#Ama

[elmushterri]

Hi can I pretty please write out your wild kratts teen thing out completely. With slight additions. Also I’m physically disabled and have recovered from surgery so I could also expland on the recovery process from first hand experience

Go ahead! This goes for everyone else who wants to write stuff based on my ideas. It’s always allowed so long as you give me a little credit for the inspiration and whatnot. No worries!

Excited to see what you do with it, it’s an honour! 😭🧡✨

[bambibimbosparkles]

I luv how every hypno dom i play with tells me "wow holy shit u drop quickly ur lyk really easy to hypno"

the program is working <3

[nickrocketrodriguez]

For a few nested questions (sorry, just super curious about it all). For Season 3, did it take a long time to sort out who would be part of "Team Malta" heading off to find Brooklynn? Was it always going to be a relatively even split? Did these decisions force any rewrites/changes for earlier seasons, e.g. Season 1? For example, I was shocked when Sammy wasn't on Brooklynn's side and based on "Camp Cretaceous" thought Yaz would be the one to be upset with Brooklynn. Looking back at "Chaos Theory" Season 1, though, each Camp Fam's Malta decisions seems very closely tied to: (1) whether they were shown having problems with their biological family (2) whether their flashback with Brooklynn showed her as "Brooklynn the friend" versus "Brooklynn the journalist", e.g. Kenji and Sammy both remember her working. Heidi (Neunhoffer) mentioned some of the Brooklynn flashbacks for Season 1 were changed or cut, so it just made me wonder if some of those flashback adjustments were made with the Malta split in mind. For a final question, what was the discussion involving the friendship development between Yaz and Brooklynn? It seems they've become a lot closer between shows. It's hard for me to imagine "Camp Cretaceous" Yaz ever choosing Brooklynn over Sammy, yet it seems to make a lot of sense for "Chaos Theory" Yaz to do so.

Woof. A hefty one. And from discussions over two years, so not sure these will be great answers. Let’s see…

1. The split between the group for Malta happened very organically, I felt. We discussed who would feel what for a very long time. If I remember correctly, the idea of the team splitting up didn’t come up until we were actually starting discussions for S3 in earnest. We knew we wanted to connect to Dominion from the beginning, so the group was always going to Malta, but the shape of that and what it meant for the characters on a personal level evolved over time. By the time we got to it, we were building upon what we already saw, so as far as I remember, nothing that happened in S3 necessitated any earlier rewrites.

(I believe was Heidi was referring to was maybe more things that got cut for time/vibes as opposed to things that were cut because of S3. The pipeline of how these things went would likely not have allowed for such adjustments. I could be getting mixed up, though.)

As far as the shocking decision and headspace for Sammy in particular, that was something we all got very passionate about once we got in the thick of Brooklynn’s lies and how they affected everyone. Sammy always being the one who kept the Camp Fam in touch and who always saw the bright side of things would have been a very easy choice for being Pro Brooklynn. But with everything she had been feeling and experiencing up to that point, that didn’t feel real for her. It would have kept in line with her sorta past self, but for where she was in S3, we really wanted to honor how all of Sammy’s issues would realistically make someone like her feel. Plus, it had the added bonus of being a bit of a twist to what you, the audience, might expect. With all that in mind, we had to do what we did.

I like how you lay out that Kenji and Sammy both saw Brooklynn a certain way and were dealing with similar issues. That was definitely part of the discussion and how they wound up being Team Let’s Go Home.

2. This is a bit harder to answer. It just felt right, especially with how much time has passed and how much the Camp Fam did still put into maintaining their friendship, even if it ultimately didn’t irl quite as well as they’d hoped. I think part of it, too (at least for me), was that in JWCC, so much of Yaz and Sammy was about building up to Yasammy, whether purposely or not. So when it came to JWCT, as much as we wanted to have that relationship be really core to the show and those characters, we didn’t wanna just repeat all of that stuff. We wanted to see remixes on the other relationships, too, and we found that Yaz and Brooklynn friendship to be particularly ripe for exploration. They’ve all grown up and grown closer and further and everything in between, so it just felt like another natural evolution to things.

[hkthatgffan]

I wonder if its just me or that the fandom at large doesnt seem to care about Wendy. Like, yeah sometimes they bemoan about how she got sidelined and raise about the cancelled stories but like, I dont see as much fan content about her. In fact I see more Pacifica art around, despite her not being the main character at all. It only seems wendippers care about her the most.

Oh yeah. Even in the fandom it feels like Wendy barely gets much attention and it upsets me a lot given I think she's a character that has so much more to give and for us to learn about her. Ironically like you said, despite how the fandom is about it, what little wendip community is out there still, gives her more appreciation than most other parts of the fandom do and continue to wanna see more out of her character in official content. And as someone who similarly wants to see more Wendy development, I'm with them on that tbh. It's a win/win really as Wendy developing will benefit all fans. I think part of the problem is that cause many fans associate her with that ship and ever since canonically at least, it was sunk, people just sort of stopped caring about Wendy and moved on to other characters, given the show sorta stopped so too. I mean, whenever I look through season 1 era GF content and blogs, there is a ton of Wendy content (and not just wendip stuff but a mix of things related to her) and barely any Pacifica content, given of course, everyone hated her then, lol. But by season 2 onward, it was vice versa.

I guess because of all that, those in the fandom who ship dipcifica don't as much care about her as a result. Of course, it's not all of them given I'm sure there's dipcifica shippers who wanna see more Wendy development and wendip shippers who in turn wanna see more Pacifica development. But it is also disappointing overall tbh, given both Wendy and Pacifica are so much more than their most popular ship. they have personalities of their own and stories that can be told with both established and to be created lore. And it is possible to do that. Using The Owl House as an example, Amity got a ton of development and lore about her that wasn't revolving around lumity. Fans of that show were able to like and learn about her through a lens that wasn't just wanting her to be Luz's girlfriend. And it benefitted that ship too given as result, it made lumity that better of an end goal, as Amity changed for the better in a way that made her and Luz being together feel more worth it and deserving (which hot take, Pacifica isn't still IMO developed enough for that to work with Dipcifica, hence why alongside his own belief about it, Alex never has fully canonized that ship).

It is possible to give Wendy (and Pacifica) a similar type of development and lore without lumping it up with shipping. Wendy is arguably the least developed main character and so, deserves more. I want Wendy to be more than just the cool character that Dipper had a crush on. I mean, similarly to that in a way, Vanessa in season 1 of Phineas and Ferb was sort of the same and more so a Candace 2.0 but overtime, became a more interesting and developed character with her own personality and story in series that made learning about her fun and gave us more to enjoy about that character. We've seen in the show there is more to Wendy from stuff she's said and lore that books have dropped. There is a lot more to her that we can learn. I think there are GF fans who want to see more out of Wendy, but with a lack of anything to really look into on her beyond all the shipping stuff which many have moved on from, there's not much to do with her. So, she gets sidelined. When Gravity Falls itself stops sidelining Wendy, fans I feel will stop doing so too.

Also side note, Wendy and Mabel content would be honestly really cool to see more of. They have a real big sister and little sister type bond and seeing Wendy perhaps giving Mabel life advice and being a sort of mentor to her would be amazing. We've already seen a bit of that in Society of the Blind Eye, so more of that would be welcome. Point is, there is so much Wendy could be used for with proper development...it's just a matter of actually trying it out and seeing what works.

[diggerofbricks]

Thanks for the reply! :-D

Does the subset of Gravity Falls fans that focus predominantly on Ford, Stan, & Fiddleford have any kinda name that you might know of, much like how the Harry Potter fandom has the "Mauraders" subfandom? Like, the "Tale of Two Stans" fandom? The "Mystery Trio" fandom? Stan Fans?

I think "Mystery Trio" fandom, probably. Not sure.

[photomatt]

You gonna do anything or make any statement about the rampant transmisogyny on this hellsite, especially in cases like predstrogen recently? Or yall gonna stay silent and keep letting/making us get pushed off of it.

I have a number of asks about this, so this is to address all of them, I won't do each individually.

We generally do not comment on individual cases, but because there seems to be mass misinformation around this, I will make an exception and comment on predstrogen.

First, Tumblr has a number of LGBT+ including trans people on staff, and they see things from the inside fully, and they're not protesting this case.

Why do we wrongly have a transphobe reputation? We did have an external contract moderator last year that was making transphobic moderation (and also selling moderation, criminally). As soon as we were aware that person was fired, and we later terminated the entire relationship with that contracting firm and have brought almost everything in-house (at great cost). I have previously commented on this publicly, several times.

I am not aware of any Automattician (people who work at Automattic and Tumblr) who has made any transphobic moderation actions. If it's reported it is investigated immediately, if anything were found that person would be terminated for cause immediately.

Predstrogen's account was suspended for:

Repeated mis-tagging of adult content against Tumblr's community guidelines. This has nothing to do with clothed transition photos, she had 20+ other blogs and multiple accounts with names so explicit I can't post them here without a mature tag.

Multiple cases of harassment of other Tumblr users, not just me.

Multiple threats of violence, not just the one I share below.

These represent a breach of our Terms of Service, and we've exercised our right to refuse service.

Threats of violence are never okay. Threats of violence are not protected speech. We will work with police and FBI where appropriate, though to be clear prestrogen's case hasn't warranted that so far. I'm referring to what we may potentially do for other threats. I just got a death threat yesterday from someone mad about predstrogen, and that account was immediately terminated.

So regardless of whether you still think Tumblr staff is somehow a bunch of transphobes, know that threats of violence or death are still not acceptable and will result in immediate and serious action. Know that when you rile people up, they can do dumb things with possibly permanent consequences.

(2 hours later update: I have changed instances of the pronoun "they" or "their" to "the account" because I am unaware of pronoun preference in this instance and don't want to misgender anyone. Thank you for the people who reported this as an issue. Update 2: "She" is apparently better, the post now says that. Sorry for the mistake.)

Here's one (of many!) examples of the harassment violations, this one targets me but there are others targeting other users on the site.

The second part seems to indicate she wanted to be suspended, I'm unaware of why, perhaps to create this sort of uproar. I agree the hammers feel silly, but the start, "i hope photomatt dies forever a painful death" is a violation of Tumblr's community guidelines and terms of service.

The car part did hit close to home as I have almost died twice in car accidents.

Update 2: Added this text to the adult content part: This has nothing to do with clothed transition photos, she had 20+ other blogs and multiple accounts with names so explicit I can't post them here without a mature tag.

[reading-writing-revolution]

Just FYI...

[genericpuff]

Tbh at this point you should just make your own webcomic app/website because it would probably be 100 times better than whatever going on with webtoon right now.

hahaha it wouldn't tho, sorry 💀

Here's the fundamental issue with webcomic platforms that a lot of people just don't realize (and why they're so difficult to run successfully):

Storage costs are incredibly expensive, it's why so many sites have limitations on file sizes / page sizes / etc. because all of those images and site info have to be stored somewhere, which costs $$$.

Maintenance costs are expensive and get more so as you grow, you need people who are capable of fixing bugs ASAP and managing the servers and site itself

Financially speaking, webcomics are in a state of high supply, low demand. Loads of artists are willing to create their passion projects, but getting people to read them and pay for them is a whole other issue. Demand is high in the general sense that once people get attached to a webtoon they'll demand more, but many people aren't actually willing to go looking for new stuff to read and depend more on what sites feed them (and what they already like). There are a lot of comics to go around and thus a lot of competition with a limited audience of people willing to actually pay for them.

Trying to build a new platform from the ground up is incredibly difficult and a majority of sites fail within their first year. Not only do you have to convince artists to take a chance on your platform, you have to convince readers to come. Readers won't come if there isn't work on the platform to read, but artists won't come if they don't think the site will be worth it due to low traffic numbers. This is why the artists with large followings who are willing to take chances on the smaller sites are crucial, but that's only if you can convince them to use the site in favor of (or alongside) whatever platform they're using already where the majority of their audience lies. For many creators it's just not worth the time, energy, or risk.

Even if you find short-term success, in the long-term there are always going to be profit margins to maintain. The more users you pull in, the more storage is used by incoming artists, the more you have to spend on storage and server maintenance costs, and that means either taking the risk at crowdfunding (ex. ComicFury) or having to resort to outsider investments (ex. Tapas). Look at SmackJeeves, it used to be a titan in the independent webcomic hosting community, until it folded over to a buyout by NHN and then was pretty much immediately shuttered due to NHN basically turning it into a manwha scanlation site and driving away its entire userbase. And if you don't get bought out and try your hand at crowdfunding, you may just wind up living on a lifeline that could cut out at any moment, like what happened to Inkblazers (fun fact, the death of Inkblazers was what kicked off the cultural shift in Tapas around 2015-16 when all of IB's users migrated over and brought their work with them which was more aimed towards the BL and romancee drama community, rather than the comedy / gag-a-day culture that Tapas had made itself known for... now you deadass can't tell Tapas apart from a lot of scanlation sites because it got bought out by Kakao and kept putting all of its eggs into the isekai/romance drama basket.)

Right now the mindset in which artists and readers are operating is that they're trying way, way too hard to find a "one size fits all" site. Readers want a place where they can find all their favorite webtoons without much effort, artists wants a place where they can post to an audience of thousands, and both sides want a community that will feel tight-knit. But the reality is that you can't really have all three of those things, not on one site. Something always winds up having to be sacrificed - if a site grows big enough, it'll have to start seeking more funding while also cutting costs which will result in features becoming paywall'd, intrusive ads, creators losing their freedom, and/or outsider support which often results in the platform losing its core identity and alienating its tight-knit community.

If I had to describe what I'm talking about in a "pick one" graphic, it would look something like this:

(*note: this is mostly based on my own observations from using all of these sites at some point or another, they're not necessarily entirely accurate to the statistical performance of each site, I can only glean so much from experience and traffic trackers LMAO that said I did ask some comic pals for input and they were very helpful in helping me adjust it with their own takes <3).

The homogenization of the Internet has really whipped people into submission for the "big sites" that offer "everything", but that's never been the Internet, it relies on being multi-faceted and offering different spaces for different purposes. And we're seeing that ideology falter through the enshittification of sites like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc. where users are at odds with the platforms because the platforms are gutting features in an attempt to satisfy shareholders whom without the platforms would not exist. Like, most of us aren't paying money to use social media sites / comic platform sites, so where else are they gonna make the necessary funds to keep these sites running? Selling ad space and locking features behind paywalls.

And this is especially true for a lot of budding sites that don't have the audience to support them via crowdfunding but also don't have the leverage to ask for investments - so unless they get really REALLY lucky in EITHER of those departments, they're gonna be operating at a loss, and even once they do achieve either of those things there are gonna be issues in the site's longevity, whether it be dying from lack of growing crowdfunding support or dying from shareholder meddling.

So what can we do?

We can learn how to take our independence back. We don't have to stop using these big platforms altogether as they do have things to offer in their own way, particularly their large audience sizes and dipping into other demographics that might not be reachable from certain sites - but we gotta learn that no single site is going to satisfy every wish we have and we have to be willing to learn the skills necessary to running our own spaces again. Pick up HTML/CSS, get to know other people who know HTML/CSS if you can't grasp it (it's me, I can't grasp it LOL), be willing to take a chance on those "smaller sites" and don't write them off entirely as spaces that can be beneficial to you just because they don't have large numbers or because they don't offer rewards programs. And if you have a really polished piece of work in your hands, look into agencies and publishing houses that specialize in indie comics / graphic novels, don't settle for the first Originals contract that gets sent your way.

For the last decade corporations have been convincing us that our worth is tied to the eyes we can bring to them. Instead of serving ourselves, we've begun serving the big guys, insisting that it has to be worth something eventually and that it'll "payoff" simply by the virtue of gambler's fallacy. Ask yourself what site is right for you and your work rather than asking yourself if your work is good enough for them. Most of us are broke trying to make it work on these sites anyways, may as well be broke and fulfilled by posting in places that actually suit us and our work if we can. Don't define your success by what sites like Webtoons are enforcing - that definition only benefits them, not you.

[bogcreacher]

“Hey bog didn’t you already post this and receive questions literally over a year ago and then never draw any answers?” Yes but ☝️ I am stupid.

info about these folks can be found under Horst tag!! Characters that are missing or dead can’t be questioned for the sake of spoilers - if you don’t know if a character eligible feel free to ask. Also please specify which character you’re asking the question to!

[elmushterri]

It’s here, people! So many of you guys have been asking for the voices, so! Names of the claims are listed at the end. Also gave Grayson some new, lighter colours. The first bit of the vid is dedicated to like, the clean and refined stuff, and then at the end it’s just a buncha voices to show more examples!

Also I wanna do a bit of an actor AU so!

[sexysmokerstoo]

A confession

[bambibimbosparkles]

I got a new toy! stay tuned, when I recover from surgery ill be back to streaming and being porn for you!!

[royalarchivist]

Phil: Also I see you, Ama. You are VIP now. Pahaha! No hiding now. Chat, I had to ignore– so Chayanne's admin and Lullah's admin gifted subs on the like, 5 year mark of this world, and I had to actively ignore their names. And I was like, "If I say them out loud, that might just put a spotlight on them, let's not." [Laughs] So I knew they were there watching, I was like, "Oh!"

Phil: And I've turned into Sun– I've tuned into SunMin, who's- SunMin, who was Chayanne's admin, I've tuned into their streams a few times as well before, which was quite funny. The first time they had no idea! They had no idea I was gonna show up, and they were like, "OH! Oh, hey!" [Laughs] "Hello!"

Phil: [Reading a message from Ama] "You weren't getting rid of us soon. We told you." That's true.

[dropoutdottv]

Hello! I'm going to be doing an AMA on the Dropout Reddit page next Wednesday! Come join!

Don't ask anything too embarrassing though, I'm shy...

[diggerofbricks]

Thanks for the reply! :-D

Are there any popular Gravity Falls AUs that you are personally indifferent to in some way, in that you either find them off-putting, don't understand their appeal, or just at minimum have the least regard for compared to other AUs that you're fonder of? For me at least, I don't care that much for Reverse Falls/Reverse Pines, Monster Falls, or 1920's Gangster/Mobster AUs.

THANK YOU! ME TOO!

I pretty much feel the same about the AU's you listed. I've never really liked Reverse Falls. In fact in some ways I hate it. Quite frankly, I think it's an overrated and super outdated AU. I mean, the whole AU idea is that it reverses the roles of the characters. But it was made back when the characters to reverse the roles of were Dipper and Mabel with Gideon (and later Pacifica). And since then, there have been far more interesting concepts that better fit the name. Relativity Falls is honestly what Reverse Falls SHOULD be; ACTUALLY reversing the roles by having Dipper and Mabel be Stan and Ford and vice versa. I just feel like it's an AU fans have just been trying to patch up and keep intact after all these years like some lemon car that really just needs to be scrapped. Maybe it made sense in 2012 when first made, but it's an AU that's showing its age and should swap names at this point with Relativity Falls.

I'll never get either how this AU out of the others got so big. I mean, it's so huge an AU now that Will Cipher as a character basically is as known as Bill Cipher. I even years back when I was new in the fandom assumed he was a real character in show I missed. I get maybe it's cause the AU seemed cool and unique, but even so, there are so many better ideas IMO that could've and should've gotten the spotlight like Drifting Stars, Immortal Pines, Reunion Falls, etc.

That said, I do have some soft spot for RF, in that finding the original creator of the AU in 2018 was a fun project and the first GF lost media search I got to be a part of back before I even made proper YouTube videos on that stuff (given the blog post is on GF Amino, lmao). Also no, I'm never making a video on that. It was years ago, I never archived all the stuff for that search properly and overall, IDC about that AU enough to spend many sleepless nights editing a video for it, lol. Art below of the gif from that post by Cherryviolets.

Monster Falls I similarly don't get. I mean, Dipper as a deer and Mabel as a mermaid? Who TF came up with that and how did the whole fandom agree on it? It's another AU that makes no sense though admittedly is a lot less outdated a concept than Reverse Falls.

IDK much about that mobster AU tbh. I've seen art for it but I think the OG artist behind it is gone so IDK much on what it was about or why or if it was popular.

Should also stress, I'm not trying to say these AU's are bad or that fans should stop making content for them. Like headcanons, AU's are a way for fans to express and make new content for the show and is an outlet for creativity. I don't like these AUs but others do and they by all means should enjoy making content for them. I'm not a big AU person myself besides the AU's I mentioned above I more so prefer (as well as working on the Adoption AU fanfics in 2018 with marehami), however, I get the value and love that fans have for them. Like headcanons, AU's are things every fan can enjoy or dislike as they please without judgement or being told they're wrong. These are just my opinions and solely my own. So, if you love Reverse Falls, enjoy it. I may not get it, but if it brings joy to you to make Reverse Falls art, then that's all that matters and more to you for that :)