#this is for the niche audience of ...... like two people

[malleusmaleficent]

i do theatre shit and it's to perpetuate an extremely niche genre of music because it needs more young people, or else it'll die out

but anyways, regarding writing for attention like. it's definitely a thing yk, like i explicitly started writing witch hammer (and my fic before that) thinking like: "this is a truly wretched combination of things, and it creates a combination so niche that i am pretty much the only person that would want to read it, and that's okay"

like that was exactly what happened when i wrote life's tangled skein, which got nearly zero interaction. but witch hammer turned out wildly differently, witch hammer caught on super hard (by my own standards anyways).

and like, let me tell you, writing these two things has felt VERY differently. like the way in which i engaged with both stories is different, life's tangled skein i had a very clear mission and i was trying to capture a particular feeling, for me specifically. like i wanted to see if i could write something to make myself feel a certain way. and i did, i think. nobody read it, but i succeeded and i was never once troubled by audience reception and i was never checking for new comments or new likes or whatever. i was never thinking how a plot point might affect people.

however, witch hammer is a very different story. i am telling you right now if i wrote the story i had set out to write, there'd be fujos howling at the moon or some shit they would be so upset LMAO and like. i don't really want to write what i had initially set out to write anymore, im just not in the headspace for that. i have enjoyed keeping it light, i like writing cute shit too much.

but also, i'd be lying if "but what will me readers think" weren't a consideration as well. like i don't really participate in fandom culture, so i wasn't really aware entirely, but some people take this shit DEATHLY seriously. and while i think that is extremely silly, right, if someone that takes it deathly seriously got invested in something i've wrote, i don't want to actively make their day worse yk.

and i am checking for new comments every day, and i am watching the like counter go up.

and i'll be honest, it does feel a bit less "pure" to me, whatever that means. i haven't unpacked what that means exactly, but that is how i feel. i want to know people like my writing, and i want people other than me to vindicate me spending so much time and effort on this very niche project of mine.

now part of this is timing, i started writing witch hammer just a few days before i got laid off from my full time job, so that put me in a weird headspace. the tremendous wave of positive feedback i got after the fact was very helpful and i'd fully admit i latched on to it for a few weeks as i tried to clear my head.

but i'm good now, and buddy i am still watching for new comments lol.

i dunno, it's a complicated thing.

i do write for attention, actually, because that's a normal reason to create art

[brw]

Wanda Langkowski should get out of Samson's body and get with a real man (Heather Hudson)

[yusuke-of-valla]

Every time someone describes or frames action RPGs as the inevitable evolution of turn based combat the monster that eats people who can't identify what a genre or sub genre is grows another row of teeth

[unproduciblesmackdown]

one in a million when i watch smthing in the horror genre and don't end up disappointed to/and/or pissed off about it so like "also yeah i liked it. ooo" is like relative to that an off the charts rave review of media of the millennium. also i did think about mh a lot along the way so would recommend its affect/effect if you like mh's horror too

[ily-no-romo]

30 sickos can feel like more of a community than a mass audience

[chewwytwee]

The thing about AI is like, what if someone just doesn’t wanna be an artist? What if someone doesn’t wanna sink a bunch of time into learning how to draw?

The whole argument surrounding art’s accessibility kinda misses the point by assuming everyone wants to dedicate the time to learning how to draw and the only thing preventing them from drawing is their own sloth and entitlement. If you wanna criticize AI tools find a better point than reactionary pearl clutching about the sanctity of human art and the inherent importance of ‘effort’. Y’all sound like fucking Ben Shapiro when you decry anyone who would dare to create art in an easy way, they’re ruining our great ‘culture’ and are degrading ‘human nature’ by breaking from tradition (which is inherently good and should never be challenged) by using new ~Technology~ (which is inherently bad and needs to be STOPPED at ALL COSTS).

[fionnaskyborn]

and TODAY ON "Songs Fionna can't listen to without them fucking her up immensely and remind her why she doesn't listen to them very often every time she listens to them", we have:

[bluebellhairpin]

Someone kick me up the pants and tell me to make this animation even if I think it'll turn out shitty.

[darlingofdots]

I do not actually use tiktok but I do scroll through instagram reels (which are just reposted tiktoks) way too much for my own health, and I also occasionally use reddit, and I can't help but think that these platforms and the emphasis on building your "brand" or finding your niche are pushing people to attach way too much meaning to labels. "Can I like flowers as a butch" "you shouldn't wear yellow as a deep autumn" "what my sensory-seeking child ate today" "when you Find Your Style and realise your teenage outfits were hideous" STOP. People don't work like that.

There's two angles to this, I think: It's always really obvious when somebody found an audience by posting about a specific thing and now they're trying to retain that audience by talking about it as much as possible, so they end up relating every aspect of their lives to it even when it makes no sense if only so they can use the right hashtags; whereas on the other end of this interaction, people who mostly receive this kind of content get the impression that there are rigid and hard rules that dictate who gets to identify a certain way or engage in an activity or what a health condition looks like. Have you ever noticed how many shortform videos but also internet comments begin with a version of "As someone who..." as if it's some kind of certificate or qualification? There is such an emphasis on labelling and clearly defining your experience! And don't get me wrong, labels and diagnoses and community identification can be really useful, and there are conversations in which being upfront about your positionality is helpful and productive. But so many posts on the lesbian subreddit the app made me join when I made my account are along the lines of "can I still be a lesbian if x?" and "do femmes think y is attractive?" as if any of these things are monolithic, strictly defined fundamental conditions of the human soul! Even medical conditions don't work this way because every body is different! Open yourself up to the complexity of experience!

[escapedaudios]

Popular YouTubers "reacting" to audio roleplay by trying to exaggerate how cringe they think it is fucking exhausts me man. Half the time they do Cinema Sins-style commentary but from this "what if I don't like beans" point of view of just refusing to suspend disbelief and roleplay as the listener character. The commentary is always them talking back at the audio like "uh, you're not my boyfriend, actually my boyfriend's name is Steven and he's in the living room right now" or just failing to accept the premise of the video they clicked on. Acting shocked when a character kisses them and going "UHHH WHY IS HE KISSING ME". It's because you clicked on a boyfriend ASMR video tagged [kissing], that's why. Don't be dense.

It feels like they want for it to be way more cringe than it actually is, so they put on this exaggerated display, or act shocked that an audio matches its premise. This shit would be like making a video called "Reacting to Horror Movies (try not to cringe)" and being like "UHHH WHY IS THE KNIFE GUY STABBING PEOPLE???? I'M SO UNCOMFORTABLE". Man shut up. Then there's YouTubers reacting to videos that are very obviously ironic, absurdist humor and refusing to get that it's a joke. No, "Boyfriend Gets Hit By a Car [Spicy]" isn't actually supposed to be spicy, it's a joke.

These reaction videos are, for many outside of the niche, their only window into audio roleplays. Anything that has a plot that takes more than two minutes to understand is left out because they don't have the patience to watch the whole thing and only want to "react" to thirty-second clips. Anything that doesn't look like it'll make for good cringe bait is left out because they decided ahead of time that they want to cringe to it.

The whole medium is already so unfairly stigmatized and poorly understood by most people. It's so agonizing seeing this be our community's main source of free publicity. I know I've taken a few shots at cheap fluff boyfriend/girlfriend ASMR before but like, it's friendly jabbing from someone very much adjacent to them. I still understand the value that comfort roleplays have to their audiences, even if their plots aren't as deep. The whole medium-wide dismissal that these YouTubers give for some cheap reaction content on a newer medium they don't understand is actually the worst.

I need to make a video essay or something to act as propaganda for audio roleplays because the publicity we get passively could not be worse I swear to God.

[inbabylontheywept]

if you are my fav tumblr account, who else should i follow? any suggestions? maybe your other followers can chime in too.

oh. that's very sweet. i've been told i have a lot of overlap with @foldingfittedsheets. she does art too, i just rec her in general. if you like me for my poignance, shes like that too, plus she can draw. @gallusrostromegalus is another storyteller, and they've been at it quite a while longer than me. absolutely massive archive of stories. top quality and top quantity. i'm in awe of the quantity - some days i feel like i'm scraping the bottom of my bucket and they just keeps going, and going, and going, and going. they are kind of unstoppable. @derinthescarletpescatarian did hfy and was frankly quite a bit better at it than i ever was. if you like my fiction. they have several books too that i've seen people go feral over. on my to-read-list after i finish my cormac mccarthy binge. god help me. or stop me. they also do life update stories that kind of fit into my niche.

there's @lizardho, who is my sister, and frankly has a similar storytelling and speaking style to me. we grew up just 14 months apart. she doesn't write as much as i do, she just got out of grad school and which consumed basically all of her mental and emotional energy for the last couple years (ive only really been writing for around... 4 years? and basically started as soon as school stopped kicking my ass) but when she does you'll go ah, yeah, family resemblance here. case in point.

@miseria-fortes-viros is more fandom focused than me, but if you read me specifically for my random emotional kicks to your stomach, she is fantastic at that and she occasionally dips into greek works, which is something i've always been interested in. if you liked my odysseus in space story then this and this are gonna burn through your brain like acetone on styrofoam. also she occasionally does life stories and theyre always top notch. you will love this.

those are all my you-will-find-works-like-mine recs. i'm opening it up to the audience if they have anyone they'd like to throw into the ring.

(i'm gonna close with someone whose work isn't actually terribly similar to mine, but i like @letters-from-the-gaps so much i'm gonna give them a rec too. their poem "Bone Saints" is probably my favorite work of theirs. i think about it at least once a week. you can go through their entire body of work in like, maybe a day or two? but it's good. feels like home to me. we both love our sunscorched deserts.)

[johnbrand]

Screen Froze

Podcasting had become inescapable in recent years. Everyone seemed to have an opinion on...well everything. Politics, world sports, cooking, an obscure movie from 1978 only released in a now-extinct language. If it could be covered, it would be. And one could find this content anywhere across the internet. Youtube, social media, even streaming services promoted their podcasters. Everyone was watching everyone talking. 

Of course, with so many different podcasters flying about, it was difficult to actually spot out talent. And from a sociologically micro perspective, it was even harder for individuals to find podcasters discussing the content they actually wanted to hear about. The more unique the niche, the less people one could happen upon to be talking about it during their recorded stream of consciousness. It was a simple formula, but it forced individuals to browse for hours or even days to find what they were searching for.

Sometimes though, people could not hold such patience. They would not wait for their new hero, a disciple preaching their values and morals to audiences around the globe. They would skip past one livestream discussing the economics of green villages in Switzerland to the next debating the potential existence between a minor character in two separate fandom universes. They could even perhaps land into a podcast like Sean’s.

“Most people just don’t understand the Soviet Union’s impact on architecture,” the measly, pale nerd innocently commented. A little shy in front of the camera, he was only able to relax a bit when discussing his favorite topics. Sean dressed in theme too, wearing a brutalist-like business casual outfit, a trait his small but dedicated fanbase adored.

“There were a lot of architects that really shaped this movement from all around the world,” Sean continued. “But today, we are just going to focus on those from the USSR.”

So what happened when one’s patience dried up? Well, everything was brought to a halt.

DragonHeart49: anyone else’s screen freeze? superduperloverboy: mine too <3bitsandmore: sean, I think ur glitching out

With the screen frozen, our impatient soul could now get to work. If one could not find the podcast they were looking for, then why not just create their own? Obviously, this did not mean constructing a podcast themselves, but rather alter the fabric of reality and completely realign another’s being to their preferred state. That was much easier.

Physical modifications were made first. A much larger body was necessary, something that demanded confidence and respect from others. Juicy pecs, rippling abs, sturdy legs. There was always something unreasonably fun in bloating the podcaster’s feet up a few sizes. An imposing frame to be craved by others, even when hidden underneath clothes, was priority. And speaking of clothes, those were quickly stripped down to less formal articles. Expensive branded tee, athletic shorts so small that boxer-briefs were visible, classic white Nike socks, all of it much more respectable than a button-up and tie.

This was not the impatient soul’s first time altering a podcaster to their liking, nor would it be their last. Physically at least, each of the end products were a little different. All alpha males, but just enough variation to not warrant any unnecessary rumors. This particular podcaster had his pre-American heritage redirected from France to India, the features in the screenshot tanning accordingly as a dark stubble acquainted itself along the sharper jawline. Of course, the bulge was accurately enlarged for geographical standards too.

Mentally however, all the podcasters could be considered copies. They each spoke of the same rhetoric, theories, and ideologies that our impatient soul wanted to hear. No matter how “backwards” or “hateful” their discussions were deemed as, nearly anything could be said by hulking bodies with undeniable charisma.

“These homos have no idea what they’re talking about!” Sanjay raged as the podcast restarted, his deep voice cocky and assertive. "Sure bro, I was just thinkin’ about a girl’s rack I saw earlier today but there's more to a girl than big tits. There's a tight pussy too!”

The chat section lit off with encouragement, their fates too having been altered.

MassiveFART69: you tell them fags bro! LOL XD crassmassschlongnator: we want to BREED THEM TOO!!!! <3TITSGALORE: JUST TALKIN ABOUT IT ALREADY GOT SANJAY GRABBIN HIMSELF AGAIN

Sanjay vacantly looked down, finding himself already subconsciously scratching at the thick bush within his shorts. He let out a hot protein fart followed by a laugh, his scratching slowly extending into groping his fat 8 inch babymaker.

“God, that was WET bros!” Sanjay applauded himself, his free massive hand swallowing the mic. “Anyway, I’ll catch you on the flip side dudes, gotta go hit the gym. Bros for life!”

There was a reason the traditional masculine movement was becoming stronger. Maybe it was because men were slowly aspiring to become the alphas’ equals, or because fags were beginning to submit to their nature. Or possibly, it could have been because each time a screen froze, reality was altered one click closer to traditional, normal masculinity.

[u3pxx]

hi woke up suddenly and am curious (also going back to sleep lol)

if u only like two of these, answer no yes only if all three!!! im curiouse!!!!

when i make like acediscomeshi crossover stuff i feel like it's for a really niche audience LOL i wanna see HOW niche. tho im guessing the results of this will skew yes just bc the first people who'll see this poll are the people who follow me pftt

[anomaly-hivemind]

Horror Convention || No. 9 Gloryhole w/ Horror Characters x Fem! Reader

Kinktober Masterlist

Part 2

Word Count: 1995

Warnings: gloryhole, free use, exhibition, overstimulation, large cock, vaginal sex, gangbang if you squint, vagianl fingering, mask kink, stranger sex, cosplaying oral sex, blow jobs, hand job, spit as lube, multiple orgasms,

You were going to a horror convention, it was your first one and you couldn't be more excited to go. You were wearing a slutty freddy krueger outfit excluding the knife coves because they sold out at the spirit halloween. It was too late to buy any online. You were wearing a ripped up black and red cropped top, a jean mini skirt, some stressed thigh-highs and wedges.

When you finally got inside the convention center, there were a lot of things going on with an unsettling low amount of security personnel around. It was a bit overwhelming but you were going to push through it just fine. It was full of cosplaying horror characters, new and old, popular and niche. Even horror shorts films, tv shows and games.

“Can I take a picture with you? I really like the freddy outfit,” the muffled voice of a guy said behind an old respirator.

Oh yeah sure, I like your outfit too. It's from my bloody valentine right?” you lean into the guy so he could take the photo. The guy pulls you close to him for the picture, then he turns to face you.

“Yeah I've had this for a while now.” he laughs and crosses his arm.

“Well it's super cool, practically identical to the movie.” you look him up and down, he was a carbon copy of the original.

“A bunch of my buddies and staff are hosting an event on the west wing in an hour. You should totally go. “ The Harry warden cosplayer handed a pass for the event. ‘Glory Horror’ printed on the card.

“Yeah I will be there.” you nod and take the pass. You can't believe you got an event pass for free.

=========================================================================

An hour had passed, you had bought a scream poster, a friday the 13th shirt and the regret of your shoe choices. You push past the last part and make your way to the event. It was a ways away from everything else which was a bit suspicious but not enough for you to turn around. You show the bouncer guy your pass and ID, because you guess this is an 18 plus event.

You take a seat in the front, the seats were really comfortable. The lights were dim and the walls around the panel looked sound proof. This was super fancy for a panel. It makes you wonder what's going to happen, especially with how fast the room is getting filled with horror fans such as yourself. Most of them were wearing masks from what you can see in the dark space.

A bright red stage light hits the middle of the stage. The familiar guy from earlier that gave you your pass to this event walks to the center. Two other people dragged something onto the stage behind him, also dressed up, one looked like Amanda the pig from the jigsaw moves or the dead by daylight game. The other person was dressed like the monster from Jeepers creepers. There was a large box with a set of holes of different sizes, odd but you find the tv and cameras placed inside and outside the box.

“Welcome to this year's Glory Horror event. Many of you who know about this event already know what's up, but for our virgin Marys let me explain what’s up.” Harry warden cosplayer says through the microphone, his mask muffling his words.

“We’re going to pick a lucky Slasher Slut in the audience to go into the box.” The man snickered as the crowd went wild. Harry looked into the group of seated people, presumably to find someone to put in the box.

“Anything goes when you're behind the veil.” he points to the closed door.

You look around the audience that you were in and they all seemed excited to either be picked or see who was going to end up being picked. You just stare at everyone in confusion.

“You, are you willing to take a dive into carnal pleasures and try out the box?” He points to you from the crowd, when you point to yourself he nods. You stand up, nerves run down your spine as you walk onto the stage. You were surprised with how excited every person in the audience seemed to be that you got picked.

“What am I supposed to do?” you asked while looking at the box.

“It's pretty self explanatory, but you get in the box, the cameras are already set up, we gave you a screen to see the reactions you're giving people.” You nod at him and step into the box, it was large and you could stand up right without being seen by anyone, not counting the screen that was broadcasting you to the outside.

“You can strip down any point and if you want out of the box just push the button to unlock the door.

“You want me to do what now.” you asked from behind the wall, your voice muffled mostly.

“Strip, take off those slutty clothes and either open that pretty mouth or a hole. Prepared to get stuffed in whichever you choose and you can switch at whatever time doll.

You think for a moment, you could back out right now but a part of you wanted to see what happened. With a shaky breath you take off your freddy krueger fit and finally take off your dreadful shoes. You were just in your bra and underwear, taking a seat on your knees in the middle. The bigger hole was covered with a black sheet.

A knock on one of the sides catches your attention, you turn your head and your eyes widen. A veiny cock filled the hole, making it look smaller than it was and it makes your mouth water. You looked over at your screen to see what you're working with, a guy wearing a Michael Myers mask. Your lip quivers as you wrap your fingers around his length.

His balls twitch as you tighten the grip on this stranger’s cock. You use your saliva to wet the tip of his dick. You hear the faint groan of the Myers look alike, it was hot and a turn on for sure. You take his cock deeper in your mouth, almost gagging on it, using your hand to massage his balls and or stroke the rest of his meaty meat.

Another knock from the others size makes you pull your lips off Myer’s member. Someone else had slid their dick into the other hole, the screen splits so you can see the masked figure. It was Brahms, down to the black messy hair, even matches the drapes decorating the base of this man’s uncut dick.

You take your other hand and start to rub at his cute dick. Both of your hands were being filled with their cocks. You were soaking wet from how hot this was and if your hands went filled you would be touching yourself right now. You placed licks on both the dicks one after the other. Even the thought that there were a bunch of people on the other side of this box, watching and listening or maybe even waiting to take a turn with you.

It was hot, you felt hot and you wanted more of all of it. You squeeze the guys dicks as you jerk them both off with determination. Michael myers’ dick twitching was the only short warning you get before he shoots a hot load onto your chest. Your bra ruined with cum makes you pout for a moment before you take the thing off. You put your mouth onto the remaining man and take him down your throat. Brahms cums down your esophagus, his seed tasting weirdly sweet on your tastebuds.

You lick your lips after pulling away the dicks both gone from the holes, making you sigh. You slide off your panties and just as you thought you dripped in arousal. You rub yourself and let out short moans, a guy that was looking like Jason Voorhees pushed his phat cock through the hole. It looked heavy, craving your touch. You touch yourself with one hand while sucking off this fat dick. Even if you couldn’t fit all or even most of it into your mouth you sure as hell tried. You moan against the length of this Jason.

Your fingers thrust into yourself at a similar pace as you sucked and stroked his dick. You come to a stand and turn around, your wet cunt fluttering with horniness. Lining your slit with a guy who looked like a slasher’s dick. You let out a hearty moan as this fat cock stretches you out. You could feel his dick twitch and the man moan from the intrusion. He bottoms out in you, your walls clench around him and then he starts to move slowly in and out of you. You rub your clit as your hole gets pounded into. Another dick pops into the hole in front of you and wraps your hand around it with hesitation. Peaking at the screen in the box you see that it's a guy dressed up in a ghostface outfit.

“Ohshit ohshit ohfucking hell.” you were on the verge of coming and the mix of a Jason hitting all your spots with his girth was making it harder to focus on stroking the guy in front of you.

You try your best to get the other guy to completion but your own impending orgasm was a bit of a distraction to say the least. This Jason guy’s thrust was getting relentless and it was super hot to say the least. You hold on for as long as you could but when you feel the man’s load start to pool down your leg sends you down the edge. Before you could complain about how fast the guy pulled out another guy pushed into you, somehow even thicker and longer than the Jason guy.

You squeeze the hell out of the ghostface and your thumb pushes on his slit. It makes the guy come all over you and hand it a messy gush. The new masked covered hottie was fast enough to work you past that previous orgasm but Jason had given you but now you were getting a bit overstimulated. The faint tapping of the man's pyramid helmet on the box wall makes you giggle. Yet the humor in all of this was cut short from the brutal thrust this pyramid head was giving you.

You were already about to fall into another climax, you couldn't help but scream out a moan that you're sure everyone in the panel heard. Maybe even people outside nearby could hear your whorish moans and whales. This massive curved dick was rubbing your insides just right and your lower half couldn't take much more of it, not standing up like you are right now at least. You reach another chaotic mind altering, pussy spasming, leg trembling, back arching, toe curling climax that almost gives you whiplash an.

You feel the sticky seed fill your cunt and pull out with lackluster pace, almost like he didn’t want to leave your warmth so it takes a minute or so before he actually does . When the pyramid head finally pulls out, your body drops to the stage ground with a thud. You were panting like a dog, cum was dripping out of you and sticking to your thighs. Your heart is pounding in your chest as you try to catch your breath.

“This is the best Horror con ever.” you say breathlessly, as you look at another dick slipping into one of the holes. Checking your provided inside the box you see who it is, the host of this event… it’s Harry warden.

[patricia-taxxon]

I want to address what’s being said about me regarding my behavior as a teenager, because some of it is true. However, more of it is greatly distorted, and some of it is false. I won’t be reproducing the video that was made about me, the creator has acknowledged the misinformation present in it & has unlisted it, willingly ceding ground for me to give my own testimony. Some of it will require me to admit to things I am still ashamed of, some of it will require me to revisit a traumatic time in my life that I have mostly blocked out. The short version is that I believe I was being groomed at the same time and in the same place as many of the people who came out against me, and my ultimate goal is to find solidarity with those people and begin the healing process. 

When I was 18, and just beginning to accrue an audience, I created a discord server. For a lot of external reasons, mainly spending my entire life up until this point being shuttled around different special ed schools, this ended up being the first real social circle I ever had. It represented the first positive attention I ever received from strangers. It’s a time where I made a lot of mistakes, it’s a time where I was gravely vulnerable. In all honesty, I was too young to manage a community of any kind, I was hot off the back of being desensitized in my adolescence by unrestricted access to early 2010s internet. I knew well enough to create special NSFW rooms, and was advised later to create further division by requiring users to self-apply for a special NSFW role to access those rooms This extra layer meant that the rooms wouldn’t even show up for people who didn’t have the role, which led to some believing they didn’t exist. 

However, I did not intuitively understand the “meaning” of sexual content, I didn’t understand the baggage that came with it. I used cropped fetish porn as emotes and indiscriminately showed the source to anyone who asked, sometimes outside of the NSFW rooms, because I found niche fetishes to be amusing, and since it was “funny” and not “sexy” it didn’t have to mean anything. The worst consequence of this happened when I was first formulating the ideas for my video about youtuber Rags, and I discovered that his youtube avatar was cropped from a NSFW image he had commissioned of his feral dog fursona. I sent this image to just about anyone who seemed interested, and this included a then 13 year old. I’m going to apologize just like I did when this first came out, but I will not be pressured as I was then into assuming predatory intent in myself. I’m not making excuses when I say that I had been a legal adult for under a year and thought of it as just an interaction between two teenagers, a kind of interaction I had with many of my friends (and some adults) before I turned 18. It was a misunderstanding, *and* I hurt you, and I’m deeply deeply sorry. 

There were some moderators besides myself, two were teenagers around my age, early adopters of the server who I felt I’d become friends with. One was a woman in her late twenties, who I won’t name simply because I’m not in the business of offloading my misery onto other people, but she knows who she is. She contacted me with a shower of attention & adoration, she left positive reviews for my albums when she noticed I was upset at their critical reception, she oversaw me as I posted my nudes in that server and later on my main twitter account. She encouraged this behavior in myself and others and participated in it too.

I want to make this clear, the bulk of the allegations against me boil down to punishing me for failing to surmise I was being exploited by the first social group I ever had. I jerked off in voice chats. I remember the day I started, I was surrounded by people older than me who were encouraging me to post my first nude pic in the self-nsfw channel, and I had to get hard for them first. I then considered this normal and did it often. At one point a 15 year old entered the room while I was doing it, and I went quiet until she left. I reconvened with this 15 year old recently, and she told me she only remembers being promptly told to leave. The claim that I “regularly jerked off in voice chat with minors” as if it were an orchestrated and habitual activity is an outright falsehood.  

I remember posting my nudes on twitter in a fevered haze of dissociation and dysphoria after being goaded by other users in my discord server. I remember doing it again and again, so that it could maybe eventually feel normal. I was 18, going on 19. I had twenty to thirty thousand subscribers, I was hot off the heels of being given 150 bucks for making thirty minutes of music for a much bigger youtuber. There are others who were in that server who were similarly exploited, and I am not here to contradict those testimonies, but I was uniquely denied the ability to understand what had happened to me as grooming, because I was technically of age and I had the very beginnings of a youtube audience. However, 20k subs didn’t give me more power than someone over ten years my senior. 

I was groomed, and just as I was beginning to understand what happened to me, the shame threatening to overtake me completely, I was slapped with the supposed news that I was the sole perpetrator of the entire situation that traumatized me so, that what I thought of as my first friend group all remembered me as a loathsome creep. The apology I wrote in abject panic was dissected and used as a cudgel against me in police-interrogation fashion, so I became afraid to say anything. A year and a half later, I made a post saying that I had been “groomed by a portion of my audience” and this immediately provoked a youtube video callout. I feel as if I have been beaten into silence and complicity, unable to form thoughts of my own regarding my experience. I am terrified, right now, writing this story that I firmly believe no one on earth will buy, because I have come to routinely doubt my own testimony.

Some accusations being made of me are so foreign that I have trouble piecing together what it could be referring to. I commissioned a NSFW size difference piece from dramamine, one where my lover is 11 feet tall, and I was pre transition at the time so I wanted a flat chest to help me feel feminine in my current body. It was wrongly tagged as “cub” (furry child porn) on E621, which I vocally protested at the time. This is the only thing I could point to as evidence for the claim that I commissioned cub porn of myself. I do not know how to convey the feeling of being flooded by accusations that require me to ponder what it could even be referring to, or to see my accuser insist that she’s receiving dozens of new horrible scoops on me without being able to see exactly what it is or what happened. I’m open to apologizing personally to anyone I ended up hurting in my adolescence who reaches out to me, I was a victim of grooming let off into a public space with a few thousand followers after all, but I’m not apologizing on behalf of people who might have heard something bad about me.

I am going to restate, my accuser has *of her own volition* unlisted the offending video & understands the misinformation she spread, there is nothing to gain from seeking her out and letting her know your opinion on the situation. I waited until this agreement was reached to make any statement at all for this exact reason. 

I am staying offline for about a day after posting this, I am under a lot of pressure, I am very tired.

[centrally-unplanned]

I watched two documentaries recently that were very "2000's nerd culture" which I thought were very fun! In like a meta way as cultural commentary, of course, it is me after all. The first was Indie Game: The Movie, a 2012 documentary on the making Braid, Super Meat Boy, and Fez. It is a "creator-focused" documentary and in particular for the latter two games the film crew actually filmed them mid-production & release, which does make for some authentically heartfelt scenes.

So in a certain sense all eras of documentary will contain this, but the 2000's going into the 2010's was absolutely rife with a new wave of films, often supported by crowdsourcing funds like Indie Game was, primarily concerned with the self-legitimization of niche subcultures. By creating something cohesive, academic, and prestigious like a documentary, the film can codify the subculture as "real" and "worthy", and additionally lend credence to narratives about the subculture that have grown prevalent. And to be clear, this is not a criticism, even if there are parts that are - all meaning and identity is forged in similar ways. But for nerd culture in the 2000's, there was a particularly intense need for this process, because this was the era of nerdom going mainstream. That level of culture shift generated demand for all the above, which films like this aim to supply. There were lot of films of this type - we made a brony "documentary" propaganda film guys, nothing was exempt.

Indie Game is overwhelmingly the story of outsider artists bleeding and dying for their art, which will triumph above all odds. And it leans, heavily, into the bleed; at one point Phil Fish (creator of Fez), openly states he might commit suicide if his game fails. Much screen time is spent on personal sacrifice, financial poverty, the "doubters", etc. This is of course a classic tale for artists, but if I may be so bold that is something of an easy sell - emotionally, narratively - for someone writing the Great American Novel. It is maybe harder to sell if you are making this?

(Cover art by Bryan Lee O'Malley btw - very era appropriate!) How do we make "dude in hat solves puzzles" worth the Starving Artist life?

We do that by positioning these games not as games, but as paradigms. These games, by dint of being the independent vision of unitary creators, are making games that Big Gaming never could. New digital means of distribution are allowing artists to cut out the middleman of publishers, groups that corrupt the real vision of creators. And with no barriers to development, now anyone (maybe...even you?) can make games that can compete in the big leagues. Indie games through this lens are a different product than mainstream titles, and these creators are opening doors. And their suffering is going to be financially rewarded with success and money to boot! That is the narrative Indie Game is selling to its audience of gamers, to understand why the indie games they bought and loved are meaningful.

And to be clear, as much as I am about to deconstruct this, it isn't like totally false or anything. Starting in the late 2000's digital platforms like Steam, more accessible development tools like Unity (released in 2005), and so on did in fact make smaller games appealing to more niche markets more viable, and by virtue of their nicheness yeah they can do things big budget games maybe can't. These creators absolutely had passionate visions for their games, sacrifice for your passions is fine (not bashing that part here), hats off to them. Indie games in this era would absolutely "change gaming".

But not really in the ways this narrative wants them to, nor with the "meaning" people of the time expected it to have. For one, there is a conflict in this documentary of them wanting to highlight "bold new visions" and also wanting to highlight...popular indie games. This is Super Meat Boy, for example:

Yeah, never had a 2D platformer blob guy dodging traps before in gaming! "No see its retro" yeah retro to what, old games? Like those Nintendo made back in the 90's, which you explicitly mention in your documentary? You know, niche indie studio Nintendo? This isn't a bash, at all, at the game itself, but instead the idea that "AAA Studios would never"; they totally would, and always did. There has never been an era where the large gaming studios weren't also making creative games, but for this narrative they need to be propped up as static for it to make sense. And the actual niche indie stuff that big studios wouldn't touch don't sell well enough to justify being in this film!

And the idea of the "solo developer" is also, hm, let us say a bit sus. Not that these developers weren't solo or small teams, they were (though ofc a solo core creator will often have dozens of helpers on supporting roles that get sidelined in this "unitary vision" narrative); but that such a model is all that new? How big do you think development teams were in the 90's for so many classic games? The original Pokemon Red/Blue game had less than a dozen core developers (the total staff list, including American localizers, is ~30 people - Super Meat Boy meanwhile seems to have 16 for comparison). You wanna bring up the dev teams for PC-98 visual novels? They were made in an Akihabara cave with a box of pixel art scraps by like 6 people! You think those games didn't have "unitary creative visions"? Small gaming companies have always been a part of the ecosystem, getting niche titles funded & published using insane magic and pure luck. The "indie boom" is better seen as a change in the numerator.

Though what did change is that, by being self-published, development was approachable by outsiders in new ways. Though even then, this is a bit of a lie - Jonathan Blow of Braid was an industry veteran, and everyone here plays the "convention circuit" and networks with people like the PAX crew and Xbox representatives. But with the games being published by an individual over a studio, even a studio of a half dozen people, it is far easier for the audience to see the creators as "one of them". No office, no suits, just a man in his gamer den banging out his dream. That aesthetic is core to why this narrative was potent at the time, and why making a documentary to codify it was seen as compelling. It takes an already ascendant idea, polishes it, packages it as nonfiction, and then sells the idea back to the people who invented it. LIke so much media, to be clear! I always enjoy seeing it, it is the dialectic of culture in action.

I also find it very funny to see a documentary made in 2012 playing tropes that will become far more ~problematic~ just around the corner. Burnout and work-life balance - in a documentary where a developer, crying, discusses suicide if his game fails, to remind you - is pretty much never mentioned, and a successful game launch is absolutely presented as justifying endless crunch. You would never see that today. The only women in this documentary are wives and parents - which is very amusing, because the co-creator of the film is a woman! No one thinks gender is relevant to mention. Boy would that change in a few years.

Indie games today, of course, are just a segment of the gaming market. They are incredibly common now, so much so that most people lose money making them, people discuss oversaturation, big studio companies have "indie wings" to cover consumer preference ranges, etc. There is no magic in it anymore, it is just dev strategy. So yeah, very enjoyable as a representative time capsule in a strain of culture that is pretty much gone now! The Capital-R Romantic Era of indie gaming; what a time.

In the next post, we are going much more niche, so stay tuned for that. Or don't, I don't know you, and like this was a loooot of writing. Maybe i'll, idk work on that for the next one? ...I probably won't -_-