All 13 Cinnamon stories, corrected, revised, and about as definitive as they'll ever be, are now available for purchase from Lulu!

Paperback: https://www.lulu.com/shop/sky-green.....t-dyz8jwy.html

Ebook: https://www.lulu.com/shop/sky-green.....t-gj2pyyw.html

Other distribution channels, such as Amazon, will be a while yet.

Every Cinnamon story has been deleted from this site in order to conform with the new rules.

Any future Cinnamon stories will be exclusive to AO3, along with a majority of my work, just to be safe.

Seriously debating whether I should continue posting here, at all. As much as I try to give benefit of the doubt, I do find myself wondering if FA isn't becoming a little too restrictive. Of course, that's largely subjective.

That said, in a choice between compromising my work, as pretentious as that might sound, or posting it somewhere I don't have to, well...it's not a choice at all.

If there's any truth in the claim I saw of FA banning eggs, as stupidly overreactive an idea as I've ever seen, that changes things quite a bit. That says common sense and logic are not making the decisions here, and makes mine a lot easier. I doubt there is any truth, however. It smells strongly of people making things up for a reaction.

We'll see how things go, I guess.

I am on it, and rather liking it. Same username as here - somehow it seems to be available everywhere - if you wish to find me.

I also have a few invite codes handy, and no friends to give them to, so rather than let them go to waste, might as well offer them up in a couple of places. Want one? Drop me a note.

A trend towards rating nudity, irregardless of context, tone or intent, as adult. More and more artists seem to be doing it. Visible vulva: adult. No exceptions. Why?

I'm confident it's nothing to do with FA in particular - though the guidelines are a little vague, but good luck finding ones anywhere that aren't - despite it being most noticeable here, because I've also seen it on Inkbunny. I also strongly doubt it's unique to the fandom.

An artifact of cultures/countries becoming ever more hostile in certain ways & towards certain things; artists erring on the side of caution rather than risk being targeted?

Given my dominant subject matters, this is something that greatly intrigues, and as noted, faintly concerns, me.

Boosting a journal by  charlestonrat that I believe posits a very important question that needs wide, open discussion.

https://www.furaffinity.net/journal/10546443/

Please chime in, as the more debate, the more perspectives, the better.

Thank you.

...and it is fabulous. Every character, every beat, hits; beautifully directed; communicates so much without words, not least through the fantastic music; one of the most vibrantly, infectiously feel-good films I've ever seen.

Particularly love Porsha and Nooshy, and found a real affection for dear Ryan the Bit-Part Tiger. Such a sweetheart.

Love it, love it, love it! :-D

Trying to make some positive changes this year, and one of them is being more open, less withdrawn, and through that hopefully forging some new connections. Therefore, I have now added my Telegram username to this site.

I'm very unlikely to RP, and definitely won't RP fetishes, but if you feel like a chat, and can tolerate my weapons-grade weirdness, hit me up.

I hope I don't regret this!

is asking for people to fill in a survey regarding fursuits, and there is a prize draw attached to it.

https://www.furaffinity.net/view/44017267/

If you can spare a little time, please look into it!

Yes, really.

I was originally looking at Ko-Fi, since I didn't think I'd be able to produce enough content for the likes of Patreon or Subscribestar, but in their terms and conditions I discovered they don't permit connection to what they term 'pornography, nudity, and other such obscene content'. That's both harsh - nudity, obscene? Really? - and seems to preclude my use of it, given the themes of my work. Buy Me A Coffee proved to be the same, albeit using the word 'adult' instead of obscene.

Mulling it over today, I realised I might actually be able to produce a half-decent amount of content, so started looking more seriously at Patreon and Subscribestar. The latter went out of contention when I noted an account would be suspended after 30 days of inactivity, which is too much pressure for someone like me, who is highly unlikely to produce enough content quickly enough. That leaves the former, and there we have a notoriously censorious approach to worry about.

To be absolutely clear, should this actually happen: I will be paywalling nothing. All fanfiction, and all original work that isn't intended for publication via Lulu (or elsewhere, if Lulu continue annoying me and I can find a viable alternative), and any variations of them will be freely available. The content would be: early access, maybe by a couple of weeks; works-in-progress; behind-the-scenes materials such as character biographies, explanations and explorations of lore, history, cultures and organisations/groups, and reference doodles; and maybe a Telegram group. Most of the background material would, inevitably, relate to Moonglade, as that's far and away my most involved project.

A big question, of course, is would people actually be interested? One reason for this journal is to try and find out. Another is to ask for any advice or information anyone could give me, especially on alternatives to Patreon should it prove unviable or otherwise not work out. Responses gratefully received.

I've decided to split the Cinnamon stories into seasons. Season 1 contains the thirteen posted so far, the next story will start Season 2. It will be a while coming, though, since once I've finished an outstanding fanfiction, I'll finally be refocusing on my fantasy project Moonglade. I would tentatively posit mid to late Spring for the start of Cinnamon Season 2.

Using sites like Patreon or Subscribestar to lock some or most or even all of your art behind a paywall is an increasingly widespread practice, and for me, an increasingly annoying one. It's not the practice itself so much as how it's approached by so many artists that rankles.

I mean, what's the point of maintaining an account here, for example, an art-sharing site, if it's mostly going to be used as promotion for your Patreon? If most or all of the things you post are teases for paid content, or your gallery is peppered with them to the point of feeling like adverts in a Youtube video? It comes across as kinda cynical, even a touch exploitative, and that only increases when you factor in the most common, and most aggravating, variation on the theme: paywalling nude versions of art.

An artist posts an image, usually of a female character, and it could be anything from clothed and tame, through minimally clothed and suggestive, to nude with certain bits obscured, and the description informs you the 'saucy' or 'rude' or 'NSFW' or 'adult' or 'lewd' version is available on their Patreon. It could be a lovely piece of art, but because they are pushing paid-for 'naughty' versions, the artist is cheapening it, reducing it to little more than a peep show; "Wanna see her tits? Pay me!".

For someone like me, who doesn't see nudity as inherently 'rude' or 'lewd' or 'adult', it's doubly annoying, because it's reinforcing problematic attitudes for self-interest. The obvious counter-argument here is they need to make money to survive, and this is the best or only way of doing it, but how many artists saying that would also insist the fandom isn't fixated on 'adult' content? If it truly were mostly 'clean', then surely you wouldn't need to be doing this in the first place, just like you wouldn't need to offer 'adult' commission options no matter how much you dislike doing such work.

I have actually unfollowed artists who've started paywalling nude versions, because it annoys me so much, and because I don't feel right supporting, even tactitly, such behaviour. On one occasion I made a rather unguarded and admittedly slightly thoughtless comment on an image posted by an artist I used to follow when they were advertising their new pay-for-nude-version approach. Their response was to delete the submission and send me a less than friendly note. I felt guilty, and apologised, and through several subsequent notes we smoothed things over and came to an understanding. However, one thing stands out to me, and I wish I'd noticed it at the time so I could have carefully brought it up to them: they contradicted themselves.

In either the journal announcing their new venture, or the submission - I don't remember which - they stated they'd wanted to do pinups and light erotica for a while, and this was their way of getting into it. In sharp contrast, in the notes to me they stated they were really uncomfortable doing such work, and were only venturing into it because they really needed the money. So, either they lied in the original journal/submission, or lied to me. Either way, they were being deceitful, and deceit is at the heart of this.

True, some artists are open about what they're doing, but many aren't. These artists want you to believe the posted version is the main one, and the others are merely optional extras, but that's a lie. The posted one is an advert, even if a subtle one sometimes, something in the pose or the framing or the composition drawing your eye to certain areas, the ones you only get to see if you pay them, the ones that are the real point. I reiterate: it's exploitational, taking advantage, and I genuinely hate it for that.

Even if not intentional, doing this makes it seem like the posted art doesn't actually matter, just the money made from the paywalled version(s), and that's pretty depressing for a fandom that prides itself on its creativity. People worry about big corporations commercialising furry as it continues to grow, but frankly, through this and the increasing dominance of commission work among other things, the fandom's already doing it to itself.

Further to my last journal, here's my first attempt to communicate my issues with adult content in the fandom better.

A big part of it, for me, is that porn is, by its very nature, exploitative. It exploits our natural sexual drives, it exploits the sexualised cast society has given to our bodies, the female body especially, and it exploits the characters depicted in adult work.

Why does this get to me in particular, to the point of flaring up my anxiety, like it has today? Partly because I don't see the human body as inherently sexual. I certainly don't see the female body as inherently sexual. In fact, that we sexualise the female body so much more readily and extensively than the male could be described as discriminatory, in that women are more demeaned and objectified than men. To be clear, though, this last is a widespread issue, not just a fandom one.

What is a fandom issue is that these problems seem more pronounced here, in that porn is more prominent in general, more graphic and extreme in nature, and nudity is almost always bundled in with it. The fandom also appears notably more keen to sexualise famous characters, especially female ones, like Krystal and Renamon; for example, an FA search for them with General and Mature ratings selected, but not Adult, will still produce far more sexualised, objectifying and fetishised work than work that actually treats them as they are.

There's so much more that can be done creatively with nudity and sexuality, so many ways they can be depicted and explored, and I don't doubt there are fandom artists doing just that, but they're rare, since things are so polarised and stigmatised (clean, porn, next to nothing in between) and thus near-impossible to find amongst the ocean of porn. Put it this way: it's a genuine struggle to find a simple nude pin-up on FA, now, and worse, artists that create those things rarely stay creating them. And actual naturist pieces, not ones that misuse or misunderstand the term, are practically non-existent.

That's particularly tough, for me; finding an artist that draws tasteful/erotic/characterful work, only to watch it grow less and less so. Today I encountered the most extreme example of that: I found the Twitter accounts of an artist (who will remain unnamed; I have to respect their choices, however much they disturb me, and avoiding potential conflict is key to that) whose clean work I admired for a long time, until they left FA.

One account remains clean, but the other, more active, one isn't just porn, it's full porn: nudity exclusively as titillation, almost everything paywalled, just all-out exploitation. It's so jarring, so extreme a change it's hard to put into words. It's triggered my anxiety because a formerly fixed, reliable point of quality art is now cheap and tawdry, to me, and that's hard to cope with. Anxieties are not fun, believe me; everything bothers you far more than it should.

Anxiety, to be honest, is probably the main reason I react with such strong negativity to porn. I worry about watching an artist only for them to turn to porn; worry about becoming attached to a character only to find them in a virginity auction (aside: why? Just why?); worry about browsing any furry art site, not just FA, because there's no way to see tasteful nudes without being exposed to sexualised work as well; worry that my own erotic work will be misinterpreted, cheapened, demeaned.

The thing is, there's nothing I can do to change this. The fandom won't change, the sites won't change, and my anxiety certainly isn't going away. Do I keep soldiering on in the faint hope things might actually change, or do I finally admit this fandom, that isn't anywhere near as creatively open and diverse and free as it touts itself to be, isn't a place I can belong?

Do I finally give up and walk away?

First off, if you haven't watched it yet, you really, really should. It's quite superb: https://youtu.be/iv0QaTW3kEY

Secondly, it's given me some fresh perspective on something. For most of my twenty-odd years lurking on the fringes of the fandom I've been pretty outspoken about adult content, about how I believe it to be too prominent a part of the fandom, and that it's having a detrimental effect as a result. I still believe that to be the case, but...

Burned Furs. I was tangentially aware of them, but knew little more than they were intent on 'cleaning up the fandom'. I was not aware, until watching this documentary, that their idea of 'cleaning up the fandom' was actually pretty discriminatory, attacking the LGBT+ parts of the community. Listening to their leader speak in the clip of a meeting the documentary included was disturbing to me, as his language was very similar to mine.

Suddenly, quite a bit of the push back I've experienced makes sense. I was unknowingly echoing a divisive group whose intent was pretty malign, and I feel guilty about that. Discrimination was never, ever my intent - it'd be hypocritical, if nothing else, since I'm LGBT+ myself - and I apologise unreservedly if anyone thought it was.

Clearly, I need to rethink my approach, how I engage with and discuss the subject. I've already made some progress towards that, I think, with the Cinnamon stories, which will continue once I've dealt with some outstanding fanfiction. Another possibility is finally trying to make proper use of my Youtube account. Regardless, I have some serious thinking to do.

Does anyone know of any active writing groups here? The ones linked from  fawd.v1 are all, or certainly appear to be, dead, and have been for years.

What about furry writing sites? All I'm finding are dead links and ghosts.

Writing really does feel like an afterthought, at best, on every Big Furry Site except SoFurry, where basic functionality is an afterthought. Even where it's supported half-decently, eg Weasyl, it seems to attract very little attention. Is the fandom really that apathetic to the written word, or is it a more widespread issue? I refuse to accept that furries willy only invest time in stories if they can be fapped to.

As noted on the submission, there's an alternative version of the seventh short story available on my AO3 account, a more detailed one.

I haven't posted it here as it's explicit enough to warrant raising my content rating, which I really don't want to do. It may be detailed, but it's not - I certainly hope it's not - pornographic, and I fear that distinction will be lost here. Beyond that, I'd be opening myself up to seeing real porn, and I really, really don't want that. AO3 is the only site I post to with the freedom and choice to hopefully make that distinction, so it's the only one to get the alternative version.

I have a personal preference of the two versions, but label neither as the 'definitive' one. It's all up to the reader.

I write it, for Zootopia, Star Fox and more.

Check most of it out on fanfiction.net.

Or all of it out on Archive of Our Own.

For the curious, I've started maintaining a fanfic projects progress list (there are no guarantees all of these will come to fruition).

Popular as it is in the fandom, I've never tried creating a race of my own, never even thought about it...until now, and even then it was just a random urge I wasn't at all sure would lead to anything worthwhile. Turns out, it's an enjoyable, engrossing process, and I rather like what's emerging, as do the two friends I've thus far shared and discussed this race with.

The original trigger was an online sci-fi comic; oddly enough, I didn't particularly enjoy it, but I did like the design of one of the protagonists, an alien. Meandering as my mind can be, that fairly soon led to me pondering an original race for Moonglade, then actually jotting down thoughts on one. Inevitably, that alien would have been a subconcious visual influence, as, I don't doubt, were my favourite Zelda race, the Zora, which should provide a fairly large clue as to where I went.

Beyond that, however, I was careful to avoid looking at any original races in the fandom, or elsewhere, focusing instead on a number of real-life animals for inspiration, so any resemblance to another race is entirely co-incidental. I have no visual reference for my race as of yet, but an abundance of notes on everything from appearance to spiritual beliefs. I could be persuaded to post these notes here if there was enough genuine interest, and a high enough chance of honest feedback. True, I've had little luck in that regard in the past, but I was never one to give up hope easily.

Please note this is currently a closed race, largely since it's being created for my fantasy world/story Moonglade, but I certainly wouldn't dismiss the possibility of it becoming more open in future. Also note that nothing about them is set in stone right now, including their name, and several of the details centre on their relationships with other Moonglade denizens, and their history in the Archipelago.

All that said, who wants to meet the Marin?

http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/8668230/

He's a good person, and neither he or his mother deserve what they've been through. I can't help them myself, right now - to my frustration - but if anyone reading this can, please do.

Thank you.

I've finally plucked up the courage to face my depression and anxieties (took me long enough ). The first step was a visit to my doctor. That has led to injections for a vitamin deficiency (cause as yet unknown) and will likely soon result in therapy sessions. I need to address many things. Some I've already started, like my diet; others, like securing a stable source of income, will come later, and not easily.

Fair warning, therefore, that I'll likely be even less active than I already am, and probably even more erractic in mood. This won't be easy, not least since real life emotional support will be hard to come by, for a number of reasons.

More pertinently to my furry side, as part of trying to gather at least some small funds, I'm seriously debating opening for story commissions. This will depend on demand, which will certainly be affected by my not doing porn or fetish work. They'll certainly be small - maybe offer a few slots for, say, 1000, 2000 and 5000 word ones, and maybe a 10,000 word one. I'll also need to research going rates for these kind of things. I'll also likely take one from a trusted friend, first, to test the waters, make sure I can actually deliver.

Any thoughts you may have very welcome.

Two nights ago I had a most peculiar encounter, which I've detailed here. If anyone can provide any insight I'd be greatly obliged, as I'm still struggling to make sense of it.

Bald patch and paunch, here I come!

Oh...

Wait...

Wanna chat? Note me and I'll share my username. Finally a messenger that really, really works. :-D

Browsing the TV listing I noted a show, World of Weird, would have a segment on Furries. Despite expecting the usual skewed, myopic cringe fest that results when TV looks at Furries I tuned in...and got a real surprise.

World of Weird turned out to be a superbly open-minded and good-natured program, and the Furry segment was genuinely delightful. A presenter journeyed to San Diego to join a large group of fursuiters, and not just talk and look, but experience the whole scene, actually donning a suit and joining in. There was no sneering, no demeaning, no judging, no extreme personalities presented as the Furry standard, just lovely people having fun, and making some very good points about escapism, expression and confidence-building.

It was remarkably positive, to the point that I actually got a little emotional - this is the fandom as it can be, at its best - and have decided that when my books make me filthy rich - and they will - a fursuit is one of the first things I'll buy. They just look like so much fun!

Dress Sense, a short story, is now available in eBook and paperback formats from Lulu - http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/FoxyFellowUK

Wider distribution will hopefully follow in due course.

When you screw up, you screw up BIG.

Contrary as I am, I won't be upping sticks for FurryNetwork. I've had a bad feeling about that site for the entire time I've known of it, and now I know it's owned by Bad Dragon the alarm bells have only gotten louder. I trust my instincts, and they say pretty clearly that a superficial site with a bad upload policy, that's run by a dildo manufacturer with a less-than-positive reputation, is best avoided.

The criminally overlooked Furiffic remains my choice alternative, even if I have neglected it for a while now.

Speaking of neglect, apologies for my silence. Worst depressive stretch I think I've ever endured.