I think what I was getting at was less about people getting their news from a variety of sources, which is of course a good idea, but more that the majority of The Furry Community is not concerned with what Flayrah, Dogpatch and Furry Times refer to as "news" at all. News to most Furries would be who is the top rated fursuit maker, when is "Zootopia 2" coming out, what is the next convention coming up, etc.
And, in the absence of actual news that is relevant to Furry fans, the 3 so called Furry news services being discussed will try to manufacture news by dwelling on the latest gossip about people in the community who are not actually involved in creating Furry entertainment. That makes them more like Supermarket Tabloids than reputable news outlets. And most Furries just don't have a use for this.
A surprising amount of Furries don't know who 2 Gryphon is, because 2 is not in the business of marketing anything Furry. Foamy The Ranting Squirrel is actually more relevant to Furry Fandom than 2 The Ranting Gryphon. But we don't hear all that much about Foamy in the so called "news" outlets.
Taking this current article as an example, I'm kind of central to it, along with Sonius and Ahmar. Basically 3 furs who know how to make good fly by night tabloid drama of no consequence to Furry fans at all. So this is a fluff piece, space filler, LOL fodder, but not in any sense serious Furry news.
Why are any of us worth serious space in a real Furry news publication if we're not doing anything Furry? I don't know right off hand if Ahmar does anything that could be considered actually Furry. Sonious has a Fursuit and makes YouTube videos. That's somewhat news worthy. I've got an ongoing Furry net serial with hundreds of episodes and hundreds of pieces of art, which is something that other furs are able to get their fursonas in and get free art of their characters. That seems pretty news worthy, but none of these 3 "News" outlets seem to think so. The only news outlet that thought that was newsworthy was The Second Life Newser, which might have all three of the outlets in question beat as far as professionalism goes. But still, nobody seems to read that one either.
Basically, unless we cartoon this little disagreement and let our fursonas hash it out, this is not worthy of a Furry fan's attention. And I would be surprised if the majority of furs don't just skip over it to get to Fred Patton's articles, which are the best thing either Flayrah or Dogpatch have going in terms of actual relevant Furry news. That and any other reviews of new Furry movies, games, or other types of Furry entertainment.
I find all this gossip, politics, back-biting and hate-mongering to actually be detrimental to the mental health of anyone who actually does bother to read this stuff. And it certainly is no asset at all to my personal Furry creativity. If anything, it prevents me from creating stuff Furries actually want to see. So I tend to regard the whole business as worse than a waste of time.
Unfortunately, it is easy to get hooked on tabloid non-sense. I find it so much easier to write than Furry fiction. But it's always nagging at the back of my mind that what I'm wasting months at a time on is totally irrelevant in the grand scheme of things, and I actually owe it more to The Furry Community to be doing that creative anthropomorphic stuff that none of these so-called news outlets think is even worth asking me about.
And I wonder sometimes how much this ripples out to other creative types who are also deterred from creating the things that should be Furry news, because they're too caught up in all this fandom politics BS. And also if the people in this fandom who are more successful, like Fred Patten, are so specifically because they avoid this trash news and refuse to get involved in it, because they know this is not how one proves one's self relevant to The Furry Community, and they've got better things to do.
Now I'm thoroughly depressed. See, this is what happens when you introduce the concept of professionalism to people who are making an occupation out of Furry BS.
I didn't come to The Furry Community to be a professional commentator on Furry BS. I came here with a dream of creating something wonderful. But some times I think the people who told me I came to the wrong place for that were right.
I think what I was getting at was less about people getting their news from a variety of sources, which is of course a good idea, but more that the majority of The Furry Community is not concerned with what Flayrah, Dogpatch and Furry Times refer to as "news" at all. News to most Furries would be who is the top rated fursuit maker, when is "Zootopia 2" coming out, what is the next convention coming up, etc.
And, in the absence of actual news that is relevant to Furry fans, the 3 so called Furry news services being discussed will try to manufacture news by dwelling on the latest gossip about people in the community who are not actually involved in creating Furry entertainment. That makes them more like Supermarket Tabloids than reputable news outlets. And most Furries just don't have a use for this.
A surprising amount of Furries don't know who 2 Gryphon is, because 2 is not in the business of marketing anything Furry. Foamy The Ranting Squirrel is actually more relevant to Furry Fandom than 2 The Ranting Gryphon. But we don't hear all that much about Foamy in the so called "news" outlets.
Taking this current article as an example, I'm kind of central to it, along with Sonius and Ahmar. Basically 3 furs who know how to make good fly by night tabloid drama of no consequence to Furry fans at all. So this is a fluff piece, space filler, LOL fodder, but not in any sense serious Furry news.
Why are any of us worth serious space in a real Furry news publication if we're not doing anything Furry? I don't know right off hand if Ahmar does anything that could be considered actually Furry. Sonious has a Fursuit and makes YouTube videos. That's somewhat news worthy. I've got an ongoing Furry net serial with hundreds of episodes and hundreds of pieces of art, which is something that other furs are able to get their fursonas in and get free art of their characters. That seems pretty news worthy, but none of these 3 "News" outlets seem to think so. The only news outlet that thought that was newsworthy was The Second Life Newser, which might have all three of the outlets in question beat as far as professionalism goes. But still, nobody seems to read that one either.
Basically, unless we cartoon this little disagreement and let our fursonas hash it out, this is not worthy of a Furry fan's attention. And I would be surprised if the majority of furs don't just skip over it to get to Fred Patton's articles, which are the best thing either Flayrah or Dogpatch have going in terms of actual relevant Furry news. That and any other reviews of new Furry movies, games, or other types of Furry entertainment.
I find all this gossip, politics, back-biting and hate-mongering to actually be detrimental to the mental health of anyone who actually does bother to read this stuff. And it certainly is no asset at all to my personal Furry creativity. If anything, it prevents me from creating stuff Furries actually want to see. So I tend to regard the whole business as worse than a waste of time.
Unfortunately, it is easy to get hooked on tabloid non-sense. I find it so much easier to write than Furry fiction. But it's always nagging at the back of my mind that what I'm wasting months at a time on is totally irrelevant in the grand scheme of things, and I actually owe it more to The Furry Community to be doing that creative anthropomorphic stuff that none of these so-called news outlets think is even worth asking me about.
And I wonder sometimes how much this ripples out to other creative types who are also deterred from creating the things that should be Furry news, because they're too caught up in all this fandom politics BS. And also if the people in this fandom who are more successful, like Fred Patten, are so specifically because they avoid this trash news and refuse to get involved in it, because they know this is not how one proves one's self relevant to The Furry Community, and they've got better things to do.
Now I'm thoroughly depressed. See, this is what happens when you introduce the concept of professionalism to people who are making an occupation out of Furry BS.
I didn't come to The Furry Community to be a professional commentator on Furry BS. I came here with a dream of creating something wonderful. But some times I think the people who told me I came to the wrong place for that were right.