#i did not want to deal with crediting artists for a throwaway post like this and didn't want to steal anyone's art for same reason

[sharkneto]

Tagged by @hauntingyourself

Rules: list 9 of your favourite characters and let people guess your type (in my case I mean qualifications for being my favorite, I don’t have crushes on them)

I have such a type it's not even funny. Can spot 'em a mile off.

In no particular order except Five is Character Of All Time so he gets to be exactly center.

Hal Yorke (Being Human UK), Matt Murdock (Netflix Marvel), Bruce Wayne (not particularly Battinson but he does have one of the best batsuits, the actual Bruce Wayne that's my favorite is Unpretty's version in her fics), Kaz Brekker (Six of Crows), Five Hargreeves (Umbrella Academy), Locke Lamora (Gentleman Bastards), Eddie Brock/Venom (Marvel, they count as one), Arthur Lester/John Doe (Malevolent, they do too), Arthur Morgan (Red Dead Redemption 2)

All of these guys selected by virtue of The Amount Of Time I Have Spent Thinking About Them. The exception is Locke Lamora, who I only met last week but he vaulted into the group by virtue of being My Exact Type Of Character.

Tagging @assaily, @non-plutonian-druid, @neosatsuma, @candiliam328 and anyone else who may want to play consider yourself tagged

[jlf23tumble]

I’d love to hear more about your thoughts on different ways they interact with fans in light of their personalities and teams and so on, if you’d like to!

God, I’m so sorry that this has taken me so long to answer! I *do* talk some shit in interviews have some thoughts about their current management teams and how they *do* seem to reflect each artist’s myriad goals and constraints, how they aren’t sabotaging things (given what we know is going on), how they have to walk such a fine line with fan involvement, but lordt, that is not a popular opinion. 

Probably because 1Dhq actually *did* know what they were doing: they wanted to exploit five young guys for immediate fame and short-term gain, and they did it primarily through constant fan access and overly publicized private lives (real and fake). Turning that spigot off or trying to change its course isn’t exactly easy because a lot of fans struggle to a) absorb the post-1D landscape in general and their role in it in particular, let alone b) understand how much the music industry has changed from even one year ago (spoiler: it requires following other artists closely, and I just don’t see that here). Add to that the fact that these men themselves (yes, they’re all in their mid-20s now, they’re men) seem to encourage intense fan engagement when it serves a specific purpose (looking at you in anger, recent tweet from Niall), and the waters just get muddier, le sigh.

I keep writing and rewriting my thoughts, and they keep spiraling out of control because this is a topic that fires me UP, especially because it mixes in some things that I could spend hours venting about:

the amateur marketing experts and business analysts who feel qualified to make sweeping statements in spite of having no clue about the goals, budgets, constraints, personal life issues, conflicting schedules, or anything else happening bts

the baffling assumption that any of these guys is a struggling indie artist aged 19 who desperately requires any of our unpaid labor and angst, 24/7 (OR TO CALL UP RADIO STATIONS, NIALL)…they are male millionaires at this very moment in time

the policing of anyone enjoying anything because they just don’t get how terrible it is that a magazine with the characters from “Frozen” on the cover “leaked” an album title

the underlying misogyny in so much of allll of this (and this one ALONE I could go on about for days)

the use of words like, “I’m so confused about why xx is or isn’t happening”…because, yeah, makes sense, YOU DON’T WORK THERE, IT ISN’T YOUR JOB TO BE UNCONFUSED ABOUT IT

Deep breath, yes, I know, “not all fans”: lots of people like me focus on loving them, supporting them, buying songs, buying an album, going to a show, buying some merch, screaming about bullshit on tumblr. But a small but extremely vocal minority screams about how I’m not doing “enough,” and newsflash, I’m not paid to stream songs all night or call radio stations or make presents or absorb the levels of anxiety I see in some inboxes, and more to the point, I’m not paid to feel guilty about it from a fellow fan or deal with a bunch of misguided anonymous bullshit. I get tired just thinking about it, tbqh. Teams of people literally DO get paid to handle the majority of that, in fact.

That’s my hot take on the fan side, anyway (I wrote up a full breakdown per man in the D—how each team is actually honoring each man’s various goals, how fans are involved in that process because it’s literally part of the promo process, you are a commodity, etc.—but it’s winter, and I’m tired, so I’ll save that for some other time). The bigger issue is what these teams actually manage, and why I feel some sympathy for them (NOTE THAT I’M NOT A DUMBASS, THE FOLLOWING IS GIVEN: the music industry is fucking awful, mgmt teams get paid handsomely, most of them are monsters, artists get screwed no matter what, I don’t lose sleep over a mgmt team’s pain, deep breath, calm down). 

As Kim said waaaay more eloquently than I ever could when I was in full vent mode with her yesterday (??? feels like years ago, lmao), people don’t give their teams enough credit for the impossibly complicated situations they’re managing. This was her overall point, and I completely agree: these guys are all closeted, but it’s so much more complicated than “some fans cling to their het fantasies so their teams (have to) keep up the closet and cater to them but end up alienating fans who think they aren’t straight”, because what about the contracts (not just Simon’s, but the ones with Sony, Capital, Columbia, the Azoffs, any other powerful person who’s treated them like shit and/or handcrafted their image for at least six years)? 

Their teams don’t just have to deal with a fandom that’s split into different factions that are basically at war over opposing images of who these guys are and what their lives look like, they ALSO have to deal with it in a way that doesn’t breach ANY of these old contracts or tells any subsection of fans that they’ve been lied to by their idol for a decade or plays into any of the (pretty arbitrary) things that either fans or the guys themselves have come to hate being associated with over the years, while ALSO crafting an image that’s distinct and individual enough to distance them from 1D enough to have a solo career, while ALSO being recognizable enough for existing fans to still stan. All that, PLUS they have to listen to their client’s wishes and help them navigate whatever it is they’re trying to accomplish as artists. It’s not an easy task even for the best team, so mistakes will be made, miscalculations will happen, big news will pop up in a throwaway article in a magazine that’s promoting the vocal talents of the “Frozen” cast. And it doesn’t mean that the team is BAD, let alone sabotaging anyone on purpose: it most likely just means that they’re trying to handle a very difficult situation and are doing it in real time. They’re building a plane as they’re flying it. On top of that, they know information we simply don’t–much of it highly personal and volatile.

Ugh, I”m getting fired up again, so I’ll sign off. Those are my thoughts, I really should shut down my inbox…enjoy!!! 

[prorevenge]

Hello again, I'm the girl/artist who's aunt tried the old "I'm giving you experience and exposure" instead of paying me for some art I did for her real estate business. Just a quick update and then I'll try to let this fade away...

Hello everyone again. I feel bad about posting again because I'm totally not a karma whore but people seemed to be really invested in it and there were actually some people from the company in question who contacted me via this throwaway account so I figure I needed to give some closure (though the story is going to play out for a long time because it's my uncle/aunt's divorce is going to be ugly).

At this point I have no idea what's removed and why, what's still out there, what's been crossposted, etc... so for those who are just checking in I'll try to reset as succinctly as possible:

At the beginning of the year my Aunt Jay (by marriage) asked me to do some artwork for her new real estate business. We had a verbal agreement that she would pay me. She was demanding, insulting and shitty from the get go and I was out a ton of time, quite a bit of material costs very quickly. She wanted me to fly out on my own dime to finish up and paint a mural I designed. I asked for payment on everything I'd already done and she freaked out and screamed at me.

Tuesday, I went to my schools licensing/legal aid office, they helped me draft a letter to cease using my work and an invoice. Aunt Jay called my mom calling me an "ungrateful brat." Mom called Aunt Jay's supposed real estate company to say that one of their agents was not paying for services rendered. Company had no idea who Aunt Jay was. This caused my Uncle to look into things and it turned out Aunt Jay had taken out a few credit cards in his name only and maxed them out. Probably for her Escalade, new "real estate agent" wardrobe and office.

My update was Wednesday so in the following 2/3 days quite a bit more information has come to light about what Aunt Jay was actually up to. She's actually not in as big of trouble as I and everyone on the last post assumed but she's still pretty much screwed in several ways.

So first of all we learned that she probably never told anyone other than my uncle that she was working for the nation wide real estate company in question going to call it ProRealty (my last fake name may have been a little to obvious). It doesn't look like she had any clients, never brokered a single deal, she may have taken a few people around to look at houses but we aren't even sure about that. It looks like the "soon to be ProRealty franchisee" thing was just a lie to get my uncle off her tracks about where this huge influx of cheaply financed money was coming from. She had told him that ProRealty had financed her new Escalade and that they had helped her rent her office.

Since she never actually claimed to be a certified ProRealty agent in order to defraud people, it doesn't look like the company itself has any legal recourse against her. However my mom (extreme extrovert, opposite of me) who has become fast friends with the most senior agent in my hometown and he is (or has, not sure) going to report my aunt to the state board of real estate to have her new (as of last fall) license reviewed and probably suspended. Even if this doesn't happen, she is essentially blackballed from ever doing a deal with ProRealty and according this senior agent, something like 45% of home sales in my town happen with a ProRealty agent one either side of the sale. So even if Aunt Jay doesn't lose her license, she's effectively chopped half of her business potential right from the get go.

One thing that absolutely came out of my last r/prorevenge post was that two actual "ProRealty" agents commented and it was because of them that I was able to figure out a huge chunk of the puzzle. So the real life version of this company uses a very identifiable form of transportation on their logo but to keep this anonymous let's say that ProRealty uses a boat. When Aunt Jay was first talking to me about doing work for her she was oddly adamant that I don't use any "boats" in any of the work I was going to do for her. I mean actually forcefully direct instruction was "no boats!" In my head at the time I was like, I'm not one to paint boats anyways but point taken. Well as me and my family now surmise, while she knew she was already fraudulent, she was still trying to walk a line of not getting on ProRealty's radar in any way shape or form because she knew they could really screw up her plans if she were to be seen driving an $80000 Escalade around town with anything resembling ProRealty's "boat" plastered all over it. But to me it shows she absolutely knew she was up to no good and I hope this can be used in the divorce.

So onto my uncle, I don't know all the ins and outs of how separations and divorces work but as I understand he contacted a lawyer Wednesday afternoon and they were working to file some sort of emergency separation motion with the courts as soon as they possibly could in order to make sure she couldn't do any more financial damages to him. One thing that I thought was really cool of my uncle to do was that his lawyer did (or is in the process) of filing paperwork so she has to turn over all financial records and declare all assets related to her "business" and my uncle specifically asked the lawyer to include the oil painting and logos I'd already shipped to her. So while I'll never get paid, at least I may get my work back. The lawyer is also figuring out what to do about the identity theft.

One thing that is totally screwed up and I totally don't understand is that my uncle has pretty much paid for everything since they've been married (about 5 years) and Aunt Jay literally committed identity theft against him, he is still the one who has to leave the house so at least until he can get a place on his own, he's staying with my parents. My dad says my uncle is basically broken over this, that he didn't see it coming and actually bought into the bullcrap about ProRealty financing a car for someone who didn't even work for them. This makes me feel bad because I brought it all to light but my dad says my uncle appreciates it because Aunt Jay could have gotten in much deeper and she didn't really have a chance to try to and cover up fraud with more fraud.

So still a lot I don't know but this is where we are today. My uncles lawyer doesn't have a timeline for the divorce, I guess it will just depend if stupid Aunt Jay actually finds a lawyer who will put up a fight or if she just tries to fade away.

We'll see, thank you for reading, thank you for all the comments the other day and thank you to the posters who provided a lot of clarity with their knowledge of relationships and the real estate business.

(source) (story by KindredCocaCola)

[prorevenge]

Hello again, I'm the girl/artist who's aunt tried the old "I'm giving you experience and exposure" instead of paying me for some art I did for her real estate business. Just a quick update and then I'll try to let this fade away...

Hello everyone again. This is an update of my previous story so if you haven't read it yet, read it first before reading this one.

I feel bad about posting again but people seemed to be really invested in it and there were actually some people from the company in question who contacted me via this throwaway account so I figure I needed to give some closure (though the story is going to play out for a long time because it's my uncle/aunt's divorce is going to be ugly).

At this point I have no idea what's removed and why, what's still out there, what's been crossposted, etc... so for those who are just checking in I'll try to reset as succinctly as possible:

At the beginning of the year my Aunt Jay (by marriage) asked me to do some artwork for her new real estate business. We had a verbal agreement that she would pay me. She was demanding, insulting and shitty from the get go and I was out a ton of time, quite a bit of material costs very quickly. She wanted me to fly out on my own dime to finish up and paint a mural I designed. I asked for payment on everything I'd already done and she freaked out and screamed at me.

Tuesday, I went to my schools licensing/legal aid office, they helped me draft a letter to cease using my work and an invoice. Aunt Jay called my mom calling me an "ungrateful brat." Mom called Aunt Jay's supposed real estate company to say that one of their agents was not paying for services rendered. Company had no idea who Aunt Jay was. This caused my Uncle to look into things and it turned out Aunt Jay had taken out a few credit cards in his name only and maxed them out. Probably for her Escalade, new "real estate agent" wardrobe and office.

My update was Wednesday so in the following 2/3 days quite a bit more information has come to light about what Aunt Jay was actually up to. She's actually not in as big of trouble as I and everyone on the last post assumed but she's still pretty much screwed in several ways.

So first of all we learned that she probably never told anyone other than my uncle that she was working for the nation wide real estate company in question going to call it ProRealty (my last fake name may have been a little to obvious). It doesn't look like she had any clients, never brokered a single deal, she may have taken a few people around to look at houses but we aren't even sure about that. It looks like the "soon to be ProRealty franchisee" thing was just a lie to get my uncle off her tracks about where this huge influx of cheaply financed money was coming from. She had told him that ProRealty had financed her new Escalade and that they had helped her rent her office.

Since she never actually claimed to be a certified ProRealty agent in order to defraud people, it doesn't look like the company itself has any legal recourse against her. However my mom (extreme extrovert, opposite of me) who has become fast friends with the most senior agent in my hometown and he is (or has, not sure) going to report my aunt to the state board of real estate to have her new (as of last fall) license reviewed and probably suspended. Even if this doesn't happen, she is essentially blackballed from ever doing a deal with ProRealty  and according this senior agent, something like 45% of home sales in my town happen with a ProRealty agent one either side of the sale. So even if Aunt Jay doesn't lose her license, she's effectively chopped half of her business potential right from the get go.

One thing that absolutely came out of my last @prorevenge post was that two actual "ProRealty" agents commented and it was because of them that I was able to figure out a huge chunk of the puzzle. So the real life version of this company uses a very identifiable form of transportation on their logo but to keep this anonymous let's say that ProRealty uses a boat. When Aunt Jay was first talking to me about doing work for her she was oddly adamant that I don't use any "boats" in any of the work I was going to do for her. I mean actually forcefully direct instruction was "no boats!" In my head at the time I was like, I'm not one to paint boats anyways but point taken. Well as me and my family now surmise, while she knew she was already fraudulent, she was still trying to walk a line of not getting on ProRealty's radar in any way shape or form because she knew they could really screw up her plans if she were to be seen driving an $80000 Escalade around town with anything resembling ProRealty's "boat" plastered all over it. But to me it shows she absolutely knew she was up to no good and I hope this can be used in the divorce.

So onto my uncle, I don't know all the ins and outs of how separations and divorces work but as I understand he contacted a lawyer Wednesday afternoon and they were working to file some sort of emergency separation motion with the courts as soon as they possibly could in order to make sure she couldn't do any more financial damages to him. One thing that I thought was really cool of my uncle to do was that his lawyer did (or is in the process) of filing paperwork so she has to turn over all financial records and declare all assets related to her "business" and my uncle specifically asked the lawyer to include the oil painting and logos I'd already shipped to her. So while I'll never get paid, at least I may get my work back. The lawyer is also figuring out what to do about the identity theft.

One thing that is totally screwed up and I totally don't understand is that my uncle has pretty much paid for everything since they've been married (about 5 years) and Aunt Jay literally committed identity theft against him,  he is still the one who has to leave the house so at least until he can get a place on his own, he's staying with my parents. My dad says my uncle is basically broken over this, that he didn't see it coming and actually bought into the bullcrap about ProRealty financing a car for someone who didn't even work for them. This makes me feel bad because I brought it all to light but my dad says my uncle appreciates it because Aunt Jay could have gotten in much deeper and she didn't really have a chance to try to and cover up fraud with more fraud.

So still a lot I don't know but this is where we are today. My uncles lawyer doesn't have a timeline for the divorce, I guess it will just depend if stupid Aunt Jay actually finds a lawyer who will put up a fight or if she just tries to fade away.

We'll see, thank you for reading, thank you for all the comments the other day and thank you to the posters who provided a lot of clarity with their knowledge of relationships and the real estate business.

Edit: eeeekkkk...pms are getting a little dodgy.

I'm not hot at all.

Aunt Jay looks like she is trying very hard to be in "step-mom" porn and coming up just short (my ex was really into it, that's how I know about it).

Edit 2: just talked with my mom again, my uncle wasn't forced to leave the house, I guess his lawyer advised him that if he felt he was any danger, or if he felt that there was even a slight chance that Aunt Jay would accuse him of harming her, it's best he just leave and they'd work out possession of the house later. It's very hard to reconcile that he was either scared of her or scared of her accusing him with the huge 6'3" dads little brother who used to throw me around in our pool. Growing up sucks

(source) (story by KindredCocaCola)