I don't even get why this is a thing. Aren't the best words you can say to an artist "I'd like to commission you"? Start the conversation with that!

It’s extremely frustrating. I’ve mentally auto deleted any hey message lol

I see your point. I understand you have had rather negative experiences.

I am of course thinking about business when texting someone but I know I am not texting a machine so I try to be friendly with people.

If I ask to get something historical drawn? I often share my knowledge about a subject. Perhaps it will let the artist imagine the situation better or with different emotion? Maybe it could inspire them to go deeper into history which I love so much?

In summary: business is business but bit of friendlines is good for people, you never know what are they going through.

And I totally get that and appreciate that when it's relevant. I'm friendly when I need to be but when I'm five messages deep and no ground has been made towards what they actually want I tend to feel like my time is being wasted and I personally am being disrespected .

Yeah, in my industry we don't get jobs if we don't socialise well. My ability to get recurring contracts from people in various companies is reliant on not only my effort in turning in high quality work, but in maintaining positive out-of-work relationships.

Not saying that you're wrong, of course - simply observing how difference our work places are. My personal experience with furries makes me definitely understand where you're coming from; I only recently had one follow me on discord and inundate me with pointless 'hello's and questions about things he could easily know by reading my profile. I eventually asked what it was he was wanting, and he only ever said "Idle chatter". My thoughts were 'right, okay then. Well I have a project to finish so...'

I presume you get that a lot. So I definitely see why you'd want to cut yourself off from that. But on the other hand, I've got my more high-profiile and best-paying work through strong social interactions and networking.

Thats understandable, I really have no problem being sociable as long as we've established what they want out of me. I don't like being jerked around for my potential business but once we've established a working relationship we can talk more casually ya feel me?

Yeah, I get you. In my business, the first way we establish contact with each other is either sitting down at a gaming table or at a bar in a convention. Our industry is built out of a hobby that we all love, and it's a social one. If you can't behave or act like a total social recluse during a game, your chance of finding paying gigs goes bye-bye. Sounds like yours works the same, but in reverse order. It's all good.