Feel free to draw Meta. Without restrictions. Of any kind...
Posted 4 years agoSo. If you want to draw Meta, my 'sona, go right ahead.
No, it's fine. It's all fine. Draw him in whatever style or form you like. f you want to make giftart, or any other type of art, of Meta, go right ahead. You don't need to ask for permission. I only ask that you let me see whatever it is you have created featuring him. Just toss me a note here on FA, that'll do fine ;)
No, it's fine. It's all fine. Draw him in whatever style or form you like. f you want to make giftart, or any other type of art, of Meta, go right ahead. You don't need to ask for permission. I only ask that you let me see whatever it is you have created featuring him. Just toss me a note here on FA, that'll do fine ;)
My path to the fandom
Posted 4 years agoIn this entry, I'm going to describe how I found the furry fandom, back in the late nineties, and how I proceeded to become the well-rounded squeaky individual I am today. I have seen similar journal entries scattered here and there and always found reading about everyone's unique experiences very interesting. I decided to post this similar journal so people can have some idea what I'm about. So here you go, an intriguing tale of intrigue!
I initially and entirely unwittingly backdoored myself into the fandom via the now-defunct webcomic Dragon-Tails, or more accurately the comic's webforums. Although I myself pretty much only posted on the general and literary forums, what really was important to my initial steps into the fandom was the roleplaying forum, which had a very close-knit community that produced silly, entirely freeform role-playing adventures which my then-extremely-naive self found utterly fascinating. A lot of the people there had dragonic characters, but there were also other animal anthros and feral characters. The discussions there first clued me to the fact that a mysterious thing called "furry" existed. Then someone mentioned SCFA/Yerf. I strongly suspect I was pretty much gloriously doomed to spend the rest of my life as a furry that exact second.
You know how some people have had this long and gradual process where they slowly come to think of themselves as furries? Yeah, that did not happen to me. What happened was that I saw Yerf for the first time, decided that whatever this was, it was the best anything I had ever seen, and that this was going to be me too, from this point onward. I pretty much spent the next weeks doing nothing but reading furry forums, webpages and online diaries, hoping like hell that this glorious new thing I had discovered really was a thing that people did and had been doing. It was, and I was amazed. You might think that some of the drama or the vitriolic comments of outsiders expressed towards the fandom that I saw at that time might have deterred me somewhat. They did not. They only succeeded in further proving to me that this "furry" thing was an actual, defined community. I was elated. I kept staring at my computer monitor with awe, lamenting that it took me this long to discover this fantastic, glorious thing.
Now, because my first experiences with the fandom were all clean, SFW and fluffy-cute, you might think that the discovery of the more adult themes common to the fandom would have given me second thoughts or something. The only second thoughts they actually gave me were along the lines of "wow, this is insanely hot". Or in more niche cases "hahahaha this is hilariousss, I must see moreeee".
And then, at the start of the 2000s, my web-crawlings led me to the Transformation Story Archive. This would prove to be a refining experience. TSA introduced me, in convenient bulk, to such delights as animal TF, age regression and size alteration. After I had convinced myself that I was really seeing the things I saw on my monitor, I went through another wide-eyed internet binge. USENET. TSA-TALK. Metamor Keep. Spells R Us. Winds of Change. Tales of the Blind Pig. TBTC. Ararchive.com. Chica's Transformation & Furry Page (hehe). And so forth.
A common theme soon emerged. I had always liked stories and artworks where cute little things struggle against great odds. I had really liked them. Upon reflection, I now realized that the reason I had liked them was because said cute little things had been... sort of... how should I put this... helpless. As it turned out, I really liked situations where you have agency, but not much ability to do anything with it. Situations where you were your own worst enemy, because you were so weak and powerless. Situations where you were left to squirm helplessly through events that would have been effortless, if you just weren't ever so delightfully, deliciously pathetic. I liked them -a lot-.
A lot of things about myself suddenly made a lot more sense.
I think my exact words to myself at the time were: "oh."
Initially, I didn't really have a fursona, or much interaction with the fandom. I already self-identified as a furry 100%, but in a very undefined manner. And this was fine, I was content. As time passed, though, I started to feel like I should interact with the fandom more, and to do that I should attempt to define myself a bit better. Although I was no therian or such, I did not just want to half-assedly create an empty self-insertional void of an internet persona, either: I wanted a proper fursona, the kind that has at least some commonality with real-life me and felt like an expression of myself.
Due to my experiences with Dragon-Tails my first impulse was to go with a dragon, but I dismissed this idea very quickly. Dragons were, in my mind, proud and dignified creatures that were bursting with might and aptitude. The last things I wanted to be bursting with were might and aptitude. I much preferred to burst with helpless squirming and possibly gore when a predator bit my helpless little body in half.
A rat felt like a much more fitting choice. My sister had had pet rats, and they had been the best of animals: tiny and cute and happy and clingy and so very helpless in their little cage. They always seemed to want closeness with their furry brethren, and I did, too. Rats also occupy a rather low position in the natural order in real life, and their purpose in life is generally to run fearfully from something and then get eaten. That was nice. Also, I already liked the ratonga, an Everquest 2 race of little cute cunning evil rat people. A rat felt nice and natural. As soon as I thought of a rat fursona, I felt an immediate connection with the squeaky thing that would soon become Meta. A rat it was, then.
"Meta", the name came from... well, you can probably guess. Due to my intense liking of all things TF, I immediately imagined my fursona being transformed into various things. I thought about the name for perhaps two seconds, and realized that the moment I had thought of the name, it had stuck in my mind. I felt this was a bit unfortunate, because the name seemed a bit common and simple, but attempting to come up with anything else seemed like a pointless act. Whatever else I would now attempt to rename my fursona, he would always be "Meta" to me.
For the latter half of 2000s my internet presence majorly consisted of playing MMORPGs and other multiplayer games on the 'net - I totally got obsessed with the things. I played as Meta in various iterations, in a variety of netgames that allowed you to have anthro or animal characters. I also played as Meta in many tabletop RPG campaigns. As a result, Meta sort of became this fluid character that could fit into many roles and take on different characteristics - rather fitting for his transformation-based core idea, really.
Unfortunately, life sort of started relentlessly kicking me in the forehead around the start of the 2010s. In addition to my university studies and work there were deaths in the family, insanity in the family, and all kinds of howling nonsense. I sort of fell out of the fandom as a result and it went off without me. This wasn't something I planned at all, it just sort of happened. Everything is fine now, though. Or at least more stable: I have graduated, my thesis is done, family relations have stabilized and my work is both steady and fulfilling.
And that brings us to 2020, and my TRIUMPHANT RETURN TO THE FANDOM.
Now that I am here, nothing will be the same again!! jk it will actually.
Thanks for reading! Let's continue to be animals together :)
I initially and entirely unwittingly backdoored myself into the fandom via the now-defunct webcomic Dragon-Tails, or more accurately the comic's webforums. Although I myself pretty much only posted on the general and literary forums, what really was important to my initial steps into the fandom was the roleplaying forum, which had a very close-knit community that produced silly, entirely freeform role-playing adventures which my then-extremely-naive self found utterly fascinating. A lot of the people there had dragonic characters, but there were also other animal anthros and feral characters. The discussions there first clued me to the fact that a mysterious thing called "furry" existed. Then someone mentioned SCFA/Yerf. I strongly suspect I was pretty much gloriously doomed to spend the rest of my life as a furry that exact second.
You know how some people have had this long and gradual process where they slowly come to think of themselves as furries? Yeah, that did not happen to me. What happened was that I saw Yerf for the first time, decided that whatever this was, it was the best anything I had ever seen, and that this was going to be me too, from this point onward. I pretty much spent the next weeks doing nothing but reading furry forums, webpages and online diaries, hoping like hell that this glorious new thing I had discovered really was a thing that people did and had been doing. It was, and I was amazed. You might think that some of the drama or the vitriolic comments of outsiders expressed towards the fandom that I saw at that time might have deterred me somewhat. They did not. They only succeeded in further proving to me that this "furry" thing was an actual, defined community. I was elated. I kept staring at my computer monitor with awe, lamenting that it took me this long to discover this fantastic, glorious thing.
Now, because my first experiences with the fandom were all clean, SFW and fluffy-cute, you might think that the discovery of the more adult themes common to the fandom would have given me second thoughts or something. The only second thoughts they actually gave me were along the lines of "wow, this is insanely hot". Or in more niche cases "hahahaha this is hilariousss, I must see moreeee".
And then, at the start of the 2000s, my web-crawlings led me to the Transformation Story Archive. This would prove to be a refining experience. TSA introduced me, in convenient bulk, to such delights as animal TF, age regression and size alteration. After I had convinced myself that I was really seeing the things I saw on my monitor, I went through another wide-eyed internet binge. USENET. TSA-TALK. Metamor Keep. Spells R Us. Winds of Change. Tales of the Blind Pig. TBTC. Ararchive.com. Chica's Transformation & Furry Page (hehe). And so forth.
A common theme soon emerged. I had always liked stories and artworks where cute little things struggle against great odds. I had really liked them. Upon reflection, I now realized that the reason I had liked them was because said cute little things had been... sort of... how should I put this... helpless. As it turned out, I really liked situations where you have agency, but not much ability to do anything with it. Situations where you were your own worst enemy, because you were so weak and powerless. Situations where you were left to squirm helplessly through events that would have been effortless, if you just weren't ever so delightfully, deliciously pathetic. I liked them -a lot-.
A lot of things about myself suddenly made a lot more sense.
I think my exact words to myself at the time were: "oh."
Initially, I didn't really have a fursona, or much interaction with the fandom. I already self-identified as a furry 100%, but in a very undefined manner. And this was fine, I was content. As time passed, though, I started to feel like I should interact with the fandom more, and to do that I should attempt to define myself a bit better. Although I was no therian or such, I did not just want to half-assedly create an empty self-insertional void of an internet persona, either: I wanted a proper fursona, the kind that has at least some commonality with real-life me and felt like an expression of myself.
Due to my experiences with Dragon-Tails my first impulse was to go with a dragon, but I dismissed this idea very quickly. Dragons were, in my mind, proud and dignified creatures that were bursting with might and aptitude. The last things I wanted to be bursting with were might and aptitude. I much preferred to burst with helpless squirming and possibly gore when a predator bit my helpless little body in half.
A rat felt like a much more fitting choice. My sister had had pet rats, and they had been the best of animals: tiny and cute and happy and clingy and so very helpless in their little cage. They always seemed to want closeness with their furry brethren, and I did, too. Rats also occupy a rather low position in the natural order in real life, and their purpose in life is generally to run fearfully from something and then get eaten. That was nice. Also, I already liked the ratonga, an Everquest 2 race of little cute cunning evil rat people. A rat felt nice and natural. As soon as I thought of a rat fursona, I felt an immediate connection with the squeaky thing that would soon become Meta. A rat it was, then.
"Meta", the name came from... well, you can probably guess. Due to my intense liking of all things TF, I immediately imagined my fursona being transformed into various things. I thought about the name for perhaps two seconds, and realized that the moment I had thought of the name, it had stuck in my mind. I felt this was a bit unfortunate, because the name seemed a bit common and simple, but attempting to come up with anything else seemed like a pointless act. Whatever else I would now attempt to rename my fursona, he would always be "Meta" to me.
For the latter half of 2000s my internet presence majorly consisted of playing MMORPGs and other multiplayer games on the 'net - I totally got obsessed with the things. I played as Meta in various iterations, in a variety of netgames that allowed you to have anthro or animal characters. I also played as Meta in many tabletop RPG campaigns. As a result, Meta sort of became this fluid character that could fit into many roles and take on different characteristics - rather fitting for his transformation-based core idea, really.
Unfortunately, life sort of started relentlessly kicking me in the forehead around the start of the 2010s. In addition to my university studies and work there were deaths in the family, insanity in the family, and all kinds of howling nonsense. I sort of fell out of the fandom as a result and it went off without me. This wasn't something I planned at all, it just sort of happened. Everything is fine now, though. Or at least more stable: I have graduated, my thesis is done, family relations have stabilized and my work is both steady and fulfilling.
And that brings us to 2020, and my TRIUMPHANT RETURN TO THE FANDOM.
Now that I am here, nothing will be the same again!! jk it will actually.
Thanks for reading! Let's continue to be animals together :)
This is soo unfairrr
Posted 4 years agoJeez. I turn my back for one lousy decade and it's like people go on with their lives or something. Couldn't all of you in the fandom have put your lives completely on hold while I was busy elsewhere, is that really too much to ask?!
A new character, and a brilliant idea
Posted 4 years agoSo, I bought an adoptable for the first time in my life yesterday, because... well, you gotta buy something, I guess. She is a delightfully ridiculous cute magic bunny witch girl. Feast your sensory organs upon her HERE. Anyway, I had no idea what to do with her. Luckily, I have just had a brilliant idea: since I'm addicted to AI Dungeon 2 anyway, I might as well write up a custom scenario featuring her and use the resulting adventure -get this- AS HER CHARACTER BACKSTORY. What I love the most about this plan is how there is no chance it will horribly backfire and she most definitely won't suffer dynamically generated indignities that would have made Marquis de Sade say things like "don't you think that is just a little excessive".
Seriously, I'm a little worried. AID2 can be incredibly weird in so many ways. I have no idea what was in the text corpus the developers used to train the "AI", but I'm pretty sure it included a massive amount of fanfiction. Still, this is a great plan, because not only will her a backstory in the weirdest way I could possibly have thought of, but playing as her might also get me to actually care about her. As of yet I don't feel any connection to her as a character, but maybe this crazy plan of mine will form a DEEP PERSONAL CONNECTION between me and her, and I will spend the rest of my life looking at commissioned art of her with dreamy tears in my eyes. Yes, this is probably the best plan I have made in my life.
EDIT: Yep, her spirit was crushed.
Seriously, I'm a little worried. AID2 can be incredibly weird in so many ways. I have no idea what was in the text corpus the developers used to train the "AI", but I'm pretty sure it included a massive amount of fanfiction. Still, this is a great plan, because not only will her a backstory in the weirdest way I could possibly have thought of, but playing as her might also get me to actually care about her. As of yet I don't feel any connection to her as a character, but maybe this crazy plan of mine will form a DEEP PERSONAL CONNECTION between me and her, and I will spend the rest of my life looking at commissioned art of her with dreamy tears in my eyes. Yes, this is probably the best plan I have made in my life.
EDIT: Yep, her spirit was crushed.
Meta's character description
Posted 4 years agoHey, all! Since a few people are already inquiring about him, here is the public character description of Meta, my dear fursona (slightly updatedX2):
Meta is a little rat. He is based on an amalgamation of an old pet rat and an old ratonga (anthro rat) character I played on Everquest 2, and numerous other influences that have accumulated over the years. He can either be anthro or feral, usually depending on the setting.
In anthro form, Meta is short, about 85 cm tall. In a world filled with anthro critters, he is on the average a tiny little thing. Let's hope the many other, bigger species will be nice to him
In feral form, there is little to diffrentiate Meta from the average rat. As a feral, he does not wear clothes, at best he wears a belt to clip things to.
He is a rat of the standard variety, with pointy ears and a smooth and glossy coat of fur. His belly is white, whereas his back is a dark grey, with a V-shaped wedge of white running across the top of his head and spreading across his cheeks... like in my little account icon, there!
He is just a bit on the chubby side. Meta's tail is also a bit more plump and a little bit longer than that of the average rat.
As an anthro, Meta usually wears a casual non-brand T-shirt with shorts. He doesn't like to stand out too much!
Personality-wise Meta is a nice and kind little rat, who is smart and energetic... but he is also a remarkably sneaky and smug one, with a very high opinion of himself and a self-sabotagingly feckless tendency to assume he is the most clever thing in the room at any given time. He likes to intentionally pretend to be vastly more naive and innocent than he actually is, and often tries to project an image of total harmlessness, which isn't nearly as effective at fooling others as he thinks it is. He prefers subtle and indirect solutions to problems, which is partially because he isn't very physically able... due to, you know, being a tiny ratteh.
In most fantasy or fantastic settings, he is good with potions, and is able to brew a variety of them, with all kinds of weird effects. But that's pretty much all he has going for him. Otherwise, he's just a regular little rat, and quite powerless.
Thank you for your interest in little me! squeaksqueak :)
Meta is a little rat. He is based on an amalgamation of an old pet rat and an old ratonga (anthro rat) character I played on Everquest 2, and numerous other influences that have accumulated over the years. He can either be anthro or feral, usually depending on the setting.
In anthro form, Meta is short, about 85 cm tall. In a world filled with anthro critters, he is on the average a tiny little thing. Let's hope the many other, bigger species will be nice to him
In feral form, there is little to diffrentiate Meta from the average rat. As a feral, he does not wear clothes, at best he wears a belt to clip things to.
He is a rat of the standard variety, with pointy ears and a smooth and glossy coat of fur. His belly is white, whereas his back is a dark grey, with a V-shaped wedge of white running across the top of his head and spreading across his cheeks... like in my little account icon, there!
He is just a bit on the chubby side. Meta's tail is also a bit more plump and a little bit longer than that of the average rat.
As an anthro, Meta usually wears a casual non-brand T-shirt with shorts. He doesn't like to stand out too much!
Personality-wise Meta is a nice and kind little rat, who is smart and energetic... but he is also a remarkably sneaky and smug one, with a very high opinion of himself and a self-sabotagingly feckless tendency to assume he is the most clever thing in the room at any given time. He likes to intentionally pretend to be vastly more naive and innocent than he actually is, and often tries to project an image of total harmlessness, which isn't nearly as effective at fooling others as he thinks it is. He prefers subtle and indirect solutions to problems, which is partially because he isn't very physically able... due to, you know, being a tiny ratteh.
In most fantasy or fantastic settings, he is good with potions, and is able to brew a variety of them, with all kinds of weird effects. But that's pretty much all he has going for him. Otherwise, he's just a regular little rat, and quite powerless.
Thank you for your interest in little me! squeaksqueak :)
AI Dungeon 2
Posted 4 years agoHelloo, everynyan. Check this out, if you haven't already: https://aidungeon.io/
Some dude made an interactive fiction generator "AI", that uses predictive text to generate dynamic adventures. It's really hit-and-miss when it comes to sensible interaction or coherent plot, but that just means that it is the most hilarious thing I have ever witnessed. You can use a custom prompt and an in-game memory feature to (poorly) "train" the game to produce desired kinds of adventures. Apparently there was a lot of fanfiction in the text corpus that was used to initially train the game engine, because it "understands" (rudimentarily) concepts like furries... and Pokémon... and other most popular fandoms... and sex. Boy, does it understand sex. In fact, even if you try to avoid sex, the game will probably veer you towards it sooner or later. Which is.... you know, fine, just fine, mmm. Until your pet cat and baby daughter start trying to make out with you. Which they likely will, because the game does not understand the difference between platonic relationships and the kind of relationships that leave the room plastered with fluids. Just... try it for yourself. And consider supporting the game via Patreon if you like it, since keeping it running is apparently a huge moneypit, according to the developer.
Some dude made an interactive fiction generator "AI", that uses predictive text to generate dynamic adventures. It's really hit-and-miss when it comes to sensible interaction or coherent plot, but that just means that it is the most hilarious thing I have ever witnessed. You can use a custom prompt and an in-game memory feature to (poorly) "train" the game to produce desired kinds of adventures. Apparently there was a lot of fanfiction in the text corpus that was used to initially train the game engine, because it "understands" (rudimentarily) concepts like furries... and Pokémon... and other most popular fandoms... and sex. Boy, does it understand sex. In fact, even if you try to avoid sex, the game will probably veer you towards it sooner or later. Which is.... you know, fine, just fine, mmm. Until your pet cat and baby daughter start trying to make out with you. Which they likely will, because the game does not understand the difference between platonic relationships and the kind of relationships that leave the room plastered with fluids. Just... try it for yourself. And consider supporting the game via Patreon if you like it, since keeping it running is apparently a huge moneypit, according to the developer.