I get that it's (apparently) a good way for artists to make money... but I don't get what's being sold. Is it a print? Is it a commission? Something about this transaction feels like the person paying is being ripped off. Let's take a look at the latest person I've seen in my submissions page and look at what's being offered:
(Note: I have nothing against Jace, he is a fine person and an artist of delicious things that I love)

https://www.furaffinity.net/view/5761247
https://www.furaffinity.net/view/5761259
https://www.furaffinity.net/view/5761268
https://www.furaffinity.net/view/5761278

These adoptables are a little different than the ones I've seen from other artists in that it looks like Jace actually took the time to draw each dragon roughly from scratch. Okay, so we've got work and effort going into these but for the most part every other adoptable I've seen has been a palette swap of a single drawing.

I don't really have any dragon characters to my name save for one I wrote about in Dragonslayer and maybe somewhere else... and should I need to make another dragon for another story, I'm fairly confident in my ability to think one up from scratch to suit my purposes. I'm assuming these characters will "belong" to the person who pays for them and they can be used in any work that person happens to make.

So, is buying an adoptable like outsourcing a portion of your creative process? Is it that difficult to try and think up a new character for a story or picture? What about characters that happen to look similar to those sold as adoptables? We can go into a nice discussion about what constitutes a reasonable differentiation between characters, but that aside what's to stop me from seeing these pictures and take little bits and pieces of their design to form a new character? I haven't paid for any adoptable, yet I'm not necessarily using any one complete dragon.

People do this all the time. Artists use references and make generic characters for their pictures (Here's something fun to try: line up some dalmatian characters and try to tell them apart.) Every writer has heard the old saying "Nothing original has been written since Homer." So why should I pay money for a new character I can simply think up in my head for free?

I'd rather buy a commission from an artist and pay money for something I want or (occasionally) buy a print of a picture that artist put more effort into. Again, I have nothing against Jace and I think he's a fantastic artist! But when I see

https://www.furaffinity.net/view/5705243
https://www.furaffinity.net/view/5744301

coming from more and more artists, I have to wonder who buys a copy-pasted character and for what reason?

It's okay.

I know in this big, scary world of ours with computers and internets it's hard to keep up with the times...

But you have to stop yourself someday and ask... "Am I really producing/selling a product that is at all necessary?"

At some point, the horse and buggy industry had to admit "Hey, this car thing isn't a fad anymore... maybe we should start making tires instead." That point has arrived for the PRIMA "official" strategy guides. Anyone who is anyone who plays video games knows gamefaqs.com Every game also has its own forum (they're linked conveniently on each game's steam profile). Almost every game (ones that are extensive enough... and even then) has its own wiki. Every bit of obscure information that could be wanted from any game is out there in easy to find snippets and complete, 100% completion walkthroughs.

And let's not kid ourselves, PRIMA doesn't even give us ALL the details of a game it covers. Let me pull out my Pokemon Gold/Silver prima official strategy guide (something I bought back when I thought these magazines were useful). For those of you at home, turn to page 85 and look at the little Trainer Information box. Let's set aside the fact that you can go to bulbapedia or serebii and find detailed information on strengths, weaknesses, movelists, and EV values for all of these pokemon (something you'll find lacking in this "guide"). Take a look at the male swimmer "Berke" and his lineup.

I don't... believe I've ever heard of a pokemon named "???"

I paid $14.99 U.S. back when fifteen bucks meant something for a guide that isn't even COMPLETE. It's a sham for you to go and spend ANOTHER $14.99 for the complete pokedex! Meanwhile, I can GOOGLE the god damned route I'm on or pokemon I'm looking at and get information NO PRIMA GUIDE COULD EVEN DREAM OF INCLUDING IN THEIR SUBSTANDARD BOOKS

FOR

FREE

As in ZERO dollars!

I have no idea how these idiots stay in business. Who BUYS these things nowadays? Children? They're supposed to be the fucking future! If I ever see any child holding a Prima strategy guide, I'm going to burn it in front of them while chanting "gamefaqs."

Fuck...

So, go check out Desktop Dungeons because I know you haven't. It's a quirky little PC dungeon crawler with some interesting game mechanics involving exploration. It's simple, it's free, and it's fun :D Go play it now:

http://www.qcfdesign.com/?cat=20

It's my birthday! Time to murder the fuck out of some cultists in DnD!

I do love street justice.

I don't know if I've mentioned it before, but I work nights at a place near the university that sells mid-quality breakfast burritos at ridiculously stupid prices. (stupid in the opposite direction... not cheap) You'd be surprised, though, at the allure of potatoes, eggs, and bacon in a tortilla to drunken college students from 10:00PM to 3:00AM.

Anyway, last night we had a fellow come in juuuust a bit too late and, unfortunately, he could not purchase a $5.24 burrito. This happens frequently and is usually met with complaining, bargaining, and general pissy-ness until the man or woman resigns to his fate and wanders off into the night. On rare occasions we have the self-righteous customer who believes that our establishment should serve him whatever he wants whenever he wants because god damn it... he's a student here at our fine (Read: meh...) university!

We didn't even see this on the video cameras until the police called later in the night, but apparently this gentleman was in this latter category. He casually strolled down the aisle of our store (we also carry basic groceries), shared a hug with a few friends he seemed to recognize... then grabbed a bag of chips and a Dinty Moore canned meal and slip out the fire exit in the back of the store.

We didn't know this, but apparently someone disconnected the lovely alarm that connects to the fire exit! Allowing our friend to escape undetected by the naked employee eye.

However

A person happened to be sitting outside the fire exit at that moment and happened to see this. I don't know if I'd.... describe this person... this man as a person of violence. No. I'd describe him as a man with moral fortitude. A man of justice. A man... with almost paladin-like fervor in his views of right and wrong. This is where the phone call from the police came into play. Our good shoplifting friend was stopped by this man and questioned about whether or not he had in fact purchased the chips and tasty meal he was exiting the.... fire exit with. Apparently, quite a scuffle ensued that dragged on around the building and left our five-finger discounter with several heavily bruised reminders that "Yes! Stealing IS, in fact, wrong!"

The police have him charged with a few things, but I felt that he had paid for his merchandise one way or another.

Since we are part of the university, our policy on shoplifting is "Please don't touch the person and get us sued :<" as well as a slew of pseudo-bureaucratic nonsense that lets these little drunken shits get away with a lot of shit for the sake of non-confrontation. Which is why this particular event really made me smile...

Before you fuckers even start.

You're not funny.

April 1st is now officially journal nuke day.

It's always nerve-racking to see that nice big red slash through the "https" in front of furaffinity....

I need one more like this:

http://oglaf.com/media/comic/blankpage.jpg

:D So far, so fun! I always seem to gravitate toward Grass-types, so I started off with Snivy for my first run of the game.

Or, as I require everyone else to call him, Cecil DeVine. *monocle*

The internet holds many strange and wondrous creations from our deepest imaginations

http://www.furaffinity.net/full/5065073/

Pikachu kissing Lil' Wayne is something, despite my experience, I would have never expected to come of it. I'm going to turn off the internet now.

You don't get lovey-dovey stuff on my front page anymore.

... perverts.

Nothing says "I love you" like big ass burgers and shit from Outback!

Happy Valentine's,  ebasslun! I love you more than I love the internet itself ^^

http://www.theneocube.com

One of the listed benefits and uses:
Stress Relief.

My first hour with the neocube.

Okay, I've.... I've got a clump... it makes a funny sound, how do I... get it back in a cube? I like the cube... look it up online...... oh, that's a cool shape, I wonder if I can..... no... wait, stop... no.... stop... stop moving that way, you stupid ball... no, stick together... no, not with that one, with... with.... fuck... fine....

Okay... how to make a cube.... make a string... fold over by sixes... make a 6 by 36... fold over flat parts.... fine, okay, that's.... easy, I can do that...... string them out... all right, okay.... then fold them-... no, fold them ov-... stop... stick to that ball.. stick together.... stick the fuck together.... stick together you fucking ball.... fine, I can just... ignore it for now and mov-... no, stick together... stick the FUCK together! NO not like that!! god, FUCK......... okay, fold this over... stick together.... stick-to-fucking-gether!.... okay...... okay............... all right, that's 6 by-..... what the fuck happened to that end? it looks like a penis made of balls! What the fuck??? god, fucking... stop that, unstick.... no, stick together.... stop that!! STICK TOGETHER... NO, DON'T STICK TOGETHER!.... STOP!!.... fucking... NO!, I-

You get the idea... I hate these god damn tiny balls...


Edit: CUBE

FUCKING

CUBE!

So, it's probably become apparent that I'm not going to finish those free stories I promised people.

I'm sorry.

I do have some stories that I have yet to put up, and I will put em up when i get home on the 5th

and you people can't seem to keep your shit together.

Shut th'fuck up and get back to drawing furry porn like NORMAL maniacs.

I hate Christmas music.

All of it.

Nat King Cole is dead. Write something new.

You people really love/despise yourselves some cub art! Well... I'd ask if we could move things along to next week when everyone stops giving a shit, but I don't really care about journals normally...

Maybe we can complain about the December banner. (My suggestion: Santa punching a cub fur in the dick)

Edit: Hey, HEY! STOP POSTING STUPID COMMENTS AND JOURNALS ABOUT THIS SHIT, YOU'RE SLOWING DOWN FA!

Fucking jeeze...

Well.... That's shitty for the people who like cub art.

I can understand why they did it, and I can understand why people would be upset...

*yawns* man, I really just... don't care...

So that new WoW patch has gotten me re-addicted ^^ Lots of new quests and foxes in Redridge! fffooooxxxieeess~<3

Heals all wounds <3

"The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results"

I do believe Dead Rising 2 has driven me insane.

Congratulations, Microsoft, you have ensured that nobody with a PC and a Steam account can play your game. That will teach those evil pirates.

Oh, and the Games for Windows - Live program makes a great addition to my programs list along with Internet Explorer and Outlook Express. I'm just wondering if there's any other broken programs you could shove onto my hard drive instead of the actual game I want to play... how about a program that emulates Pong and fills up my memory with pasta recipes? Or an animated graphic of the windows logo jumping rope while it slowly melts my CPU into my motherboard?

It's all right. Really, it is. I didn't want to pay forty dollars to mow down zombies with fancy, elaborate weapons.... no, I wanted to play "twiddle my thumbs for a day or two while Microsoft or Steam fixes this shit." It's quite immersive. If you get a score of 100,000, you can actually hear the hemorrhage sizzling into your brain.

Honestly, I blame myself for expecting to play a game to run on the date of it's release. I forgot there are two times in a game's release: the date it becomes available to the public and the date when people can actually play the game.

I'm going to stuff my face in a blender, now....

I hate the ads on FA where the thing they use to catch your attention is the fact that the artist is starving and destitute.

A) So is everyone else.
B) Starving artists draw better.

Edit: Especially those lazy tigers.... "Wah, someone save us"

has been ffffuun. Between work and classes, I've actually gotten around to writing a little story :D

What I HAVEN'T been able to do is get it edited and fixed up nice for all (4 of) you wonderful people! Monday begins my two days off (well... I have class tomorrow, but that doesn't count...) and I will do my best to get it up :D

you play almost all your games through Steam.

And if you're like me, you say today they were selling a game involving suicidal robot ninjas with extremely large knives for $2.00.

And if you're like me, you're now waiting for Plain Sight's account servers to stop being bombarded by the BILLION other people who are like me and bought the game.

sssso, I'm sorry to all those people I gave free commissions to. And I'm also sorry for ending that sentence with a preposition. (I'm a great author)

I AM still working on those stories! And they shall be done before November, damn it, I promise! I now know what it's lie when artists say it's hard to do commissions.... not that I don't like your guys' ideas... they're just.... hard to write <_<

Just thought I should put this up here to let you all know. (except.... most of the people who wanted stories got through to me on sofurry.....*ctrl-a, ctrl-c*)