Headlines, links and little stories to make your tail wag.  Tips are always welcome. 

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Media and Fandom News

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The Animation Show of Shows: There’s no better source for artistic animation, and they need support.

This touring show presents the best of the best in the world of short films, by the most talented directors.  It’s ordinarily only seen by invite at top movie studios (your Pixars and so forth), and at colleges, with special public access to those who hear through word of mouth.  You may not have heard of it, because it’s been a personal project funded by one amazing guy, Ron.  (He also runs Acme Filmworks, who directed a good couch gag for The Simpsons.)

Now, The Animation Show of Shows is appealing for support for their amazing art cause.

I don’t ordinarily post crowd funding (too much to cover!)  Leave that to awesome Furry journalist Corbeau at Furstarter.  (We need more “furry news” specialists.) This is just an exceptional cause. If you like animation, don’t miss it.

Through this show, I discovered the hilarious short, Flamingo Pride.  It shows what happens to the only heterosexual flamingo at the birds celebration.  It’s almost as fabulous as the San Francisco Bay Furries will be this weekend, in the SF Pride parade.

Knoxville, TN has furries in their Pride parade.  Draconis, Chair of Fangcon, reports:

Fangcon marched in the Knoxville Pride Parade as an official unit representing the Furry Fandom and their convention on June 20th. The Fursuiters were met along the parade route with a positive response from the crowds and local media. There were 8 fursuiters and 2 furs in the parade, as well as others who assisted along the parade route for photos and video. Fangcon is Oct 29th to Nov 2nd, 2015.

YIFF vs. MURR: the Toy Commercial.

“Culturally F’d” (furred) has an awesome new Youtube channel – look for a headline article soon!  Their mission is to expose anthropomorphic art in history, culture and mass media, with entertaining showmanship akin to V-Sauce or PBS Idea Channel.  Here’s an exclusive sneak peak to their next episode on TV and Merchandising:

Famed furry artist Doug Winger passed away.

Flayrah memorializes a huge name from earlier days, when Furry was just becoming one of the big internet things.  I think this comment sums up the underappreciated value that exists in the freakiest of expression.

You know someone was good when even the people who had absolutely no interests in their fetishes still loved their art… even if I wasn’t ‘into’ it I still loved his humour, his totally unashamed style, his ability to poke fun at himself… I’m sure many would say I was silly for feeling so sad at the loss of what is ‘just’ a pornographer but Doug honestly was an amazing force of good.  He didn’t mute his extreme fetishes at all and made everyone who saw his work feel less like a freak… He was so casual about it, he helped take away some of the stigma of sex in general.

Porn is the topic that furries love to hate, that brought so much ridicule, bullying and contempt from outsiders stooping to the level of little kids pulling the wings off flies.  It also makes raw energy and strong independence.  (You can’t hold back limit-pushing human desire, that leads many achievements.)   That’s the Power of WTF.  It repels, but also draws.  I don’t think anyone can say whether or not Furry fandom would be bigger if it wasn’t around – but I think that without it, it wouldn’t be much different than putting on a hat and singing “M-I-C… K-E-Y…”

Furries around the world: Belgium fursuiting.

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Further fun

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Learn about the Animal History Museum.

In Los Angeles, CA, it’s the “first museum dedicated to understanding and celebrating the human-animal bond.”

Neat Twitter account: Animal History.

This author covers “Animal History – esp. human-animal interaction”.  She wrote the 2013 book Beastly London: A History of Animals in the City.

The history of Faux Fur.

This is very cool to know… considering how important the fur trade was to founding the American nation.

Controversy: Real fur sold as fake fur.

Economics are weird.  They call it “the dismal science” because of the futility of predicting how it works… Don’t rely on Truth in Advertising either.

“In this global marketplace, there are fur farms in China that raise dogs for clothing that is labeled as fake fur here in the U.S. because that’s what the market best responds to.”

How to make fake fur.

Now I understand why the stuff is so expensive.

National Fiber Tech: the premiere source for synthetic fur will exhibit at Anthrocon.

It’s the first time at AC for this company that supplies Hollywood, and the special effects industry. They have recently started efforts to directly reach out to furries, and that’s a big deal!  They have arranged for reps to meet me, for an article to cover what they do with furries.  (If you have a good cause or interesting story, pitch it over any time.)