Oh, that's not a new trend at all. The word "furry" has been used in multiple contexts for decades and there's never been much agreement. When referring to things people have created, furry can mean (like you said) "created with awareness of, or for the specific consumption of, the furry fandom" (usually by someone within the fandom, but not always) - or it can mean "contains content which might appeal to people within furry fandom, regardless of origin". So we say Watership Down is furry, Bugs Bunny is furry, Flayrah is furry - anything goes.
When it comes to someone who's not in the fandom, the vagueness of using the word "furry" sometimes results in the creators saying, "Look, what I've created may have characters that you call furry, but it's not made with the fandom in mind, and I don't participate in the fandom." Although some them aren't so polite about it, sadly.
Drat - I wish I could find the example - an online comics artist who's not a furry recently did a short webcomic about why they like to use anthropomorphic characters, it was quite a positive thing. Then you've got things like the Game Dogs series of videos where they made it quite clear at the start that it wasn't going to be a furry thing.
I think what it boils down to - when you're talking about anthropomorphic stuff to another person - some people want to know if a piece of creative work is being produced from within or from outside the fandom, and who its intended audience is. As a reviewer, this is important. However in day-to-day fandom conversation, the distinction doesn't need to be made so much. :)
Oh, that's not a new trend at all. The word "furry" has been used in multiple contexts for decades and there's never been much agreement. When referring to things people have created, furry can mean (like you said) "created with awareness of, or for the specific consumption of, the furry fandom" (usually by someone within the fandom, but not always) - or it can mean "contains content which might appeal to people within furry fandom, regardless of origin". So we say Watership Down is furry, Bugs Bunny is furry, Flayrah is furry - anything goes.
When it comes to someone who's not in the fandom, the vagueness of using the word "furry" sometimes results in the creators saying, "Look, what I've created may have characters that you call furry, but it's not made with the fandom in mind, and I don't participate in the fandom." Although some them aren't so polite about it, sadly.
Drat - I wish I could find the example - an online comics artist who's not a furry recently did a short webcomic about why they like to use anthropomorphic characters, it was quite a positive thing. Then you've got things like the Game Dogs series of videos where they made it quite clear at the start that it wasn't going to be a furry thing.
I think what it boils down to - when you're talking about anthropomorphic stuff to another person - some people want to know if a piece of creative work is being produced from within or from outside the fandom, and who its intended audience is. As a reviewer, this is important. However in day-to-day fandom conversation, the distinction doesn't need to be made so much. :)