving straight content is also increasing, as well as the number of female-only YCHs and adoptables. Even with my own characters, who were once assumed to be gay, are getting more and more interest from female characters and players.
So I wanted to ask you guys: is it just me, or is furry trending straighter? I wonder if this is a result of furry becoming more mainstream, or if there's something else to it.
I'd love to hear your thoughts. Leave comments down below!
~ Etheras
I've noticed a trend over recent years where more and more artwork is being produced involving straight couples. The number of YCHs involving straight content is also increasing, as well as the number of female-only YCHs and adoptables. Even with my own characters, who were once assumed to be gay, are getting more and more interest from female characters and players.
So I wanted to ask you guys: is it just me, or is furry trending straighter? I wonder if this is a result of furry becoming more mainstream, or if there's something else to it.
I'd love to hear your thoughts. Leave comments down below!
~ Etheras
DISCUSSION: FurAffinity Improvements (Payments)
Posted 10 years agoGood day, my subjects.
A few weeks ago, I made a post discussing ways that I believe FurAffinity can be improved. Today I want to go into more detail around payments.
When FurAffinity started, it originated as an artwork sharing site. It was basically a furry-only DeviantArt (and may have even emerged from the time when DeviantArt had that anti-furry backlash). However, over time, new uses were developed by the community. It ceased to be simply a site for displaying artwork, and artists began to sell their artwork. Then they offered commissions. YCH's. Adoptables. Eggs. Bases. Proprietary species. Streaming services. Classes. Tutorials. The uses of FA have changed, and yet FA has not changed to accommodate these new usecases. Why?
To some degree, I think FA doesn't change much because it doesn't have-to. FurAffinity is by-far the most successful furry website in the world. (So maybe this isn't really a discussion topic for FA, but for all their competitors to come up with new and innovative ways to improve the FA experience and thereby increase their customer base). From the patterns how users use FA's features, we can see there are lots of unmet needs. You see it in the glut of YCHs in your submissions stream, and the number of "Commission Opening" and "CLOSED" journals you get.
Why do you get all of these? Because FA doesn't have an in-model mechanism to deal with them.
Today I want to talk about one in-particular that can be improved and that's PAYMENTS. I've touched on this before in a previous journal but didn't go into much depth. Last time I talked about streamlining the process of artists interacting with their customers. Now I'd like to take it a step further.
Paypal is not really our "pal". If paypal catches users performing transactions about adult furry content, they have been known to lock down, suspend, or otherwise ban furry commissioners and artists from using the service. Additionally, Paypal's fees have been increasing to levels that one might consider onerous. The smart move would be for furries to move away from Paypal. That way we can't get banned for transacting for furry stuff (furry stuff is kind-of the point), and we could use those fees to fund FurAffinity rather than non-furry ads.
The problem is that Paypal is entrenched and nobody really thinks that they can be replaced. But they don't have to be replaced! Paypal has an enormous and efficient security infrastructure, but we wouldn't have to duplicate that for a furry site. We don't need direct withdraws from bank accounts, or embeddable endpoints for external sites. All we need is a credit card reader, and a way to use Paypal for those furs who don't have credit cards.
Naturally, to streamline the process, there should be a way for FA to save credit card data in a very-secure encrypted place and format. This is an area where FA has been lacking in the past. Furries are a prime target for hackers, but there are best practices that make stealing useful data impossible. One just simply has to follow them.
But this is the missing piece. If included with my previous proposals, one can actually build a system that is self-financing, for only a marginal fee (still cheaper than Paypal), and integrate it into the commission process discussed previously. This opens up other possibilities like custom store-fronts for artists where they can sell digital or physical goods. Replace Patreon with a furry-only equivalent. And more!
Soooo much synergy.
Just putting this out there. Feel free to discuss below. (Civilly, of course.) And thanks for reading!
~ Prince Etheras
A few weeks ago, I made a post discussing ways that I believe FurAffinity can be improved. Today I want to go into more detail around payments.
When FurAffinity started, it originated as an artwork sharing site. It was basically a furry-only DeviantArt (and may have even emerged from the time when DeviantArt had that anti-furry backlash). However, over time, new uses were developed by the community. It ceased to be simply a site for displaying artwork, and artists began to sell their artwork. Then they offered commissions. YCH's. Adoptables. Eggs. Bases. Proprietary species. Streaming services. Classes. Tutorials. The uses of FA have changed, and yet FA has not changed to accommodate these new usecases. Why?
To some degree, I think FA doesn't change much because it doesn't have-to. FurAffinity is by-far the most successful furry website in the world. (So maybe this isn't really a discussion topic for FA, but for all their competitors to come up with new and innovative ways to improve the FA experience and thereby increase their customer base). From the patterns how users use FA's features, we can see there are lots of unmet needs. You see it in the glut of YCHs in your submissions stream, and the number of "Commission Opening" and "CLOSED" journals you get.
Why do you get all of these? Because FA doesn't have an in-model mechanism to deal with them.
Today I want to talk about one in-particular that can be improved and that's PAYMENTS. I've touched on this before in a previous journal but didn't go into much depth. Last time I talked about streamlining the process of artists interacting with their customers. Now I'd like to take it a step further.
Paypal is not really our "pal". If paypal catches users performing transactions about adult furry content, they have been known to lock down, suspend, or otherwise ban furry commissioners and artists from using the service. Additionally, Paypal's fees have been increasing to levels that one might consider onerous. The smart move would be for furries to move away from Paypal. That way we can't get banned for transacting for furry stuff (furry stuff is kind-of the point), and we could use those fees to fund FurAffinity rather than non-furry ads.
The problem is that Paypal is entrenched and nobody really thinks that they can be replaced. But they don't have to be replaced! Paypal has an enormous and efficient security infrastructure, but we wouldn't have to duplicate that for a furry site. We don't need direct withdraws from bank accounts, or embeddable endpoints for external sites. All we need is a credit card reader, and a way to use Paypal for those furs who don't have credit cards.
Naturally, to streamline the process, there should be a way for FA to save credit card data in a very-secure encrypted place and format. This is an area where FA has been lacking in the past. Furries are a prime target for hackers, but there are best practices that make stealing useful data impossible. One just simply has to follow them.
But this is the missing piece. If included with my previous proposals, one can actually build a system that is self-financing, for only a marginal fee (still cheaper than Paypal), and integrate it into the commission process discussed previously. This opens up other possibilities like custom store-fronts for artists where they can sell digital or physical goods. Replace Patreon with a furry-only equivalent. And more!
Soooo much synergy.
Just putting this out there. Feel free to discuss below. (Civilly, of course.) And thanks for reading!
~ Prince Etheras
DISCUSSION: FurAffinity Improvement (Commissions)
Posted 10 years agoGood day, my subjects.
A few weeks ago, I made a post discussing ways that I believe FurAffinity can be improved. Today I want to go into more detail around commissions.
When FurAffinity started, it originated as an artwork sharing site. It was basically a furry-only DeviantArt (and may have even emerged from the time when DeviantArt had that anti-furry backlash). However, over time, new uses were developed by the community. It ceased to be simply a site for displaying artwork, and artists began to sell their artwork. Then they offered commissions. YCH's. Adoptables. Eggs. Bases. Proprietary species. Streaming services. Classes. Tutorials. The uses of FA have changed, and yet FA has not changed to accommodate these new usecases. Why?
To some degree, I think FA doesn't change much because it doesn't have-to. FurAffinity is by-far the most successful furry website in the world. (So maybe this isn't really a discussion topic for FA, but for all their competitors to come up with new and innovative ways to improve the FA experience and thereby increase their customer base). From the patterns how users use FA's features, we can see there are lots of unmet needs. You see it in the glut of YCHs in your submissions stream, and the number of "Commission Opening" and "CLOSED" journals you get.
Why do you get all of these? Because FA doesn't have an in-model mechanism to deal with them.
Today I want to talk about one in-particular that can be improved and that's COMMISSIONS. Thousands of people now make their livelihoods through FurAffinity, and yet the process is still as arcane and painful as the day when FA launched. Here's how I would improve it, and I'm going to propose it by walking through a transaction.
ARTIST has cleared his/her queue and is ready to take on new work. S/he knows about how much time s/he will have and how many projects s/he wants to get done during that time period.
ARTIST clicks "Open for Commissions" button and is taken to a webpage that stipulates the amount of time that they want to spend, and links to their price page (I would also digitize this and consume it as meta-data). Then this published. Using the price page as meta-data, it can than block out that an artist has time for 2 full colors or 4 flat colors or 1 full and 2 flats (etc).
COMMISSIONER then sees the link OPEN if the artist is open, next to journals in their User Control Panel. As soon as the openings are filled, this link goes away (and therefore reduces spamminess).
COMMISSIONER can also go to a new link up there near "Search" and "Browse" for "Open Commissions" and take a look at everybody who is open at any given time. This allows commissioners easy access to artists, and also gives artists more exposure. Ideally, this could also be expanded to be searchable. "Adult", "Chibi", "Vore", "Sci-Fi" (etc), and find artists easily that will fit the idea that they have in mind.
ARTIST can then see which commissioners are attempting to commission them, and accept or reject. When they accept, it provisions a Commission object in memory (serverside). This is a private object visible only to Commissioner(s) and the Artist(s). It starts out as "Unpaid". And has a required field for commission description and references. Upon Payment, artist marks it "Paid" and can begin to work. Now it flips to a private place to store temporary WIP images. The artist can upload here, and the commissioner can comment on uploads (making suggestions, pointing out fixes).
FINALLY the two can publish, nuclear-submarine style, at which time, it appears in BOTH the artist and commissioner streams, automatically filling the "Artist" and "Character" fields that we normally see. If someone is watching both streams, it only need appear once.
Its just an idea, but I think it will reduce the complexity for everybody. Using this, commissioners would no longer have to keep track of which artists they've commissioned, since listing would be an easy feature. Artists could also stop using external services like Dropbox and Gyazo. Everything could be encapsulated in the FA ecosystem. Artists would not longer have to keep queues on Trello and other places because it could be managed here automatically, and (if they decide to make it public) it would eliminate questions like "How long before you start on mine?" It would easily keep track of payment status, all ALL of the commission details in one place.
It would even cut down on journal spam. In fact... there's really no downside. So, FA...
~ Etheras
(BTW: This is not an endorsement of Shia LeBeouf, who I sincerely believe made the worst TED talk of all time, and was probably high on cocaine during this video. But I think its funny.)
A few weeks ago, I made a post discussing ways that I believe FurAffinity can be improved. Today I want to go into more detail around commissions.
When FurAffinity started, it originated as an artwork sharing site. It was basically a furry-only DeviantArt (and may have even emerged from the time when DeviantArt had that anti-furry backlash). However, over time, new uses were developed by the community. It ceased to be simply a site for displaying artwork, and artists began to sell their artwork. Then they offered commissions. YCH's. Adoptables. Eggs. Bases. Proprietary species. Streaming services. Classes. Tutorials. The uses of FA have changed, and yet FA has not changed to accommodate these new usecases. Why?
To some degree, I think FA doesn't change much because it doesn't have-to. FurAffinity is by-far the most successful furry website in the world. (So maybe this isn't really a discussion topic for FA, but for all their competitors to come up with new and innovative ways to improve the FA experience and thereby increase their customer base). From the patterns how users use FA's features, we can see there are lots of unmet needs. You see it in the glut of YCHs in your submissions stream, and the number of "Commission Opening" and "CLOSED" journals you get.
Why do you get all of these? Because FA doesn't have an in-model mechanism to deal with them.
Today I want to talk about one in-particular that can be improved and that's COMMISSIONS. Thousands of people now make their livelihoods through FurAffinity, and yet the process is still as arcane and painful as the day when FA launched. Here's how I would improve it, and I'm going to propose it by walking through a transaction.
ARTIST has cleared his/her queue and is ready to take on new work. S/he knows about how much time s/he will have and how many projects s/he wants to get done during that time period.
ARTIST clicks "Open for Commissions" button and is taken to a webpage that stipulates the amount of time that they want to spend, and links to their price page (I would also digitize this and consume it as meta-data). Then this published. Using the price page as meta-data, it can than block out that an artist has time for 2 full colors or 4 flat colors or 1 full and 2 flats (etc).
COMMISSIONER then sees the link OPEN if the artist is open, next to journals in their User Control Panel. As soon as the openings are filled, this link goes away (and therefore reduces spamminess).
COMMISSIONER can also go to a new link up there near "Search" and "Browse" for "Open Commissions" and take a look at everybody who is open at any given time. This allows commissioners easy access to artists, and also gives artists more exposure. Ideally, this could also be expanded to be searchable. "Adult", "Chibi", "Vore", "Sci-Fi" (etc), and find artists easily that will fit the idea that they have in mind.
ARTIST can then see which commissioners are attempting to commission them, and accept or reject. When they accept, it provisions a Commission object in memory (serverside). This is a private object visible only to Commissioner(s) and the Artist(s). It starts out as "Unpaid". And has a required field for commission description and references. Upon Payment, artist marks it "Paid" and can begin to work. Now it flips to a private place to store temporary WIP images. The artist can upload here, and the commissioner can comment on uploads (making suggestions, pointing out fixes).
FINALLY the two can publish, nuclear-submarine style, at which time, it appears in BOTH the artist and commissioner streams, automatically filling the "Artist" and "Character" fields that we normally see. If someone is watching both streams, it only need appear once.
Its just an idea, but I think it will reduce the complexity for everybody. Using this, commissioners would no longer have to keep track of which artists they've commissioned, since listing would be an easy feature. Artists could also stop using external services like Dropbox and Gyazo. Everything could be encapsulated in the FA ecosystem. Artists would not longer have to keep queues on Trello and other places because it could be managed here automatically, and (if they decide to make it public) it would eliminate questions like "How long before you start on mine?" It would easily keep track of payment status, all ALL of the commission details in one place.
It would even cut down on journal spam. In fact... there's really no downside. So, FA...
~ Etheras
(BTW: This is not an endorsement of Shia LeBeouf, who I sincerely believe made the worst TED talk of all time, and was probably high on cocaine during this video. But I think its funny.)
DISCUSSION: Furaffinity Improvement (Ads)
Posted 10 years agoGood day, my subjects.
A few weeks ago, I began a journal series about possible improvements to furaffinity. Since then, there has been yet-another controversy on FA... this time around their use of graphic adult advertising on the site. Thankfully, it seems that the folks at IMVU have listened and replaced those ads, since I haven't seen any adult ads in quite a few days. Today I have a Mercedes Benz banner looking me in the face.
When FA began posting ads years ago, it bothered me greatly, but then I came to realize something: FA ads actually are a feature. Unlike ads on Gmail or Yahoo (or most places, for that matter) I have actually found them useful. I click through more often than I ever thought I would. So rather than them detracting from my FA "furry" experience, I discovered that they complemented it.
Not-so-much for Mercedes, and definitely not so much for human porn. While I earn a substantial paycheck, its not enough to purchase a new Mercedes, and I don't think I am alone in this. Furries tend not to be flush with cash. So I fail to see how these ads enhance the FA experience, unless ad revenues are directly going into funding future development (which is sorely lacking).
So my question is... Is there some way to increase FA's funding, while simultaneously enriching the furry experience on FA? Is there an untapped synergy there, or do we have to resort to external "mundie" advertising banners?
Here's one idea that I had. Why not charge 1% finders-fee for all business performed on the site? While that sounds onerous, its a pittance compared to how much PayPal gouges. And Paypal doesn't even really want us furries as customers (as shown by the number of artists and commissioners who have been banned from using that service). What if FA could set up a payment service? Take 1% (in addition to however much VISA or whoever takes), and it would still be cheaper than using Paypal. No risk of being banned for "furry artwork". Furthermore, it would fund FA better than these silly mundie ads, and allow the site to remain 100% fluffy.
I will probably post more on this, since I have more ideas to expand both the "payment" and "commissions" feature concepts. But for now, I think this already a lot to consider. So now I turn it to you all: what do you think of the mundie ads? Are you happy to accept them if they are funding future development? Can you think of another "more furry" way to fund future development? And what do you think of my proposal for a payment model?
Love to hear your ideas! Thanks,
~ Etheras
A few weeks ago, I began a journal series about possible improvements to furaffinity. Since then, there has been yet-another controversy on FA... this time around their use of graphic adult advertising on the site. Thankfully, it seems that the folks at IMVU have listened and replaced those ads, since I haven't seen any adult ads in quite a few days. Today I have a Mercedes Benz banner looking me in the face.
When FA began posting ads years ago, it bothered me greatly, but then I came to realize something: FA ads actually are a feature. Unlike ads on Gmail or Yahoo (or most places, for that matter) I have actually found them useful. I click through more often than I ever thought I would. So rather than them detracting from my FA "furry" experience, I discovered that they complemented it.
Not-so-much for Mercedes, and definitely not so much for human porn. While I earn a substantial paycheck, its not enough to purchase a new Mercedes, and I don't think I am alone in this. Furries tend not to be flush with cash. So I fail to see how these ads enhance the FA experience, unless ad revenues are directly going into funding future development (which is sorely lacking).
So my question is... Is there some way to increase FA's funding, while simultaneously enriching the furry experience on FA? Is there an untapped synergy there, or do we have to resort to external "mundie" advertising banners?
Here's one idea that I had. Why not charge 1% finders-fee for all business performed on the site? While that sounds onerous, its a pittance compared to how much PayPal gouges. And Paypal doesn't even really want us furries as customers (as shown by the number of artists and commissioners who have been banned from using that service). What if FA could set up a payment service? Take 1% (in addition to however much VISA or whoever takes), and it would still be cheaper than using Paypal. No risk of being banned for "furry artwork". Furthermore, it would fund FA better than these silly mundie ads, and allow the site to remain 100% fluffy.
I will probably post more on this, since I have more ideas to expand both the "payment" and "commissions" feature concepts. But for now, I think this already a lot to consider. So now I turn it to you all: what do you think of the mundie ads? Are you happy to accept them if they are funding future development? Can you think of another "more furry" way to fund future development? And what do you think of my proposal for a payment model?
Love to hear your ideas! Thanks,
~ Etheras
HELP: Musically Talented Furs
Posted 10 years agoGood evening, my subjects!
Recently I've gotten back into music production. But despite the huge ears, I am actually not that adept at music. I'm not tone-deaf, but when I hear a tone, I couldn't say whether its E or G or F. I want to remix the Game Of Thrones intro song, but using MIDI synth, rather than samples. This poses a problem, since I can't write down that music by ear.
I was wondering if any of you out there can tell what a tone is by ear, and can help me with reproducing the GoT intro song in MIDI? Or if you know someplace where the song already exists in MIDI, I'd be grateful if you could help me.
Thanks,
~ Etheras
Recently I've gotten back into music production. But despite the huge ears, I am actually not that adept at music. I'm not tone-deaf, but when I hear a tone, I couldn't say whether its E or G or F. I want to remix the Game Of Thrones intro song, but using MIDI synth, rather than samples. This poses a problem, since I can't write down that music by ear.
I was wondering if any of you out there can tell what a tone is by ear, and can help me with reproducing the GoT intro song in MIDI? Or if you know someplace where the song already exists in MIDI, I'd be grateful if you could help me.
Thanks,
~ Etheras
CON REPORT: Furrycon 2015
Posted 10 years agoGood afternoon, my subjects.
And thanks to all of you who came out to Furrycon 2015. I hope you all had fun ( I know I did ). For those of you who don't know, I am the co-founder of a little convention in upstate New York called "FurryCon", who's theme this year was "Game of Con Chairs (season 2)". But its actually our third year, with the first year being "Furry End of the World Convention". The idea behind Game of Con Chairs, is that the convention is deeply themed (much moreso than any other convention that I am aware of), and has at its center is a game, with an incredible grand prize: being the honorary Con Chair (aka: "The King") for the next year.
The convention was actually Memorial Day weekend, but I've been feeling a little burned-out post-con, so that's why this wasn't posted last weekend. Anyway, here's a little summary of my time there:
LEADING UP
This year I had a lot less to do leading-up to the convention. Being a bit of a perfectionist, I tend to stress myself up to crazy levels, and so I tried to reduce my official con related workload prior to the convention. However, it didn't work out that way. With Concast, building my new costume, getting/designing huge House Foxish buttons for everybody on my team (in the con game), and writing a new song for Hixbi that I wanted to debut at the con, and with track selection for my DJ sets, I ended up stressing myself out just as much as when I had less "officially" to do. Which leads me to believe that, no-matter how many (or few) responsibilities I am given, I will tend to fill the available time to the maximum. If I have fewer official capacities, I will just add on unofficial things. Not sure what to do with this information... but there it is. Anyway: leading up to the convention, I took a few days off for last minute prep work, and it was vitally necessary, so I am glad that I did it.
WEDNESDAY
Drove up later than I expected, getting to the hotel in the dead of night (as usual). Checking in and unloading. I was a bit miffed that I had to pay for my room (being a convention founder), but this year we were trying to make the convention solvent, so I suppose that's to be expected. Not much to say about Wednesday. Lots of packing, driving, unpacking, shower, and then bed.
THURSDAY
I slept in because the first convention events on Thursday weren't until the evening. Got all dolled up in my ren faire garb and moseyed down to registration. Met Soron and Foxy and Kasi, and it was generally pretty awesome. Checked out the new convention swag, which I have to say, I'm pretty impressed-with. (We put a lot of extra effort into reg level gifts and merchandise). I registered and then went over to the Thursday Night Social. It was pretty fun. Met with a lot of repeat attendees. Talked for a long time with Hixbi, Ashadan, and picked the General of the Foxish Army: Delyun. (He's very passionate about Tabletop and had a sound strategy). I passed out Foxish pins, which people really liked. The Taurguryans also had pins, but only gave them to upper-level reg members, and while they were nicer than my Foxish pins, the Foxish pins really stuck out because they were HUGE and blatant. I saw them all over the convention, showing-off how legion my house is! Anyway, and I had some cocktails and h'orderves. Then went to bed.
FRIDAY
The big day. A lot of this was poorly-managed for my usual schedule. I set the alarmclock, and got up earlier than I would have liked, got all cleaned up and dressed up for Opening Ceremonies. Last year I arrived at this late, and hung-over. So this year I was determined to be early and bushy-tailed. Which I was. Unfortunately others weren't and it still ended up starting late. After this, I went to a few panels (which unfortunately weren't taking attendance), then went to the Dealer's Den to check out "The Strategic Game" - a tabletop portion of Game of Con Chairs where the various houses move their armies using points and tokens ("gold") that they get from participating at the convention. I was happy to see that Foxish was dominating. Delyun's early-game strategy had worked, and all we had to do was hang on. The King's Feast was on Friday this year, and so I had to go to that next, despite the fact that I try not to eat before a performance (I was DJing that night) to avoid feeling sick. So even though I was there, I didn't eat anything. Which made me sad. I had to switch DJ sets with Ashadan because the King's Feast kinda put me into a weird situation where I wouldn't have time to get all prettied-up before my DJ set. I ended up taking the last set, which is unfortunate because it was kinda dead. Also: we set off the fire alarm with the fogger. But otherwise it went pretty smoothly. I played the Hixbi song, which people seemed to like. (I will post this eventually to my music profile) When I went to bed that night, I kinda just CRASHED. And ended up sleeping for 12 hours.
SATURDAY
Got up ridiculously late, got cleaned up, went to the convention only to find that House Foxish had been annihilated in the Strategic Game. Apparently my trusted General Delyun had been bragging about Foxish's position and had rubbed the other houses the wrong way. They proceeded to gang up on us, and it was only through the fast action of FinnWolf (thanks!) who stepped in as General when Delyun gave up, and reinforced the final land at the very tip of Dorn (named "Balls Deep" by Koss). We were pretty-much out of the game. But then I noticed some things, and I felt that, if I stepped in as General, that we might have a chance of salvaging something. I went to the Wine Tasting, where I chatted with The King. Despite them being the main house to destroy us, we had to negotiate a deal with Taurguryan if we ever wanted to get back to Highgarden (Foxgarden?) which was held by the Lyonstarres. We offered Dorn to them without resistance, which we knew they wanted, and which we could have made costly. Instead, we offered to give it to them freely if they would allow us passage through their territories to siege the loosely-defended Foxgarden territories. They agreed. After this I tried to enjoy the wine tasting, but really became engrossed in The Convention Game, particularly the Strategic Game. Then I had a second DJ set. Unfortunately it wasn't much livelier than the first one. But I did get to meet the Blue Angels, who were staying at the hotel for a Memorial Day airshow, and who came to our convention to hang out with the furs. We got them super-drunk, and apparently they had a great time. There may also be a photo of me in show-costume with them floating around the internet somewhere. I also debuted the new show costume style, which I was a little worried about. Rather than the loincloth, its tight, with a high neck. Much closer to what Etheras wears with his show costume in artwork. People seemed to really prefer it, and in hindsight: so do I.
SUNDAY
Got up early to make first moves in The Game. Now having to step into the role of General, as well as making the convention nightlife as good as possible, puts a lot of pressure on a fennec, and he gets a lot less sleep. Got up, made coffee, hit the shower, and went down to make initial moves. The Taurguaryan alliance had solidified, and so we were granted permission to move through their territories to Foxgarden. I got to meet their general Scales, who was really nice. Now apparently, Lyonstarres and Bark had a bit of an incident, and Hixbi was seeing red. I was about to attack Lyonstarres from the South, and Hixbi and his Avarryn allies were out for blood in the North. Taurguaryan kinda was on our side but didn't want to commit troops. Anyway, it all came down at once, and there was a huge war. In two turns we had retaken Highgarden, and were besieging the Lyonstarres home territory. Bark managed to take over a good chunk of the map. Lyonsstares, began to feel the pressure, and went to Soron to ensure that the Lyonsstare house wouldn't be removed from next year if they came in last. (The original plan was to was to disband the house that came in last, in order to make room for new ones.) Soron stepped in and removed the disbanding rule. Then one person won pretty-much all of the events at the Fursuit games because it was so sparsely attended (furs were off doing other things). Lyonsstare cried foul, and Soron had to step in again. In case its not clear at this point, I spent almost all of Sunday on the Strategic Game. It was really intense and I got quite a kick out of it. I even missed when the Blue Angels gave us a flyover and "dive bombed" the pool deck. Which I guess was a "thank you" for the fun night that they had the previous night. The Strategic Game wrapped up with a surprise move by Lyonsstare to take Kings Landing: one giant push, that denied Taurguaryan their home territory (and therefore 100 game points). It still seemed very close for the final game. Foxish had taken the marketplace each day, but Taurguaryan took it back on Sunday after contesting a sale. I took the King (SomaCat), and his Master of Scritches (Lupine) out for dinner to a noodle place. It was really good. I went back and hung out a bunch with Xan and his GF, we got fancy desserts at Legends, and had lots of tequila, then they did Karaoke. I had kind-of a sore throat and was feeling kinda sick, probably from all the alcohol and sleepless nights, so I opted not to sing. And yeah... that's about it.
MONDAY
With the Marketplace on Sunday, I think Foxish would have won the game. But with it given to Taurguaryan, that put our two houses in a statistical dead heat. I pushed my foxes to go to every event, buy stuff in the dealer's den, and win tournaments. We totally dominated Monday, and you could see it on the faces of the Taurguaryans who tried to mobilize but couldn't quite match us. I even took 2nd Place at the Atari Grab Bag. :)
But in the end, somehow Bark got through (probably from the sheer volume of awards won at the uncontested Fursuit Games). Aerun Wolfsong ended up being declared King for next year. After this I helped them pack up a little, then packed up myself, and went home.
CONCLUSION
It really is one of the best conventions out there. The strong theme gives a super-intense atmosphere of real rivalry and competition, which was much stronger than last year. Also the Medieval feeling of it was stronger than last year too, with all the heraldry and using the BobLEDs in the King's Feast. Apparently the convention went much better than last year, because in the "Scritch and Bitch" (post closing-ceremonies and coronation) there were almost no complaints.
WHAT WENT WELL
... Thursday Social was awesome (people got less drunk than last year, much more open, and good food)
... Opening Ceremonies went well
... The Game was way better than last year, and people really got into it.
... Attendance, while down from last year, seemed the opposite. Attendees were all over, going from room to room, chatting on the convention floor, attending panels (etc). I think this was because of The Game, which got people out of their rooms and into the convention to do stuff!
... The dances were run on time, and generally did very well. Early set Friday was totally hopping!
... Wine Tasting
... King's Feast
... The theme, continues to be strong and attendees play along strongly!
... Dance's laser light show is great, but still could use more. I would really like the lasers to be on the control board. Its hard to blackout when there are all these green beams everywhere.
... Stuff went off mostly without a hitch
WHAT WENT BADLY AND NEEDS TO BE CHANGED
... The convention game, while much more awesome than last year, and more robust against one person meddling, still has problems. Panels that aren't run didn't have counted attendance, what to do when only 2 people show up to fursuit games, 11th hour rule changes (while the game is in progress). I feel that in some ways, the King last year had too much influence, and that this year, we gave the same to the Game-Masters. Really, I'd like the game to be digitized to remove any bias or inconsistency, and also have hard rules that Game Masters can't change after the game has already started. I heard numerous complains about this during the convention, and honestly... if people are putting this much time and effort into the game, I think the Game Masters really need to not change the game.
... Panels didn't get held. This happens at all conventions, but last year we were really good about holding panels, even if only a handful of furs showed up. This year we kinda regressed on this front, where numerous panels that I wanted to attend were not held, or had to be held elsewhere because rooms were locked (etc), and getting the word out that a panel has been moved is a challenge.
... We have run into an interesting problem. One of the complaints during Scritch and Bitch was that there's no evening programming. The thing is, we did that intentionally so that people would come to the dance. This being a Frozen Oasis founded con, the dance / frozen drinks is supposed to be the center of the convention. Last year we had programming conflicting the dance, and dance attendance was very low during certain panels ("What I Hate About the Fandom" being the obvious one). This might be an irreconcilable problem. A lot of effort goes into making that dance room and then the DJs to go up there... so we owe it to them to try and give them an audience, but at the same time we have to accept that not everybody likes rave-style dances. So how do you provide programming for the latter, without sapping attendance from the former?
AND FINALLY...
Due to a family conflict, its a bit "up in the air" whether I will even be able to attend next year (its moving to September to the weekend of my nephew's birthday). Because of this, and because I think there's a conflict of interest with a founder being a house-lead, I'm going to be stepping down as leader of House Foxish. I do hope we win some year, but it will be under someone else's supervision. Initially this was going to be Hixbi, but after Bark won this year, he's likely to stay on as the Bark House Leader. So there's a vacancy for some fox out there!
Anyway-way, thanks for reading!
~ Etheras
And thanks to all of you who came out to Furrycon 2015. I hope you all had fun ( I know I did ). For those of you who don't know, I am the co-founder of a little convention in upstate New York called "FurryCon", who's theme this year was "Game of Con Chairs (season 2)". But its actually our third year, with the first year being "Furry End of the World Convention". The idea behind Game of Con Chairs, is that the convention is deeply themed (much moreso than any other convention that I am aware of), and has at its center is a game, with an incredible grand prize: being the honorary Con Chair (aka: "The King") for the next year.
The convention was actually Memorial Day weekend, but I've been feeling a little burned-out post-con, so that's why this wasn't posted last weekend. Anyway, here's a little summary of my time there:
LEADING UP
This year I had a lot less to do leading-up to the convention. Being a bit of a perfectionist, I tend to stress myself up to crazy levels, and so I tried to reduce my official con related workload prior to the convention. However, it didn't work out that way. With Concast, building my new costume, getting/designing huge House Foxish buttons for everybody on my team (in the con game), and writing a new song for Hixbi that I wanted to debut at the con, and with track selection for my DJ sets, I ended up stressing myself out just as much as when I had less "officially" to do. Which leads me to believe that, no-matter how many (or few) responsibilities I am given, I will tend to fill the available time to the maximum. If I have fewer official capacities, I will just add on unofficial things. Not sure what to do with this information... but there it is. Anyway: leading up to the convention, I took a few days off for last minute prep work, and it was vitally necessary, so I am glad that I did it.
WEDNESDAY
Drove up later than I expected, getting to the hotel in the dead of night (as usual). Checking in and unloading. I was a bit miffed that I had to pay for my room (being a convention founder), but this year we were trying to make the convention solvent, so I suppose that's to be expected. Not much to say about Wednesday. Lots of packing, driving, unpacking, shower, and then bed.
THURSDAY
I slept in because the first convention events on Thursday weren't until the evening. Got all dolled up in my ren faire garb and moseyed down to registration. Met Soron and Foxy and Kasi, and it was generally pretty awesome. Checked out the new convention swag, which I have to say, I'm pretty impressed-with. (We put a lot of extra effort into reg level gifts and merchandise). I registered and then went over to the Thursday Night Social. It was pretty fun. Met with a lot of repeat attendees. Talked for a long time with Hixbi, Ashadan, and picked the General of the Foxish Army: Delyun. (He's very passionate about Tabletop and had a sound strategy). I passed out Foxish pins, which people really liked. The Taurguryans also had pins, but only gave them to upper-level reg members, and while they were nicer than my Foxish pins, the Foxish pins really stuck out because they were HUGE and blatant. I saw them all over the convention, showing-off how legion my house is! Anyway, and I had some cocktails and h'orderves. Then went to bed.
FRIDAY
The big day. A lot of this was poorly-managed for my usual schedule. I set the alarmclock, and got up earlier than I would have liked, got all cleaned up and dressed up for Opening Ceremonies. Last year I arrived at this late, and hung-over. So this year I was determined to be early and bushy-tailed. Which I was. Unfortunately others weren't and it still ended up starting late. After this, I went to a few panels (which unfortunately weren't taking attendance), then went to the Dealer's Den to check out "The Strategic Game" - a tabletop portion of Game of Con Chairs where the various houses move their armies using points and tokens ("gold") that they get from participating at the convention. I was happy to see that Foxish was dominating. Delyun's early-game strategy had worked, and all we had to do was hang on. The King's Feast was on Friday this year, and so I had to go to that next, despite the fact that I try not to eat before a performance (I was DJing that night) to avoid feeling sick. So even though I was there, I didn't eat anything. Which made me sad. I had to switch DJ sets with Ashadan because the King's Feast kinda put me into a weird situation where I wouldn't have time to get all prettied-up before my DJ set. I ended up taking the last set, which is unfortunate because it was kinda dead. Also: we set off the fire alarm with the fogger. But otherwise it went pretty smoothly. I played the Hixbi song, which people seemed to like. (I will post this eventually to my music profile) When I went to bed that night, I kinda just CRASHED. And ended up sleeping for 12 hours.
SATURDAY
Got up ridiculously late, got cleaned up, went to the convention only to find that House Foxish had been annihilated in the Strategic Game. Apparently my trusted General Delyun had been bragging about Foxish's position and had rubbed the other houses the wrong way. They proceeded to gang up on us, and it was only through the fast action of FinnWolf (thanks!) who stepped in as General when Delyun gave up, and reinforced the final land at the very tip of Dorn (named "Balls Deep" by Koss). We were pretty-much out of the game. But then I noticed some things, and I felt that, if I stepped in as General, that we might have a chance of salvaging something. I went to the Wine Tasting, where I chatted with The King. Despite them being the main house to destroy us, we had to negotiate a deal with Taurguryan if we ever wanted to get back to Highgarden (Foxgarden?) which was held by the Lyonstarres. We offered Dorn to them without resistance, which we knew they wanted, and which we could have made costly. Instead, we offered to give it to them freely if they would allow us passage through their territories to siege the loosely-defended Foxgarden territories. They agreed. After this I tried to enjoy the wine tasting, but really became engrossed in The Convention Game, particularly the Strategic Game. Then I had a second DJ set. Unfortunately it wasn't much livelier than the first one. But I did get to meet the Blue Angels, who were staying at the hotel for a Memorial Day airshow, and who came to our convention to hang out with the furs. We got them super-drunk, and apparently they had a great time. There may also be a photo of me in show-costume with them floating around the internet somewhere. I also debuted the new show costume style, which I was a little worried about. Rather than the loincloth, its tight, with a high neck. Much closer to what Etheras wears with his show costume in artwork. People seemed to really prefer it, and in hindsight: so do I.
SUNDAY
Got up early to make first moves in The Game. Now having to step into the role of General, as well as making the convention nightlife as good as possible, puts a lot of pressure on a fennec, and he gets a lot less sleep. Got up, made coffee, hit the shower, and went down to make initial moves. The Taurguaryan alliance had solidified, and so we were granted permission to move through their territories to Foxgarden. I got to meet their general Scales, who was really nice. Now apparently, Lyonstarres and Bark had a bit of an incident, and Hixbi was seeing red. I was about to attack Lyonstarres from the South, and Hixbi and his Avarryn allies were out for blood in the North. Taurguaryan kinda was on our side but didn't want to commit troops. Anyway, it all came down at once, and there was a huge war. In two turns we had retaken Highgarden, and were besieging the Lyonstarres home territory. Bark managed to take over a good chunk of the map. Lyonsstares, began to feel the pressure, and went to Soron to ensure that the Lyonsstare house wouldn't be removed from next year if they came in last. (The original plan was to was to disband the house that came in last, in order to make room for new ones.) Soron stepped in and removed the disbanding rule. Then one person won pretty-much all of the events at the Fursuit games because it was so sparsely attended (furs were off doing other things). Lyonsstare cried foul, and Soron had to step in again. In case its not clear at this point, I spent almost all of Sunday on the Strategic Game. It was really intense and I got quite a kick out of it. I even missed when the Blue Angels gave us a flyover and "dive bombed" the pool deck. Which I guess was a "thank you" for the fun night that they had the previous night. The Strategic Game wrapped up with a surprise move by Lyonsstare to take Kings Landing: one giant push, that denied Taurguaryan their home territory (and therefore 100 game points). It still seemed very close for the final game. Foxish had taken the marketplace each day, but Taurguaryan took it back on Sunday after contesting a sale. I took the King (SomaCat), and his Master of Scritches (Lupine) out for dinner to a noodle place. It was really good. I went back and hung out a bunch with Xan and his GF, we got fancy desserts at Legends, and had lots of tequila, then they did Karaoke. I had kind-of a sore throat and was feeling kinda sick, probably from all the alcohol and sleepless nights, so I opted not to sing. And yeah... that's about it.
MONDAY
With the Marketplace on Sunday, I think Foxish would have won the game. But with it given to Taurguaryan, that put our two houses in a statistical dead heat. I pushed my foxes to go to every event, buy stuff in the dealer's den, and win tournaments. We totally dominated Monday, and you could see it on the faces of the Taurguaryans who tried to mobilize but couldn't quite match us. I even took 2nd Place at the Atari Grab Bag. :)
But in the end, somehow Bark got through (probably from the sheer volume of awards won at the uncontested Fursuit Games). Aerun Wolfsong ended up being declared King for next year. After this I helped them pack up a little, then packed up myself, and went home.
CONCLUSION
It really is one of the best conventions out there. The strong theme gives a super-intense atmosphere of real rivalry and competition, which was much stronger than last year. Also the Medieval feeling of it was stronger than last year too, with all the heraldry and using the BobLEDs in the King's Feast. Apparently the convention went much better than last year, because in the "Scritch and Bitch" (post closing-ceremonies and coronation) there were almost no complaints.
WHAT WENT WELL
... Thursday Social was awesome (people got less drunk than last year, much more open, and good food)
... Opening Ceremonies went well
... The Game was way better than last year, and people really got into it.
... Attendance, while down from last year, seemed the opposite. Attendees were all over, going from room to room, chatting on the convention floor, attending panels (etc). I think this was because of The Game, which got people out of their rooms and into the convention to do stuff!
... The dances were run on time, and generally did very well. Early set Friday was totally hopping!
... Wine Tasting
... King's Feast
... The theme, continues to be strong and attendees play along strongly!
... Dance's laser light show is great, but still could use more. I would really like the lasers to be on the control board. Its hard to blackout when there are all these green beams everywhere.
... Stuff went off mostly without a hitch
WHAT WENT BADLY AND NEEDS TO BE CHANGED
... The convention game, while much more awesome than last year, and more robust against one person meddling, still has problems. Panels that aren't run didn't have counted attendance, what to do when only 2 people show up to fursuit games, 11th hour rule changes (while the game is in progress). I feel that in some ways, the King last year had too much influence, and that this year, we gave the same to the Game-Masters. Really, I'd like the game to be digitized to remove any bias or inconsistency, and also have hard rules that Game Masters can't change after the game has already started. I heard numerous complains about this during the convention, and honestly... if people are putting this much time and effort into the game, I think the Game Masters really need to not change the game.
... Panels didn't get held. This happens at all conventions, but last year we were really good about holding panels, even if only a handful of furs showed up. This year we kinda regressed on this front, where numerous panels that I wanted to attend were not held, or had to be held elsewhere because rooms were locked (etc), and getting the word out that a panel has been moved is a challenge.
... We have run into an interesting problem. One of the complaints during Scritch and Bitch was that there's no evening programming. The thing is, we did that intentionally so that people would come to the dance. This being a Frozen Oasis founded con, the dance / frozen drinks is supposed to be the center of the convention. Last year we had programming conflicting the dance, and dance attendance was very low during certain panels ("What I Hate About the Fandom" being the obvious one). This might be an irreconcilable problem. A lot of effort goes into making that dance room and then the DJs to go up there... so we owe it to them to try and give them an audience, but at the same time we have to accept that not everybody likes rave-style dances. So how do you provide programming for the latter, without sapping attendance from the former?
AND FINALLY...
Due to a family conflict, its a bit "up in the air" whether I will even be able to attend next year (its moving to September to the weekend of my nephew's birthday). Because of this, and because I think there's a conflict of interest with a founder being a house-lead, I'm going to be stepping down as leader of House Foxish. I do hope we win some year, but it will be under someone else's supervision. Initially this was going to be Hixbi, but after Bark won this year, he's likely to stay on as the Bark House Leader. So there's a vacancy for some fox out there!
Anyway-way, thanks for reading!
~ Etheras
FurryCon meme
Posted 10 years agoGood day, my subjects.
I'm at the 3rd Furrycon (if you include End Of The World Convention, which I do), and I just wanted to do a little meme for it, as I've seen other furs do for conventions.
What day are you arriving?
Already here! Came up on Wednesday.
What day are you leaving?
Probably late on Monday after the festivities are over.
Where will you be, most of the convention?
Hard to say, other than "around". I'll be going to a lot of panels, just not the ones in the morning (in true fox fashion, I'm a bit nocturnal). I'll be at all the dances and convention-held parties.
Can I talk to you?
You can try...
Can we hang out?
I might be a little busy with convention responsibilities, but if you can catch me between events, then perhaps!
Can I buy you a drink?
At furrycon, drinks are supplied by the convention.
Can I touch you?
No. As I get older, I've become a little more conscious of my personal space. Hugs are one exception, but I'd like to be asked first.
How will I know you?
I'll be the one in the fancy non-fursuit costumes.
Will you be doing the costume thing?
Yup!
Additional questions welcome down below!
Hope to see you at the con!
~eth
I'm at the 3rd Furrycon (if you include End Of The World Convention, which I do), and I just wanted to do a little meme for it, as I've seen other furs do for conventions.
What day are you arriving?
Already here! Came up on Wednesday.
What day are you leaving?
Probably late on Monday after the festivities are over.
Where will you be, most of the convention?
Hard to say, other than "around". I'll be going to a lot of panels, just not the ones in the morning (in true fox fashion, I'm a bit nocturnal). I'll be at all the dances and convention-held parties.
Can I talk to you?
You can try...
Can we hang out?
I might be a little busy with convention responsibilities, but if you can catch me between events, then perhaps!
Can I buy you a drink?
At furrycon, drinks are supplied by the convention.
Can I touch you?
No. As I get older, I've become a little more conscious of my personal space. Hugs are one exception, but I'd like to be asked first.
How will I know you?
I'll be the one in the fancy non-fursuit costumes.
Will you be doing the costume thing?
Yup!
Additional questions welcome down below!
Hope to see you at the con!
~eth
DISCUSSION: FurAffinity Improvement (Journals)
Posted 10 years agoGreetings, my subjects.
In recent weeks, I've resumed work on the languishing promise of www.etheras.com . I plan to have a working site up within the next month or two. But work on etheras.com got me thinking about furry websites as a service. FurAffinity hasn't substantially changed (from a customer perspective) since its inception. Some small tweaks have improved it in mostly-transparent ways, such as performance optimizations, hacking defenses, and some image layout/rendering. But its mostly stayed the same. In some ways, I think that's laudable. It embodies a bit of the age-old wisdom, "Don't fix what isn't broken"... something that many other companies fail to heed, often to their misfortune (Microsoft).
But that's not to say that FurAffinity has everything right. On the contrary: many things are broken with FurAffinity, and some have been fixed through administration, rather than technology. However, this usually indicates that there is an unmet need in the consuming populace, and that should be considered an opportunity to introduce a new and popular feature, rather than something that needs to be stamped-out.
Of course, I am referring-to the JOURNALS system, which has been abused by the customer base because there are several unmet needs for functionality that journals have been co-opted to take the place of. FurAffinity started out primarily as an art-sharing site, but its purpose has evolved into a nexus for the furry online experience. However, the functionality remains that of an art site, when that's not the only usecase anymore.
Case in point: how many journals do you get every day that are actually journals, rather than advertisements for commissions opening, stream announcements, contests, YCH's? How much artwork in your submission stream is actually artwork?
Here's what I think FA should do to improve the site: break journals up into a few different types. Journals, Commission Announcements, Contests, Streams (etc). Then allow Watchers to decide, when Watching another user, which to subscribe to. This would cut down on the amount of journal spam we all get every day, and allow users to get just the information that they're seeking without having to wade through a bunch superfluous stuff. Like... lets say I want to watch a livestream right now? Is there a way to see all the currently-running livestreams? No. But it would be almost trivially easy to implement. How about ... Which of the artists that I am watching are currently open for commissions? Today, I actually would have to click through every one, and hope that they update their front page.
Why not just make these features?
A couple years ago, FA banned chain-mail style art raffles because of the amount of journal spam. Why not just make it a feature? Have a submission type "Raffles" where you pick a start date and an end date, and anybody who wants to sign up can just go to the list and select the raffles that they want to join.
The point is that there are a lot of usecases for FurAffinity that weren't considered at the time when FA began. As new products are developed by artists and crafters, such as YCH's, perhaps it would be wise to support those new types, and not just have everybody piping everything through 2 streams (Journals and Submissions).
In the coming weeks, I am going to expand on this topic and talk about other pain-points that I think FurAffinity can (and should) endeavor to solve. But for now: What do you think FA should do with the journal system? Comment down below, and who knows? Maybe some FA developer will read this thread and go "Hey that's actually a good idea. Lets do that!"
One can hope. ^.^
~ Lord Etheras
In recent weeks, I've resumed work on the languishing promise of www.etheras.com . I plan to have a working site up within the next month or two. But work on etheras.com got me thinking about furry websites as a service. FurAffinity hasn't substantially changed (from a customer perspective) since its inception. Some small tweaks have improved it in mostly-transparent ways, such as performance optimizations, hacking defenses, and some image layout/rendering. But its mostly stayed the same. In some ways, I think that's laudable. It embodies a bit of the age-old wisdom, "Don't fix what isn't broken"... something that many other companies fail to heed, often to their misfortune (Microsoft).
But that's not to say that FurAffinity has everything right. On the contrary: many things are broken with FurAffinity, and some have been fixed through administration, rather than technology. However, this usually indicates that there is an unmet need in the consuming populace, and that should be considered an opportunity to introduce a new and popular feature, rather than something that needs to be stamped-out.
Of course, I am referring-to the JOURNALS system, which has been abused by the customer base because there are several unmet needs for functionality that journals have been co-opted to take the place of. FurAffinity started out primarily as an art-sharing site, but its purpose has evolved into a nexus for the furry online experience. However, the functionality remains that of an art site, when that's not the only usecase anymore.
Case in point: how many journals do you get every day that are actually journals, rather than advertisements for commissions opening, stream announcements, contests, YCH's? How much artwork in your submission stream is actually artwork?
Here's what I think FA should do to improve the site: break journals up into a few different types. Journals, Commission Announcements, Contests, Streams (etc). Then allow Watchers to decide, when Watching another user, which to subscribe to. This would cut down on the amount of journal spam we all get every day, and allow users to get just the information that they're seeking without having to wade through a bunch superfluous stuff. Like... lets say I want to watch a livestream right now? Is there a way to see all the currently-running livestreams? No. But it would be almost trivially easy to implement. How about ... Which of the artists that I am watching are currently open for commissions? Today, I actually would have to click through every one, and hope that they update their front page.
Why not just make these features?
A couple years ago, FA banned chain-mail style art raffles because of the amount of journal spam. Why not just make it a feature? Have a submission type "Raffles" where you pick a start date and an end date, and anybody who wants to sign up can just go to the list and select the raffles that they want to join.
The point is that there are a lot of usecases for FurAffinity that weren't considered at the time when FA began. As new products are developed by artists and crafters, such as YCH's, perhaps it would be wise to support those new types, and not just have everybody piping everything through 2 streams (Journals and Submissions).
In the coming weeks, I am going to expand on this topic and talk about other pain-points that I think FurAffinity can (and should) endeavor to solve. But for now: What do you think FA should do with the journal system? Comment down below, and who knows? Maybe some FA developer will read this thread and go "Hey that's actually a good idea. Lets do that!"
One can hope. ^.^
~ Lord Etheras
QUESTION: What went wrong?
Posted 10 years agoHello, my subjects.
Over the past couple weeks I've been talking about different ways to manage co-commissions. An idea was proposed and I decided to give it a try. I opened a "beta" to try out the idea, and accept 10 applicants. I figured, considering the number of requests that I get via notes, that I would have to close the beta about 1 hour after opening it...
... but its now been a week. So clearly something is wrong, since I have many more than 10 who have been emailing/noting me, and probably about 20 in my "few good equines" list. So this is a question to all of you out there: if you have an equine character, what turned you off from this project? Was it too unpersonal? Didn't want to give out your email? Didn't like the "reflex" nature of it? What do you think lead to this being unpopular? I would really like to know so that I can fix it... or scrap it, if that's what's required.
Please comment down below or via notes.
In case you haven't been following, here are the previous journals:
QUESTION: Managing Co-Commissions,
IDEA: For Managing Co-Commissions,
OPEN: Co-Commission Signup (beta)
Thanks guys :)
~ Etheras
Over the past couple weeks I've been talking about different ways to manage co-commissions. An idea was proposed and I decided to give it a try. I opened a "beta" to try out the idea, and accept 10 applicants. I figured, considering the number of requests that I get via notes, that I would have to close the beta about 1 hour after opening it...
... but its now been a week. So clearly something is wrong, since I have many more than 10 who have been emailing/noting me, and probably about 20 in my "few good equines" list. So this is a question to all of you out there: if you have an equine character, what turned you off from this project? Was it too unpersonal? Didn't want to give out your email? Didn't like the "reflex" nature of it? What do you think lead to this being unpopular? I would really like to know so that I can fix it... or scrap it, if that's what's required.
Please comment down below or via notes.
In case you haven't been following, here are the previous journals:
QUESTION: Managing Co-Commissions,
IDEA: For Managing Co-Commissions,
OPEN: Co-Commission Signup (beta)
Thanks guys :)
~ Etheras
OPEN: Co-Commission Signup (beta)
Posted 10 years agoHello, my subjects.
Last week, I discussed an idea for managing co-commissions, inspired by an idea from
shakal. It involves forming a list of interested equines who want to be featured in Etheras artwork. Then when opportunities arise, I will push out emails to this group.
* It won't be too spammy... possibly 1 or 2 openings per week, each with 2 emails: Opening and Closed messages.
* BCC'd so that you don't get flooded with responses or expose your email to strangers.
* The email will contain an idea, an artist (with quality selection), and a price.
* Respond if you're interested and can afford your half.
* I will select the equine that I like the best from the group
* The opening will remain open for a few hours, but probably less than a day, since I don't want to loose the spot with the artist.
* If no good applicants submit before closing, I will offer the position in journals.
* If you respond, it means that you agree to the price listed, and can pay within 24 hours. If you're selected and can't pay, I will select someone else. Repeat offenders will be removed from the list.
* To remove yourself from the list, simply respond to one of the emails that I send, and say something like "please remove me from the mailing list" in the body.
* Members of the list who haven't responded to any submissions in several months will be assumed to be abandoned or uninterested and removed from the list, but they can always request to be re-added if they are still interested.
Right now this is a "beta", so I am only going to accept a small number of applicants to test the process out and see how well it works.
If you have an equine character that you want to be in the beta, SEND ME A NOTE (no comments). Note should include:
1. CHARACTER NAME
2. YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS (this is where you will get the BCC message, so no burners please)
3. YOUR CHARACTER REF (this is the one that I will check against when selecting characters)
4. SHORT DESCRIPTION - Include essentials like...
... personality
... setting (and whether you're flexible on the setting)
... essentials (things you MUST HAVE with your character, like setting element, or secondary characters)
... kinks you like
....kinks you don't like that you've seen Etheras artwork of in the past
I will keep taking offers as long as this journal says "OPEN". HOWEVER: Anyone who is on the Few Good Equines list can join after its closed. Commissioners who get a lot of repeat commissions with me don't need to be on the list, and we can discuss ideas through other channels.
Comments below if you see any potential problems with this process. I'd love to be aware of any pitfalls that I might not have noticed.
Thanks!
~ Etheras
Last week, I discussed an idea for managing co-commissions, inspired by an idea from
shakal. It involves forming a list of interested equines who want to be featured in Etheras artwork. Then when opportunities arise, I will push out emails to this group. * It won't be too spammy... possibly 1 or 2 openings per week, each with 2 emails: Opening and Closed messages.
* BCC'd so that you don't get flooded with responses or expose your email to strangers.
* The email will contain an idea, an artist (with quality selection), and a price.
* Respond if you're interested and can afford your half.
* I will select the equine that I like the best from the group
* The opening will remain open for a few hours, but probably less than a day, since I don't want to loose the spot with the artist.
* If no good applicants submit before closing, I will offer the position in journals.
* If you respond, it means that you agree to the price listed, and can pay within 24 hours. If you're selected and can't pay, I will select someone else. Repeat offenders will be removed from the list.
* To remove yourself from the list, simply respond to one of the emails that I send, and say something like "please remove me from the mailing list" in the body.
* Members of the list who haven't responded to any submissions in several months will be assumed to be abandoned or uninterested and removed from the list, but they can always request to be re-added if they are still interested.
Right now this is a "beta", so I am only going to accept a small number of applicants to test the process out and see how well it works.
If you have an equine character that you want to be in the beta, SEND ME A NOTE (no comments). Note should include:
1. CHARACTER NAME
2. YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS (this is where you will get the BCC message, so no burners please)
3. YOUR CHARACTER REF (this is the one that I will check against when selecting characters)
4. SHORT DESCRIPTION - Include essentials like...
... personality
... setting (and whether you're flexible on the setting)
... essentials (things you MUST HAVE with your character, like setting element, or secondary characters)
... kinks you like
....kinks you don't like that you've seen Etheras artwork of in the past
I will keep taking offers as long as this journal says "OPEN". HOWEVER: Anyone who is on the Few Good Equines list can join after its closed. Commissioners who get a lot of repeat commissions with me don't need to be on the list, and we can discuss ideas through other channels.
Comments below if you see any potential problems with this process. I'd love to be aware of any pitfalls that I might not have noticed.
Thanks!
~ Etheras
