#anyway message me about your niche interests

[markscherz]

Can I ask how you feel about your Tumblr fame?

I get the impression you just made this account for normal casual funsies reasons, but it kinda blew up by happenstance. If that's right, I'm curious if now you feel like it's kind of a more serious thing, where you have an opportunity to sorta act as a science communicator with a reach you otherwise might not?

Or maybe something else? You gonna see if you can somehow leverage your Tumblr fame to get research funding? Deputize us to harass polluters and developers destroying habitats? Crowdsource name ideas for new species?

It's a bit bizarre, in that it has very little real-world-ness to it. I showed my mother the ongoing tumblr celebrity poll, and she was like 'how many people could possibly be interested in frogs?', to which I replied 'well as of today about 46,000 and counting'.

I have always had an unhealthy relationship with fame. I spent most of my teen and young adult life fawning after it, as is I suppose very often the case.

More after the cut…

I always really wanted to be famous, but I was never really interested in changing who I was or what I represented in that pursuit. That is to say, I wanted to be known for what I was already doing, or for things that were already interesting for me, rather than things that might have much higher chances of success but require more effort or be less in line with the things that I am interested in.

I had my first brush with virality in 2012, when a poem I wrote went a little viral (largely thanks to StumbleUpon). I remember the rush of seeing how much attention it was getting, and staying up late to keep refreshing the page as the visitor numbers went up and up and up.

But not long after that, I had some closer encounters with fame and people becoming famous. That was extremely eye-opening. I witnessed first hand how strongly that can affect someone's life, for good and for bad. That experience also made me realise, quite jarringly, that famous people are still just people; that celebrity is something extrinsic to them; that they also wipe their own butts (if they are able); and that in many cases, it is a substantial inconvenience if not downright pain in the ass for them. I think this is why we see so many of the big celebrities having mental health crises or trying to live as much of their lives out of the public eye as possible.

That experience pretty much stifled my desire to achieve fame, and really changed my relationship with it. I should add that I could say much more on this topic, but nothing so coherent or insightful as John and Hank Green, who have given me so much clarity on this topic over the years through their thoughtful commentary on youtube and their podcasts.

Anyway, in spite of the fact that fame itself doesn't really appeal to me anymore, I do still have a problem wherein I quickly became addicted to the microdosing of euphoria associated with every reblog and like and follow. So I put huge efforts into social media in order to try to gain traction in the space that I felt I could really compete in—Very Niche SciComm™—and build up a following.

Tumblr was the first platform where I felt that really succeed; I managed to fight my way to a few thousand followers with a thick queue of regular posts about herpetology and other science. At that time, there was a great community building up in the rudimentary private messaging system—I am still friends with several other tumblr bloggers from that era (none of whom I have ever met in person). From that early time (2013), I think my most successful post was probably this one about germination of 32,000 year old seeds—a post that, as of today, has 836 notes, but at the time felt huge and exhilarating.

As I went through gradschool, I got more and more active on twitter, and less and less active on tumblr (by the time I wound down, I had about 8,000 followers on tumblr). This was partly because of the pornbot takeover on tumblr, which meant I basically could not go on the platform in public or at work, but also because the audience and interactions are just fundamentally different. Twitter had a different kind of vibe and energy than tumblr, and there were real SciComm experts there, who were doing it just completely differently. More importantly, I became more focussed on doing outreach aimed at colleagues, rather than non-experts.

Then, in 2017, I hit headlines for the first time. The description of Geckolepis megalepis made it big on social and traditional media, and I had my first experience with real media attention. I had a flurry of late-night phone-calls with journalists in the US. This was a different animal altogether than the few viral posts I had had until that point. It was extremely stressful, but exhilarating. Then in 2018, our chameleon fluorescence story made similar headlines, and in 2019 the Mini frogs, and in 2021 with gecko fluorescence and the smallest chameleon.

Seeing my name on the BBC News website and in the New York Times and National Geographic—those things have been the most surreal moments of near-fame I have experienced so far. The number of followers on social media is quite difficult to conceptualise, but seeing your own name in a media outlet that you consume regularly, or have grown up with, is more palpable.

In any case, I continued to run with twitter as my main platform for years, because I found the interaction with colleagues and other academics highly stimulating. In 2021, I even posted a twitter thread about a different species of frog from Madagascar every day for the full year. All this work was ultimately greeted with mediocre success; I just crested over 10,000 followers a few months before the Musth takeover. But then the platform became basically unusable. And in the fallout, I came back to tumblr, where, just by chance, I happened to find a post about the Mini frogs and reply to it and it went properly viral and now here we are. In the space of a year, I went from having 8000 followers to having >46,000.

How do I feel about that? It's bonkers. I think it is great that so many people are interested in hearing the Good News about frogs and other creatures. But I also feel like I am not really on the same playing field as most of the others in that poll mentioned above, in that I do not have any of the celebrity that several others have. And I know for a fact that there are fanblogs with far, far larger followings than I have. But perhaps that is the great thing about tumblr; that the playing field is somehow levelled…

What's the point of this ramble? Well, first I guess it is to outline that I have given fame a lot of thought over the years, and I have a long-standing and complicated relationship with it, and take it quite seriously. Second, to illustrate that I have been working on as a science communicator or person in outreach for many years—it has kind of been my social media brand since I started gradschool in 2013. And third, to kind of outline how we got here, because I often feel like you have to know where an arrow has come from in order to figure out which direction it will continue to fly.

You asked if I would somehow try to leverage my tumblr fame to get research funding—I already do that. In fact, my social media activity had a signfiicant role in landing me my current job, and will continue to help me achieve tenure. Outreach is an important part of my job, and funders like it too.

I would love to have the community-building power and tenacity of the brothers Green; Nerdfighteria has achieved some incredible things over the years, and the power of that community is now being seen at an unprecedented scale in their battle for equitable access for tuberculosis diagnosis and treatment. But I do not have that in me; this platform is the wrong one for community activation, and my community is still too small for that. Moreover, it is not organised or structured, in the way that I think effective deputisation would require.

As for the crowdsourcing of name ideas, that is currently off the table. I like to try to name things on my own or with my colleauges; it is a very good part of the process. And I have yet to hear a suggestion for a Mini species epithet that I had not already come up with myself, so I am not convinced that this would really augment the experience.

So for now, I hope that the main way I use the platform, and the power that comes with a few thousand followers, will be to spread the Good News about frogs and other wonderful animals, and the other kinds of science happening around us (and occasional other off-topic content). I hope that you are encouraged to explore the world around you, and to do your own reading to find out more about the subjects that interest you. And also I will continue to try to make meme-worthy content, because it does nice, if addictive, things in my brain when I get the clicks.

Thanks for asking, anon, and sorry for the Wall of Text.

[randomprose]

“Can you make this?”

Mo Guan Shan frowns at He Tian’s phone when he angles it in his direction. It’s a video of someone making cute rectangular layered cakes. 

He tilts his head a little, lower jaw jutting out in consideration, and He Tian knows Mo Guan Shan will make it anyway regardless of whatever he’s gonna say next.

"You into this shit?"

He Tian just shrugs. It's cute. He's into cute shit and he's not afraid to admit it. "It looks tasty."

"Hm," Mo Guan Shan hums with a non-committal shrug. "I'll try I guess."

'Try' he said as if that isn't as good as a yes. He Tian knows Mo Guan Shan won't just try. The second the question left He Tian’s lips Mo Guan Shan already took it as a challenge. He'll fucking do it and blow He Tian's mind in the process at how way better and prettier his version will be than the one in the video. Just like all the other times He Tian has shown him foods he thinks are interesting. It's as good as done at this point.  

See, it’s like this. Outside of work, the foods Mo Guan Shan cooks are just a rotation of his and He Tian’s favorite or any dish He Tian has mentioned even in passing that he likes. Mo Guan Shan has picked up on He Tian's picky eating habits and developed an instinct to mentally cataloguing He Tian’s niche food preferences and all the subtle ways he’s let them known. In his published cookbooks, at least half of the foods featured are a variation of what suits He Tian’s tastes and all of them have ‘For 贺天’ printed on the first page.

God. He Tian loves him so much. What the hell did he do in his past life to deserve such devotion?

The weekend rolls around and Mo Guan Shan presents He Tian with his own version of the cakes. 

He Tian, as he expected, is floored by how pretty they are that he doesn’t even say anything. He just stares at the little rectangular cakes in pastels decorated with intricate shapes made of fondant and meticulously piped icing.

"What's wrong?" There's worry in Mo Guang Shan’s voice seeping into defensive. "What? You don't like it?"

"No, its..." He Tian looks up at him, brows furrowed and a look of genuine conflict on his face. "They're too pretty. I kinda don't wanna eat them."

“Idiot,” Mo Guan Shan just scoffs and rolls of his eyes but the slight quirk at the corner of his lips lets He Tian know he’s pleased. "Just eat it. Food is meant to be consumed. I can always make more."

"These are definitely way, waaaay cuter than the ones in the video I showed you."

"They're okay. You're just exaggerating."

"No, I'm not," He Tian insists. "When have I ever lied to you?"

Mo Guan Shan stares at him. He looks to be considering He Tian's words for a moment before nodding curtly.

He Tian takes what seems like a thousand pictures and sends them to their group chat with Jian Yi and Zhang Zheng Xi, to his brother, and then to Brother Qiu with a very proud caption of 'Momo made these for me~. They’re pretty AND they taste great~.’'

He revels in Jian Yi exploding in the group chat and demanding Mo Guan Shan make some for him and Zhan Zheng Xi too.

‘Heh,’ He Tian types with a smug smile, ‘Eat your heart out, bitch.’

(He Cheng thumbs-upped his message while Brother Qiu’s reply was to tell Mo Guan Shang to bring some over the next time they come to the mansion. To which He Tian replies a very empathic ‘No <3’).

When he’s done gloating, He Tian turns back to Mo Guan Shan and knows by the look on his face that he’s already thinking about including the cakes in his next cookbook. He thinks that if Mo Guan Shan ever gets his own restaurant, he’ll make it so at least half of the menu will be to He Tian’s liking. 

"I love you," He Tian says and means it. Because he really does and because he doesn’t know any other way of saying it. 

"Wha—" Mo Guan Shan blinks, a flower fondant halfway to his mouth, and looks at He Tian weirdly. "Just because of this? You're too easy."

For Mo Guan Shan? He really is. Always has been and always will be.

"You take care of me so well." Mo Guan Shan's loudest love language has always been food and He Tian still can't believe how lucky he is that he gets to have this. “I’ve gotten spoiled.”

“You’ve always been spoiled,” Mo Guan Shan retorts as he bumps a forkful of chiffon against He Tian’s lips. "Shut up and eat your damn cake." 

I love you too.

[nytehavyn-circle]

It's funny how many of the younger RPers online today go for canon muses. All of the older RPers online - anyone who is 40+ (some slightly younger) - grew up with Original Characters.

When I first started RPing on AOL in RP chatrooms, on AIM with 1x1 RPs, and in private chatrooms with group RP people - canon characters just weren't something that was played back then. (Not in my experience, anyway.) Most of us had never heard of anyone RPing a 'canon' character.

Canon RP characters didn't really start popping up and getting popular until a lot of fandom websites and such started popping up and getting really popular. Then RP chatrooms started getting filled with them, and a fuckton of RP message boards popped up (mostly fandom-based), filled with canon characters, and then canon characters started showing up EVERYWHERE.

Which was fine, and fun. Because for us OC players, it was very interesting to play our OCs against a canon character; expanding on world-building, figuring out how these characters fit together, etc.

Now, for me, personally (I can't speak for other older RPers), it wasn't until I came to Tumblr that I saw so many damned canon characters being played. I was honestly shocked. And to find out that a LOT of canon character RPers (and this bleeds over into this day) would shun RPers who played OCs.

I was very annoyed, but I found a niche of OC RPers and had fun with that. When I decided to try my hand at the possibility of playing a canon character, I went for Spike from Buffy/Angel. But he was basically used for shitposting and dash commentary, asks that were sent to him; he was used for funsies.

I ended up gaining over 500 followers on his blog, and was shocked by the amount of fan asks I got telling me how good I played him, that they could hear his voice in the posts, etc. This is not me bragging, this is me being utterly shocked and amazed that I, apparently, played a canon character so well that he gained a small fanbase. >_O I'm STILL shocked it happened, to this day.

So, I branched out with him and made him a fully-fledged RP character, one who grew over the years and changed a bit as I played him.

So, I KNOW I can RP a canon character. Some of them I can RP better than I can other canon characters, it just has to be a character that I can kind of connect with and understand, not to mention really, really like.

But, for me, and probably a lot of the older RPers, the real fun comes in creating a muse from scratch - from the bottom up, fleshing them out, creating a backstory that hasn't already been written for them; coming up with a personality all their own.

I am not disparaging those of you who play canon muses. A lot, a hell of a lot of you, are very, very good. Kudos to you on it, because some of you play canon characters I wouldn't dare try to play for fear of destroying the fantasy. For example. I wouldn't and couldn't be able to RP Steven Rogers/Captain America well. Not at all.

But, I will always prefer to play an OC - and so will a lot of the older RPers. And by that, I mean the older RPers who grew up with RP from table to online.

So, from one RPer to another, whether you be young or old... try to give OCs a chance, even if you've had a bad experience with one or two of them in the past. You might just find a decent OC that fits with your character and playstyle.

So don't give up on us (OC players and/or older RPers). We just want the same chance and respect that canon characters have been afforded.

Love to you all, whether you are young or old, whether you play a canon character or an OC. You are valued.

Be good. And have fun in the RPC. Because that's what it's about - Pure, unadulterated fun.

<3<3<3

[screamsinsilver]

Tell me more about your Noah/Jesse ideas!

AAAAAA so (i have so many of these)

to start with it's like. they work pretty well together - they're friends to lovers with mutual pining, both pretty stubborn and kinda stupid to see why everyone else considers them married

becuase they're the type to be dating before they're dating - they watch their niche arthouse films together both at home and at screenings and they both go out for food when they've been up too late working and don't have the energy to cook and end up accompanying each other to different things theyre interested in

they're both home types too, and try to spend as much time in those few moments off tour just existing together (probably also spend a lot of time just chilling on calls together) again, before they actually get together they're spending time in each others' rooms becuase they genuiney enjoy each others' company

their dates are stuff like artisian coffee shops and museums and parks and beaches, calm places mostly

they're also like, annoying in a disgustingly cute way, they flirt a lot and bicker a lot and are always joined at the hip (and draped over each other). sometimes one will join the other's band on tour for a bit which their bandmates are mostly chill with (conor and matt as tour managers just have a little more to deal with especially if it's unexpected), and the other bands inthe package are a bit surprised when noah walks out of the erra bus at some show in, like, chicago, but whatever, they're all friends its chill.

(they do fuck on tour, which annoys matt and conor if they're disappearing away with no explanation but it's mostly fine as long as they don't leave a mess that has the venue staff leaving some angry message and a cleaning invoice. they both are also mindful of the fact that they're both singers and therefore a quick bj before a show might not be the best idea (does it stop them? probably not))

when erra and bomens are touring together both bands spend a lot of time hanging out together anyway, but when travelling sometimes one band will have to check their singer is with the other band because sometimes he is but sometimes they might have left him (or both of them) somewhere and they can't have that lol

there is more, a lot of which is wrapped in the context of fic i'm writing with a friend. angst and smut and fluff and everything. it's gonna be a long fic. we're even talking sequels and spinoffs

[gatheredfates]

I thought I might start using this graphic for the updates, too! At least until I get bored of it and end up creating another. 🌊 We love eye-catching visuals in this house.

Anyway, sorry for the delay with this update! Last weekend was insane, putting it lightly, and I only really feel like I have started to return to capacity now. I appreciate your patience!

As of 04/27, I have added the following resources (in no particular order) to Sea's Community Compendium for FFXIV Creatives:

LARGE SCALE

XIV TODO — honestly, huge thanks to whoever submitted this resource because I didn't know it existed! This is another set of tools and tailored checklists for XIV that help you track encounters, content completion, dailies and more! It's also extremely alt-friendly for those of us who have more characters than sense.

FREE COMPANY / COMMUNITY FOCUSED

THE VIERAN MAFIA — do you like suave Noir-themed bars framed by mystery and intrigue? How about a bit of organised crime? This Free Company is for you! (They're also hiring, if you're interested. Get in touch with @fjotla-vithir!)

MISC

FFXIV BUFF AND DEBUFF MAKER — if you have ever thought a screenshot of yours would be made funnier by a buff/debuff but you don't have access to photo editing software, @fortunafavore has you covered with this simple tool!

XKIT REWRITTEN — The most up-to-date iteration of the original XKit tool, XKit Rewritten provides a series of enhancement tools for Tumblr's web-based interface including accessibility tools, anti-capitalism bocks and recommendation tweaks.

Want to submit? You can either fill out the google form here, send me an ask with the relevant information contained on the Compendium, or join my Discord at SEAFLOOR (21+ only)!

As a reminder, the answer to the question of "Is my resource/community applicable to the Compendium?" is almost always a resounding yes. I want to know what's out there. I want to feature your project!

However, for the sake of clarity, I'll pop the FAQ from this post below in a read more for you to check out if you're worried. ✨

I want to put my community on the compendium but we have an application process. Is this okay?

Yes! Just note somewhere in your application that's a requirement. The only thing that is mandatory for the Compendium is that you must be open to new members or have a public-facing/accessible facet. There's no point advertising a community if no one can join it in some way!

I want to put my community on the compendium but I only have x number of members —

Also totally okay! People don't start with large communities. Activity is a must but, whether your server has two or two thousand members, if you're looking for new people to join, I'd love to help you find people.

I want to put my community on the compendium but I worry its too niche?

Okay, and? If your Eorzean Fishing Alliance has four members but you roleplay every second weekend, I still want to know about it.

What resources/communities can I add if I'm not the owner of them?

Mutual consent is extremely important to me, so anything that isn't a large-scale community OR a publicly accessible resource must be endorsed by the owner/admin/moderators in order to be added to the compendium. I operate under the assumption that a resource posted to a public space (tumblr, googledocs, youtube, etc) is open to all. A large-scale community is one with a significant member count or openly advertises itself as being accessible to everyone for whatever purpose it serves. If in doubt, please get in touch with me. I'm happy to contact your community owners for you!

How active does a community need to be?

If you find a community has not been active in about two/three months, send me a message and I'll take a look at it. Communities have ebbs and flows, especially event spaces that may take hiatuses depending on member interest/life events. I'm not strict in my implementation provided a space isn't dead. If a link or anything is broken, absolutely contact me about that.

I have [insert a question not stated here]?

No drama! Send me an ask or use the #Compendium channel in my Discord!

[ltleflrt]

Hi! Okay so I came across your fic Omega And The Beast completely randomly in a comment section on Tiktok and marked it for later a while ago. Well a few days ago I hadn't slept and was running on a lot of tea and started reading it. It was absolutely amazing! I have not seen Supernatural, I barely know any of these people except for random stuff I've seen on Tumblr but I got so immersed in the fic. I was not expecting that at all tbh. Well...I kinda had no idea what to expect? Since I know nothing about them? So it came as a total surprise when I fell in love with the universe!

Absolutely wonderful fic! I am really busy these few months but I literally could not stop reading any chance I got. My heart broke so much for Cas tbh. In my head, he now lives the absolute best life with no worries at all! All the good things for him! The slow bond that is formed between Cas and Dean had my entire heart! I am an absolute sucker for stuff like that. Ahshfhhff hurt/comfort is soooo good!! My favourite scene is probably their midnight picnic. Dean completely disregarding all the rules to take Cas on a picnic...almost cried! I was yelling at my best friend about the fic the entire time too hdhdhfj. Gonna get her to read it too!

I have now started No Words...I told myself this wouldn't become a thing but I am a liar! It's slow going because like I said life is busy atm but it's such a nice reprieve after a long day! Your writing is so so good and I'm pleasantly happy with my first experience in the spn fandom

Anyway, yeah! I need to get back to work now but thank you for sharing your wonderful craft with the world and allowing it to keep me company on long days and sleepless nights 💜💜

I was at work when you sent this, and I'm stressing out about my first international trip and my first business trip, and was generally having a foggy brain day. But this message cheered me up so much that I kept opening it and reading it, so thank you. You have excellent timing 💜💜

I'm always blown away when people decide to read my stuff when they haven't watched Supernatural. What perked your interest? Are you into omegaverse in general? This was my last spn/destiel fic before I burned out, and I think it turned out pretty good considering it took me a year to write, which is usually long enough for me to forget what I'm doing or lose interest in something. It feels really good to hear that it appeals to a wider audience, because I figured it was really niche lol

(If you ever decide to watch the show, just don't watch the very last episode. Stop at 15x19 and go find more fanfic, you'll have a more satisfying experience lol)

(Also, check out this incredible fanart of Cas from Omega and the Beast by @strwbryshortie that is so stinking cute and captures him perfectly.)

Anyway THANK YOU! I'm so glad you enjoyed OatB, and I hope you enjoy No Words too 🥰

[yakichoufd]

hello,

i'm not an artist so i don't know all of the struggles, but it does seem hard. especially when your livelyhood depends on an audience that consumes your art, i imagine connecting with them as friends too would be quite difficult.

in my humble & unexpirienced opinion, i think it's healthy that you see tumblr as your quite & chaotic space. it's easy to see the Tumblr-Famous artists everywhere on your dash bc, well, that's what being Tumblr-Famous looks like. however, i think most of us are just posting to the void and every once in a while find someone with a shared interest for a moment. that's my tumblr expirience anyway. and i don't see it as that bad.

i hope you'll find the joy in art again. i can say for myself that i follow you bc of your gorgous art style, and so i hope you'll return to liking it too.

Hi Anon <3 Thanks for your sweet message! Some of my patrons are very understanding and super friendly to me, and I think, I can call them my friends! :) But sometimes I get some hateful or disrespectful patrons and it makes me questions everything I have done in my life haha (I'm a dramatic gremlin)!! And I am usually very fine with one or two fandom friends where I can send silly niche memes or random angst headcanons so we can cry (or laugh) together. It is always fun to be able to be chaotic with another person who share a similar interest! I am unsure about how tumblr works nowadays. I am mostly a NSFW artist. I do enjoy drawing SFW art but that's not the kind of art that make my patreon interesting unfortunately. I enjoy drawing NSFW art so I won't complain about it. But it is just not the best kind of fanarts to share here. Even with I censored them and add content warning (which are very much appreciated). But I can still post safe cropped WIP and rent about my latest obsession. It seems fun and relaxing! Posting to the void sounds very freeing. I think I still see posting as a way to connect with others, so I do not know how I'd enjoy "posting to the void" as long I have this point of view. But there is only one way to figure this out :) thank you again for your very kind words <3 I am so happy you like my art and I hope you'll continue to enjoy it <3 take care and have a lovely day/night!

[anshiiiiin]

Hey!!!! Found you through your work on Reddit, was delighted to see you have an account here too!!

I've been wanting to say this for a little while, but this isn't the kind of thing I'd be willing to put in a Reddit post.

I love your work and your style so much. So so much. Lately I've been allowing myself to explore my interest in heavy gore in a more neutral and healthy way, and your art has helped me to do that. Your work is very often beautiful, grotesque, and cute all at once. And not in that grand, self-contratulatory "Look at me, drawing something cute but it's all fucked up and gory!!!! Aren't I sick and twisted????" but in a quiet, earnest way, if that makes sense.

There's something very grounded about your art that's pretty rare to see in other gore artists. You don't aim for the super composed, super artsy vibe, where everything is perfectly placed, framing the viscera as divine and perfect and all that. As much as I do love that kind of art, I find it can be kind of... distancing I guess? Likewise, I get the sense you don't aim to be As Shocking And Twisted As Possible, nor overly "sexy". Rather, it's just... humans and human bodies. Ordinary and messy and beautiful, and that makes it all feel so much more real. There's something about that drawing of Valya, bloody and alive and lying in the snow, that has just... really stuck with me.

Speaking of which, I love Valya and his Terrible Horrible No Good Very Bad Consensual Adventures. There's something very charming and endearing about his mannerisms and personality. I love his comfy clothes and fluffy hair, I love how open he is about his masochism, I love that he's covered in scars (again, not something you see in most gore art). Like your art, Valya is chill, earnest, cute, and more than a little fucked up. I sort of get the sense he's a person who has found his own version of inner peace, despite everything that it entails for him. I'd love to learn more about him, If you have any facts about him you'd be willing to share.

Anyways, sorry for the rant, and sorry if this was kind of a lot to hear from a stranger. I'm not an art critic or anything, I don't know if anything I just said makes any sense. But your art really does mean a lot to me, and I wanted you to know that.

wow, omg, thank you for taking time to write such a wonderful and long message!! i am really happy that you get all those kinds of feelings from my art, and i am super grateful to you for sharing it. i myself like all kinds of guro, be it intentionally shocking, or candy, or divine-looking, but i am happy that for you i occupy this niche that you enjoy! a theory on why my art is not overly sexual is maybe because i am an asexual myself :D i am so glad you like valya!! i love him too ♫꒰･◡･๑꒱ a fact about him.. hmm... he really hates it when someone does anything bad to cats or dogs, but for once in his life he is smart enough to never tell it to anyone bc he knows there are people who would do it on purpose to make him feel worse. so it's one of the mental torture kinds that he does not enjoy

thank you again for everything you said, when i feel down about my art i will reread your message and feel inspired again :D please have a wonderful day!!

[ladyswillmart]

Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers. Spread the love ❤️

Hey wow, thanks for the message! I actually had to think about this one quite a bit. I'm not always the biggest fan of my own work, but in recent years I have published a few fics that I ended up liking. These... might be in some particular order? Eh, I dunno! Anyway, here goes:

5.) "It's Up To You" (Portal). The one where Doug Rattmann is trying to repair Grady. This is the last Portal fic I did and probably ever will do (though, never say never, right?). I'm not sure why I envisioned Doug as a fan of Ricky Nelson but it kinda works. Like the rest of my Portal stories, I put a lot of heart into this one, but in the end it felt like a bit of a waste. Oh well, I still like how it turned out.

4.) "Fish is Also a Four-Letter Word" (Gensou Suikoden II). It's sort of a screwball comedy where Jillia kind of asks Klaus to use his strategist super-powers to kill her brother. This was one of those magic stories where it all just brilliantly came together in a matter of days, footnotes and all. Rarer still, it's a story I can re-read and go "oh, that was cute", without cringing!

3.) "Malus" (Soul Blazer). The tiny fic in the tiny fandom that could! The first story I've ever done that was narrated by a goat. It's such a sweet and gentle tale, and I still think this setting is really interesting. There are not a lot of fics for this old SNES game, but I guess it is kind of a niche title. I got about halfway through a follow-up (narrated by a dormouse) so maybe I'll finish that one some time too...

2.) "A Difficult Business" (FF14). Originally a shitpost on Tumblr, which should tell you everything you need to know, if you don't want to actually read the fic summary. It's the one where Y'shtola bribes Nero Scaeva to deep fry Nidhogg's eyeballs in the fry vat at the Husting Strip Galleria food court's Ol’ Mistbeard Fish ‘n Chips.

1.) "Mog House" (FF14). In here, there is only Mog. And House. Huh, this one also involves Nero in some manner of bribery (only this time he's the one doing the bribing).

Ironically (?), my actual #1 pick isn't something that I can link to because it hasn't been published anywhere yet! It's called "Ancient History" and it's a 16-chapter work of Ultima VII (Serpent Isle) fanfic that's going up on my Neocities. For whatever reason, I made the boneheaded decision that it would be the FIRST thing to go up on my website, along with a complete (read: way too verbose) timeline and character profiles and little pictures, the works! All of this is still under construction, HOWEVER the bulk of the actual writing/markup of it is DONE and has been for some time. It's really just down to the getting the formatting just right, plus some light revision and last-minute edits.

Oh yeah! I still need to write the epilogue. Hah!

Unfortunately, it looks like Dawntrail got in the way as it's currently taking up my "writing" time slot. 😅 However, I'm also making my way to the end of all that so I expect I can get back into finishing my website pretty soon as well.

It's something I don't really expect people to be interested in so I'm not putting this story on AO3 or anything like that. I'm really proud of the work I put into the website and the story and the little AU world I crafted around it, but in the end, it's something I did just for me. 😛

[kremlin]

you know, i don't do the super longform posts like i used to, i mean to say, i don't post them anymore, but i still do write looooong ass walls of text, they don't ever make it to my blog. idk. on re-read they all have a very distinctive, unmistakable smell of "bus stop crazy" to them, and even after fixing all the grammar mistakes & forgotten words & etc they graduate from nutcase scribblings to "manifesto"

all those posts go to pastebin, anonymously, and then on to reddit, which is a huge pain, i have to farm throwaway accounts for like a year, not posting at all, before i can post a pastebin link and not have it be spam filtered, just to gauge how accurate my self-assessment is. it doesn't work because nobody reads it, unlike this blog, where 5-6 people read it.

and even that isn't working due to a wild phenomenon. when you write about niche subjects unappetizing to a normal audience, it only really makes its way to the same freaks that you're already friends with. in my case, these are people i've spoken with at great length solely textually over the internet, for like, twenty fuckin years. it probably wouldn't surprise you to know that they can clock something i've written like eight sentences in. and this sucks, it defeats the purpose of trying to hide my Shame Posts from the world with anonymity, so let me tell you what i did.

i tried just, you know, making a conscious effort to write in the most unkremlin way possible, and the result was indifferentiable than something i wrote normally. like, didn't even fool them any longer than otherwise. sure. fine. i guess that isn't interesting. but i wasn't satisfied.

so i call in an owed favor to a buddy that has zero language skills, like, unless you are speaking to him and standing in front of him, every message, regardless of platform, will read like a business email, signature and all. total dingus. he's like 26 & perpetually on welfare, (like all elite programmers) but writes like he's your dad sending email with that fancy corporate-branded-outlooko client that auto-appends some long ass disclaimer to all your email. anyways, that's besides the point, i gave him something i wrote & asked him to rewrite it in his own voice. no dice. "this sounds like something kremlin wrote but he's doing some kind of joke i don't understand, or maybe he got hit in the head". fuck. so i write a WHOLE new thing, not even solely focused on some niche subject that auto-reduces the potential culprits to like 5 people, and i give his ass the broad strokes of what i wrote and asked him to flesh it out. only a marginal improvement. they still nailed me after just a bit more thinking.

so fuck it. i hit up "Gunther" which i don't have the right keys on my keyboard to type properly, there's two dots over the U. gunther is very clearly a german guy, which you can tell on account of him speaking German, and when you speak to him in english, he's all "wast ist das" and shit. so i try giving HIM the broad strokes and having him re-create it, which was an idea/concept he did not grasp fully or understand on account of us not really sharing a language exactly. guess what. it wasn't immediately recognized, at least, it took about an hour for them to deduce i was the author, and at this point i have given up, i have lost because these increasingly cartoon antics have become my signature, and i will never be able to escape the shame of my Weird Bad Writing. they even figured out it was gunther sort-of-ghostwriting it, since it didn't have the quirks of software translation & was sent using some fucking ISO/IEC charset that europeans prefer over utf-8, at least the ones i talk to, for completely unknown reasons. they try and explain it, and i can't figure out what they're talking about, not because i don't speak french & german but because i don't speak ÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈÈ

i will never -- and this is a solemn promise -- write in any other way than to bang out the whole thing in 1 hour, never organizing anything, never looking backwards even 2-3 words, never *ever* proofreading (i get someone else to do it for me with explicit instructions to only fix grammar & highlight completely incomprehensible gibberish that they couldn't decipher for my reluctant fixing). i will also never stop posting it.

[olderthannetfic]

Sorry in advance for the message length. I just had a very odd fandom experience. I've been in fandom in one way or another for almost 20 years, but I've always been pretty low-key and never particularly popular or well-known (which is cool, really, since I just want to have my little corner to do my own thing). I was browsing fic in a fandom that I recently (~6 months ago technically, ~3 months more realistically) started writing for and wouldn't consider myself particularly established in. Haven't garnered much notice, but a few nice interactions, and I'm happy with that. I write about pretty niche stuff that's not everyone's cup of tea--I was honestly surprised that people read it at all. So I was reading this fic and noticed from the opening line that it was incredibly similar to something I'd posted last month. At first I thought it was a really fascinating coincidence that someone else was interested in the same things I was and apparently thinking similarly about it. But by the end of the chapter, it was absolutely eerily similar (enough differences that it's a different fic with different goals, but similar enough that there was a little vertigo reading it and I was sort of creeped out).

So lo and behold, the end note has an edit mentioning that they drew inspiration from my fic! So, like, huh, okay, weird but cool? Thanks for the shout-out, I guess? I glanced in the comment section and apparently a commenter had politely noted the overwhelming similarities and asked them to mention it, and the author responded that, yep, they'd absolutely drawn heavily from my fic without realizing and thanked them for pointing it out so they could give credit. Then the next comment said something about how they worry whenever someone says they're inspired by [my username], and that that's a compliment. Which is hilarious to me because, as I said, I don't really have a presence in this fandom and I'm not well-known anywhere. Like, I just got here, and already I've accidentally walked in on this little corner chatting about me. I'm not annoyed or anything--I mean, I basically walked in on strangers saying nice things about me? It's just super weird and kind of funny to my little fandom hermit self.

And it's extra hilarious because I don't get a lot of comments, so that there was a whole thing where someone recognized my work and people were chatting about me in someone else's comment section is just. Bizarre. Especially so because this particular author has written a LOT of reminders to interact and support via kudos and comments, but they have not interacted with me in any way and mentioned that they're bad at commenting themselves. I totally wouldn't have known about this entire little thing if I hadn't stumbled across their fic one day. So, that's a new one for me. Anyway, thanks for letting your blog be a space for people to share stuff like this.

--

[spindrifters]

dude i really dont know how to tell you this in a comprehensible way but im just so in awe at you. i've been following your blog for maybe two months or smth bc of the constant wolfstar spam and really enjoy that.

but also i find it so so nice to see an adult in fandom that is comfortable with being an adult in fandom. i've seen lots of people turn away from fandom activity as they grow older (especially from harry potter related stuff. ig it becomes embarrassing for people) but i couldn't imagine that for myself as it is a big part of my own life. why would i stop engaging in a community that shares art and stories and beliefs?

(also as i'm a nonbinary teenager my heart just kind of jumps seeing an adult whos comfy presenting themselves like that on the internet. i'm finishing school soon and growing into the age where lots of people in my social circle seem to expect from me to grow out of this "phase". ALSO i make art myself and its just cool to see "real" writers in fandom. (i really hope me telling you this doesn't bother you.))

i just wanna tell you that your silly little posts always make me giggle and this blog feels like its own little safe space :) hope you're having a nice day <3

I want you to know that it really made my day to wake up to this.

I remember being a teenager and seeing my 30+ fandom friends and just sort of thinking well that's great for them, but there was an underlying assumption that I'd probably grow out of it by then. which made me really sad, but I assumed it was just a natural part of growing up. and then I didn't grow out of it. but more importantly, like you've said, I became really comfortable with it. if football fanboys can have their niche obsessive interests their whole life, then so can I. that's something that happens across the board, at least in my experience. I hit 27 or 28 I think and started embracing things I thought I'd have to put away as an adult, only now I had the freedom to do it in ways I didn't when I was younger. (I'm not just talking fandom. I'm talking dying my hair pink after 7 years of blonde because it made me happy and I stopped caring about it looking professional.)

and I do think part of this is because there's no actual way to 'be an adult.' part of that's because the markers and milestones boomers and much of gen x had don't really exist for us anymore. so you get older and it's a realization that, "I don't have to look and act like an adult. an adult looks and acts like me, because that's what I am." and then you start to meet other people who think similarly. the community of 30+ fans here on tumblr dot com are honestly some of the best people I know.

anyway, all this is to say, I so remember what those growing pains you're going through/can see on the horizon were like, especially relating to the interests I had that society messaged to me were shameful to have. I was a teenager during peak fangirl shaming of the 00s/10s. so I turned it into a fucking career instead.

I'm really, really glad that this feels like a safe space for you, it makes my lil gremlin heart very cozy and warm. xx

[roleplayhonestybox]

A person who liked my ad today was infuriating. After some messages, it became clear they were not interested in anything I asked for in the ad except the fandom.

I admit I was a bit aggressive but I became frustrated and I asked them why tf they liked the ad in the first place. Their reply was "the ad was too long, who has the patience to read all of it? And you can't expect me to keep all your rules in mind."

So, firstly the ask was long. I admit that. I had a handful of plots I liked and I went into them with some detail. However, you didn't need to read all of it. If a plot doesn't sound interesting, you can just skip to the next one. No need to even remember it. But also, who forced you to like the ad??? This was not a carrd I sent when we were already talking. If the ad is too long and you can't be bothered, you can just scroll past.

Secondly, the things they "couldn't keep in mind' were pretty basic stuff. I understand that some things will slip your mind after a while. For example, if I tell my partner vomit squicks me and then their character happens to vomit two weeks into the roleplay, I can see how they could forget.

But if my ad asks for novella, and you know you can't write novella, there's nothing to keep in mind! You either can do it or not. If I ask for ccxcc and you want to write your oc, it's nothing you should keep in mind, you simply don't like the ad in the first place!

To be clear, I'm not talking about people who do both and get things mixed up. If you suggest your OC because you forgot, I'll just remind you and that's fine, I don't mind. But bestie, you can't say you don't do canon characters at all. You should have just gone like "that sucks, time to scroll past" instead of liking it.

The cherry on top was that this person said they liked it anyway because it was for a niche fandom. So they thought I'd be too desperate to enforce my boundaries, maybe? The kicker is that I would have relented on some of my rules because I kinda am desperate. I wouldn't have cared for adv lit replies, for example. They only needed to be upfront with it and maybe we could have both compromised a bit. But if you try to be sneaky and I'm the only one who needs to compromise? No, thank you.

.

[kharmii]

last week I stopped looking at the submas tag here on the hellsite... and I'm feeling less frustrated about the fandom. If I look at the toxic positivity and passive agressive additude towards anyone thinking differently.

Taking a step back and only and unapologetically all the content on X feels a lot better. I'm happy that even if they get shit the fans in Japan keep creating wonderful content. Was just thinking about that when I saw your post earlier when I looked into the tags here earlier.

Little furry bs no forced political messaging unique and interesting takes on the twins gorgeous art and comics and so much more

the western "hellsite" side of the fadom has worn me out but I feel rejuvinated whenever I look at the content Japanese and Koreans create. Shipping or not. Their content is so much better. Stuff from here can be good too but they're the exceptions and not the norm.

and thank you for sharing work here so I can discover new great artists!

I'm having a better time with the Submas tag because after being into this fandom for 2+ years, all the obnoxious people have blocked me by now. Some people I actually liked blocked me as well, but I'm still able to see enough new material that I'm reblogging a tumblr artist every day.

It's the damn shipping tags I stopped looking at so much, and I haven't checked Blankshipping on AO3 in over a year. *checks just now* What do we have? Lets see....mermaid bullshit, zoroark bullshit, omegaverse, niche fetishes maybe two people are into, two Ingos and one Emmet, gross transgender mutilation crap, father/daughter with a minor, more mermaid bullshit except Ingo and Emmet are a COLOSSAL SQUID AND SPERM WHALE, WHICH ARE NATURAL ENEMIES, YO!!! (My OCD making me flinch because if they are identical twins, then they'd have to both be one or the other).

Whoa, I'm actually amazed I got two pages in reading summaries, and didn't see a single thing labeled 'whump/hurt no comfort/dead dove do not eat/major character death...' That used to be the majority of content when I first got into Submas Yaoi. Maybe that clique moved on. Still, there's not a single description that made me want to open something up and read it. I'm into the Japanese/Korean aesthetic more than the actual ship. Other blankshippers did a more thorough job turning me off of brother-fucking in that couple months when PLA was at its height of popularity than any foaming-at-the-mouth antis could have done in a lifetime.

I wouldn't give up on general here on Tumblr though. There's still a lot of good content to be had. I've always liked general more than shipping because there's more of the casual intimacy and cutesy spice-of-life. Add to that, but there's a few Asian artists posting here too. The craziest part is there are probably a handful of people who would agree with me, or at least they'd rather see fluff than explicit, but they blocked me anyway for political reasons.

Art credit: 寿@kaz8ens Twitter.

[argisthebulwark]

Hi yes hello just stopping by to say that I'm obsessed with everything you write. Every time you post something new I literally drop everything to read it immediately. Your drabbles about Farkas, Vilkas, and Brynjolf always leave me smiling, swooning, and pining. How you fit so much perfect characterization into so few words yet make it so spot on for them each individually leaves me in awe. Especially for the less popular characters! Like Balimund – love that big cuddly blacksmith man! And Thrynn! I flipped out when I saw you had Thrynn content, he's one of my absolute favorites and there's so little about him out there. I'm absolutely obsessed with your headcanons about him! But anyway, that's all, I love you and hope you have a lovely day.

Thank you!!! I wish I could type thank you a hundred times because this is so very kind, I am always so relieved to hear that people enjoy the things i write. I work really hard on characterization so it's awesome to hear that it comes across!!! Thrynn!! I know I haven't talked about him in ages but it's so exciting when people get interested in niche side characters, it feels like there's so much freedom with them since bethesda gave them a handful of repetitive lines and called it a day lol. I was soo into him for a hot minute idk what happened. I keep a sheet of paper with a running tally mark of how many times I've used each dude, I guess he just never made it on there lol. I am so so so grateful that we have this shared fandom space. It's so fun to create things and hear from folks that enjoy them, tesblr is the nicest place I've been on the internet. Thank you again for your message, it made my day <3

[notoneopinion]

The Newsletter #2: Feeling Stuck

Oh boy, here we go.

I am twenty years old. A baby. Barely a dent made in the experience known as life, and yet feeling stuck is one of the biggest issues I battle through on a daily basis.

I know for a fact this is a common thing, because I've talked about it with so many people my age. Social media has us tricked into thinking we have to have everything figured out by the time we're thirty, that if we aren't living our best lives as soon as we're out of our teenage years, we're doomed. And it would be so easy for me to come on here and tell you that isn't true, but nobody will believe it, because we're all too far gone by now.

This blog post is really just going to be a rant about this phenomenon. I don't know if there will be some grand realisation at the end of it, so we'll see where it takes us.

My dream is to be self-employed. A writer, preferably, whether that be blog writing, or novel writing, or journalism - I just want to write, and have that writing pay the bills. At the moment, I work as a care assistant, and as much as I adore my duty and have so much pride in the fact I take care of others for a living, it really isn't what I want to be doing. I hate waking up at six in the morning, leaving my house in the freezing cold to go work a twelve hour shift. I hate it. It's such a direct contrast to my dream of waking up every morning, making a coffee and trudging into my office to start commissions, or drafting, or whatever writing term will be appropriate at that stage.

There are nights when I can't sleep because I'm so upset with the life I'm living right now. I will sit up into the early hours of the morning, Googling different ways to just start chasing my dreams, and I'll get this massive burst of motivation to really start and really put the effort in, but it's so, so difficult. Getting traction for this kind of thing takes a long time, and it's hard for me to keep that motivation up for that amount of time. It's my own fault, but I feel like I can't help it, and then I end up back at square one.

This blog was - in ways - an attempt at building my dream career. It took me a while to figure out my niche, but I eventually settled on the whole self-care, mental health side of things, because that's what I'm interested in, and that's what I'm knowledgeable about. I told myself I would stay consistent with this blog, and see where it took me - and so far I think I've done okay, though there is always room for improvement. My following here has been growing, and I really enjoy making these blog posts for you all, so I suppose that's an upside.

But at the end of the day, I am still living pretty unfulfilled. I'm not afraid to admit that. I take commissions from people who like my writing (message me if you're interested ;)) which I'm so grateful for, and that's the kind of thing I want to be doing - I just want to be doing it on a bigger scale, and that's where I struggle. I don't know how to reach that bigger scale. It feels like I'm working so hard, but in the end, I realistically have no idea what I'm doing, and nothing is working.

Anyway, that's my self-deprecating blog post over. Feel free to share your thoughts and experiences, I'd love to hear from you all. I'll be back with some more self-care tips and more Newsletters for you all soon, but I just wanted to get this off my chest, since it's something that's been heavy on my mind for a while now.

I love you all!! Have a good day!!