Alright, so, didn't get up a post yesterday (but Andrew got up a post (link!) so you can read that until I find time to get around posting. (Outbreak, it's got all my favorite mechanics,* AND hexes, AND hefty doses of theme!)) And suuuure let's say it's because I'm super busy this week, that I didn't find time to do the Valentine's-day-stuff-now-on-discount review that I'd meant to do.
Been, AAARRGGGHHH, is how I've been today. I thought that I had stuff to get on doing yesterday, but today was literally nutsoid (and by "literally" I of course mean definition 2 (is there any other kind?)) On the spur of the moment, in Business for the Professional Artist class, Brother Burr created for us a new assignment to have completed: create (a) Facebook and Instagram page(s?) exclusively for our arts, link them, post regularly like we're already supposed to be doing, net 100 followers by Tuesday, offer up our arts through an e-commerce site of our choosing, and, by the end of the semester, sell something through said e-commerce site. So today I had to, I mean, I, well today, well, yikes.
But let's walk through it.
I realized a couple of days ago, may have even been as late as yesterday, that I have no obligations to my own past. I have no obligations basically at all, as far as the future goes. I may love filmmaking, and my pet project may be a fictionalized surrealistic high school memoir/police procedural, but I don't have any obligations toward it. I mean really, I love making movies so much, but how frequently do I really get to try my hand at it? Besides this semester, where I've got a motion design/animation class? I don't have to rail or derail, one way or the other, my future just to get a USA (or whatever) original television show just because some of its episodes have pretty neat whodunnits at their core, or because already I have strong stylistic conceits for the project. That doesn't need to be my future, though all the way up to this point it's been the one I've been gunning for. I could begin making a new, entirely different future for myself right now. Maybe starting an Equestria Daily-style fansite for Zootopia. Maybe I throw myself behind writing full-time, and churn out all those novels that have the cranial drifts. Maybe I could- or should!- launch that webcomic I've been working on since before I had this blog. Maybe I could do all three and more! Right? The assignment to throw ourselves behind our art and start making a profit out of it doesn't behedge our ability to do anything else outside of the semester. But it is forcing our feet in that door, which is useful to have, especially considering that with so many interests and possible futures for me, I don't have much intrinsic motivation to pursue any paths at all, other than the ones that always get me into trouble which is no good.
Just keep all that in mind. None of these paths need be permanent. Not that they can't be.
So, create new art accounts/pages apart from the personal accounts, and link them together, on Facebook and Instagram. Step 1.
I've finally managed to get my Instagram to work. I mean, it worked, and you can view Instagram without an app, but if you want to post anything yourself it requires one, which I didn't have till now. It wasn't a problem with my mobile device not being the cellphone I used to sign up for Y! mail at all- that number's connected exclusively to my Yahoo! account, and my Facebook (and by extension Instagram) have no mobile number listed for me at all. Google Play doesn't support Kindles, is what it was, even though Kindles are Android devices, (probably) because Kindle is already covered by Amazon's services including the Kindle Appstore. Which appstore does not have Instagram on it, so I had to forego the mobile app thing altogether- I got the app by going through the Microsoft appstore and downloading the app onto my desktop which is apparently possible. So that's good.
I've never used my Instagram for anything but art, so far, so I think I'm clear there.
The thing I'm stuck on is the Facebook page thing. Am I soliciting advice right now? Let's say yes. I know the technical aspect of making a new Facebook page, that's all both well and fine; what I've got questions about, and want feedback on, is the branding.
I'm leaning toward furry art, as my artistic output. It's not the only kind of art I do, nor really some second thing, but there's a built-in audience for it which helps targeting and marketing and is financial gold especially if you manage to net repeat customers out of that built-in audience, but also because really heaven knows I've got a sizable enough corpus that it wouldn't be too hard to find something appropriate to market myself with.
Questch is, would that be then, marketing myself, or marketing my fursona? By which I mean, what's the name of the dadgummed page going to be, which is it going to be named after?
I like Pretzels. As a name. Pretzels are delicious, and Pretzels sounds like Perazzo, and it's just solid all around. I got the name, honestly, from a dude who was seriously given that name (or at least I assume it's a dude, maybe it's a chick I dunno) but that was the person's actual name, and their entire name too by the looks of it. However long ago they lived, it's on FamilySearch, and is on the "names that make us go 'hmm...'" wall/ whiteboard/ corkboard at Data Quality. And I'm allowed to say that because they never had me sign the non-disclosure agreement.** And also because it's non-sensitive information of a deceased individual, and thus publicly available anyway. Seeing that name made me realize I think how much I like it, but it is- was- a real person's name at one point, unless hijinx are going on with that.
But I think Pretzels is a pretty good handle for me. It seems to go over well on WordPress, and all, and all. But there are one or two things that keep me from, as yet, throwing myself behind this (not counting the ever-present, keep that gross furry crap to yourself, part of me.)
Searching through WikiFur's exhaustive database of basically every furry ever, there's already a dude out there who goes by Pretzel, singular, already, though that's not the only name he goes by. People have similar/the same names all the time, so that's alright I guess, especially seeing that that's not his only handle. The Thing Is Though, it's a name similar enough, and looking at the dude's page he mostly does work of a, let's call it, a majority-age nature. Fairly tame, as far as that kind of thing goes, from what I've seen, and it's just this random dude, but, well, maybe it wouldn't represent a problem if there weren't this second concern I had:
Pretzels, it's a short name. The idea is I'm trying to name my Facebook page, and, Pretzels as a Facebook page name doesn't do much for me (other than maybe one for a page that designates actual literal pretzels? (Oh, yeah, I guess there is a first definition of the word "literal.")) So, what, "Pretzels artist" or something, then? Kind of a lame concern, but this deals with the name of the page itself, over, whether I'd actually be going by Pretzels online. I can't call the page just Pretzels, one; but, two, I don't want to limit the medium I do by calling the page like Pretzels Prints or anything (though that does have a nice ring to it.) Pretzels T Fox, or something, makes the name longer and all, though gosh that makes my skin crawl, and actually he's a skunk anyway, and actually he's a raccoon anyway, just with the body of a skunk (I couldn't decide, and have a marked distaste for hybrids. Shut up.)***
But then I've got another thought, engendered by the discussion of possible futures for myself, up above. As I mentioned in footnote b of this post, made 2 years 10 days ago (2 years 9 days ago in terms of this blog's timezone, but it's past midnight here,) and keeping in with the idea that ah am dang bad at intrinsic motivators for myself, I'd decided some time ago apparently that I'd start Other//half (and this is actually the first I've mentioned O/h since the post I just linked to) by the deadline of the Justice League movie's release. The JLA film seemed such an abstract concept back then, but the joke's getting less and less funny now... Release date this year, 10 months away exactly (once again going from my current time zone and not yours,) and remember I wanted to get a go on it before the movie comes out...
So here's an alternate idea: the Facebook page isn't from me as "Pretzels" at all, but I use this opportunity to force myself into getting started on something I've been wanting to do for donkey ears but have held myself back from in the name of percolation; the Facebook page is for Other//half.
But I don't know. Even if nobody replies with any advice (and I need to decide soon because like I said, I need 100 followers by Tuesday,) talking through it has given me a few ideas, and I think I know the direction I want to take.
* action point allowance, variable player powers, potential hidden traitors in an otherwise co-op game, Come to think of it, I like other mechanics too, but like I've never played a game that implements e.g. tech trees as solidly as I'd like, and just because I do like something doesn't mean it's my favorite as much as these guys are. (Outbreak almost has tech trees, I mean, you can upgrade your building, just in a clear pathway with no decision-making is all.)
**come to think of it, I wonder if they ever managed or tried to find a replacement for my position there, such as it was.
***or well it's the body of a raccoon still technically, because he's a raccoon and it's his body. (I think about transgender issues a lot. I wonder what the implications of that are (both that, and the other thing, linking species with gender.) And the further implications of those two implications taken together, also very interesting. It was, much like his character design with the rainbow face, all kinds of very deliberate, sort of as a parody of the whole special snowflake deal, sort of as a deconstruction of it, sort of as a commentary on it to make you think about these themes, and also with the species thing sort of because, like I said, I couldn't decide.)
(...Maybe his last name could be Fox, just to make the whole thing more confusing... But I'm still no great fan of that, and a one-name name is fine.)
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