Dogpatch Press

Fluff Pieces Every Week

Category: announcements

March 27, 2015

FurAffinity’s new ownership makes a turning point. Should fans fear commercialization?

by Patch O'Furr

(Via Greenreaper):

Screen Shot 2015-03-20 at 6.46.18 PM

From 2008.  Anthrocon has grown to generate $7 million in 2014.

From 2008.  Anthrocon has grown to generate $7 million in 2014.

A comment from 8Chan:

The furry community is loaded with cash compared to other niche internet communities and it’s been exploding in popularity over the last decade. Nowadays it’s becoming more apparent with kickstarter and patreon making the figures public and internet companies are starting to move in on their turf to get a cut before it really goes mainstream.

And for those doubting that it’s about to enter the mainstream just wait until “Zootopia” from Disney comes out in 2016. Even Marvel giving prominent roles to a furry character in their recent major Hollywood movie would have been unthinkable 10 years ago, people who study the furry phenomenon are expecting it to explode soon. Universities and marketing groups are preforming surveys and studies on the fandom, this is considered a legitimate field of study.

A series of three articles:

 

  1. About the FurAffinity sale, and the issue of trade-offs.
  2. IMVU does a Q&A with me.
  3. Community > Commodity, and the Value of WTF.  Long live furries.

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March 20, 2015

IMVU’s big buy-in. These messages sponsored by hugs and scritches. Newsdump (3/20/15)

by Patch O'Furr

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

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Fandom News

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FurAffinity sold to 3D social network IMVU.  

downloadYou heard, right?  FurAffinity is the shaky but most active anchor for furry socializing and art.  Naughty stuff on it can’t go without mention.  That makes it a haven for freedoms that make the community what it is, for good or ill (depending on how prudish you are.)  The sale to IMVU comes as a surprise.  It’s a bold move for a company to partner with a community with stigma attached.  How well will this work?

In January, IMVU reached out to me. They got an article about their appearance at Fur Con.   (It was before today’s news was public, but apparently around when FurAffinity was sold.)  I got back in touch with their rep, and have a confirmation that they’ll answer my questions.  Everyone’s yapping about it – more soon in a followup article.

4 fursuits stolen from Jakedashep. Send hugs.

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March 18, 2015

Ooops! Noah is Gone… Animated movie announcement by Fred Patten.

by Patch O'Furr

Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

Ooops! Noah is Gone…, directed by Toby Genkel and Sean McCormack. For Summer 2015.

The number of theatrical animated features coming in 2015 keeps getting larger.

There have been uncountable magazine cartoon variations of a pair of unicorns standing on a rainswept mountaintop, watching Noah’s Ark sailing off into the distance. But up to now, no animated feature has concentrated upon the animals that didn’t get onto the Ark.

Well, mainly just a couple of the animals; the nestrians and the grymps. No, I haven’t heard of them before, either. The German film sales company Global Screen has announced that Ulysses Filmproduktion in Hamburg is just finishing production of Ooops! Noah is Gone… (Ooops! Die Arche ist Weg …), a CGI “end of the world comedy” for families/children about the “untold story of the animals that didn’t get on the ark”.

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March 16, 2015

I just voted for 2014’s Ursa Major Awards. Now it’s your turn! Voting is open until April 15.

by Patch O'Furr

Yay! Two things promoted here are on the short list of Ursa Major nominees.fryfrc-315x172

  • Best Anthropomorphic Magazine: Dogpatch Press – OF COURSE!   Well, it may be more accurate to claim “Fluffiest hugs” or “Most Linty”.  Who can pick just one from all the awesome choices?  But vote for us anyways, so we can spread more awards and hugs to everyone else.
  • Best Anthropomorphic Dramatic Short or Series: Furry Force from College Humor.  It’s the funniest piece I’ve seen of “fursploitation” comedy. (More on that in a future post). It works because the creators tease with love.  So, good for them for making the cut from 33 choices down to 5 nominees.  Vote for them to encourage more!  Pssst, I have a secret about Furry Force… there will be some exclusive news, but right now it’s for me to know and you to find out. Haha.

Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer:

The 2014 Ursa Major Awards

 

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March 11, 2015

Animation remakes: Watership Down, NIMH, DuckTales, Dumbo, more. Newsdump (3/11/15)

by Patch O'Furr

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

The Tufts Daily goes to a furry convention.

Anthro New England gets a good college news piece.  My Newsdump gathers links as news happens, but it’s interesting there’s no other media articles this time!

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Comics/animation: “who likes remakes?”

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I hope you like remakes, because it seems there’s no stopping the onslaught…

New images for Disney’s Zootopia.

i09 shares an update from what may be the new furriest movie ever, scheduled for 2016.  “Taken from the Disney Facebook page, these new Zootopia images reveal these animals have designed their buildings and bridges look like their own furry appendages.”

Hulu’s docuseries “Behind the Mask” stars pro mascots.

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February 11, 2015

Kiwi Tiger lends a paw to help Patch and Fred Patten share furry news.

by Patch O'Furr

kiwiyay
Time Crunch!  This month, my posting will be cramped by life commitments – (even internet dogs get those.)

There’s a big backlog of Fred submissions to fill the gaps. Formatting them takes time.  So I sent out a call for help to do something nice and help make stories better.  Kiwi Tiger stepped up to help.

Here’s his delicious bio:

Kiwi might not be the biggest fruit in the bowl, but he sure is one of the best!  Sweet, Tangy, and just the right amount of fur.  Kiwi’s hobbies include preforming shower concerts, binge watching Netflix, and actin’ a foo’.  Kiwi loves meeting new people, so never be afraid to approach and say hi!  The customary approach is to get right in his face and say “What I wouldn’t give for a mouthful of Kiwi!”

We talked about formatting, and he told me:

Lucky for you, I spend a large amount of time at work making spreadsheets and word documents clean so they don’t assault eyeballs!

Thanks Kiwi, for saving our eyeballs. When you see Fred’s articles, thank Kiwi for helping bring them to you.

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February 7, 2015

Furry animation contest deadline; WordPress theme experiment.

by Patch O'Furr

Animation news via Higgs Raccoon of Furrymedia:

 

Hiya Patch,

Here’s something for you to report in the Dogpatch Press. Kinda time-critical, though.

There’s a company called Saban Brands, which is running a competition for animated shorts. The judging is by public voting, but there’s only a day-and-a-bit left (I only just happened upon it.)

Website here: http://sabanshorts.com/

The shorts include a few with anthro critters.(“Late to Work!” with the raccoon is nice, but “Hijacked” with the furry pirate crews is my favourite.)

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February 2, 2015

Introduction for Fred Patten Presents – History of Furry Publishing.

by Patch O'Furr

UrsaMajorAwardsAnthologyIt’s an honor to host articles by Fred Patten, “Furry’s favorite reviewer and historian.”  There’s minimal management, supporting him to post what he wants.  Many are reviews and some are in depth writing from his experienced perspective.  Those are the ones I want to select for a new feature.

FRED PATTEN PRESENTS joins other features: INTERVIEWS FOR FANS AND FURRIES – THE “FURCLUB” SURVEY – and FURRY GOOD IDEAS.

I’ll pick the best to highlight and link.  It’s inspired by the great quality of Fred’s article that posts tomorrow:

A History of Furry Publishing (Part One – Beginnings, and Part Two- Current Publishers.)

While I shake my sore paws after many hours of tedious book cover image layout for Fred’s pieces… I wanted to announce it, and toss a little “outtake”.

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January 15, 2015

3D Social Network IMVU loves furries, wants to meet you at FurCon.

by Patch O'Furr

I don’t often see outside companies actively reaching out to the small but thriving Furry subculture.  Not directly.  If I had to guess where it would happen, I’d guess for Second Life users.  But there are signs that Furries count as modest but valued audience, for some game media like Furvilla aimed right at them.

One of these companies, IMVU, reached out:

“IMVU is the world’s leading 3D social network with over 130 million registrants… IMVU’s users seek and create new connections, lives, and lifestyles in a completely user-generated world that combines custom avatars, chat, community, content creation, commerce, and anonymity.”

It was cool of them to search my blog to talk about their plan for Further Confusion:

“I’m writing to connect with Dogpatch Press and let you know that Mountain View-based IMVU will be at the show to embrace the furry community, many of whom are a part of IMVU’s 3D, avatar-based social network. As a company, we meet “furries” every day on IMVU but look forward to meeting them in real-life at FurCon 2015.

If you plan to be at the show, stop by and see us at FurCon – we expect out “fan table” to be in an area outside the Dealer Marketplace – 2nd floor of the San Jose Convention Center in a walkway/hallway leading to the adjoining Marriott hotel.”

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January 14, 2015

On Jan 15, the Ursa Major Awards nominations open for 2014’s best furry works.

by Patch O'Furr

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Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

For fans of anthropomorphic/furry fiction:  2014 has rolled over to 2015!  Are you ready?

If you’re wondering what you may have missed in 2014, go to the Ursa Major Awards website.

The 2014 Recommended Anthropomorphics Reading List has just been closed out.  It contains all of the works first published or released during the January–December 2014 calendar year that have been recommended by furry fans, in eleven categories:

  • Motion Picture
  • Dramatic Short Works or Series
  • Novels
  • Short Fiction
  • Other Literary Works
  • Graphic Novels
  • Comic Strips
  • Magazines
  • Websites
  • Published Illustrations
  • Games

Recommendations for 2015 are now being taken, although the first compilation of 2015 recommendations will not be published for several weeks.

The 2014 Ursa Major Awards nominations open on January 15, 2015, and are open through the end of February.  Go to the UMA website to nominate your choices for the Best Anthropomorphics of 2014 in the above eleven categories. Voting for the Awards is open from March 15 through April 15, 2015 on the UMA website. Nominations and voting are open to all. Instructions are on the UMA website.

Voting for the 2014 Ursa Major Awards will open on March 15, 2015 and close on April 15.  Go to the UMA website to nominate and to vote. The presentations of the 2014 Ursa Major Awards will be made at Morphicon 2015, in Columbus, Ohio on April 30-May 3, 2015.

– Fred Patten

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