Dessa

Did any pony already mention toola roola? Don't know much about her, but her name is sweet, and she was a major character in the last gen. All the other main ponies from then got an update, why not Herr too? There's something appealing about old school nods like that, i think.

Question: I have the most experience writing in nonfiction styles, where succinct phrasing is praised, but I've seen elsewhere on the site that wordier styles work better for this sort of thing. Coming back on day 2 and reading the above, it's a bit dry, but it runs counter to my instinct to "fluff" it with adjectives. Also, with as many apps as the staff here processes, I definitely want to avoid making this longer unless necessary. On the plus side, the text is at least descriptive enough to get the point across cleanly. I guess I'm saying I'm not sure where to proceed from here. This is my first forum RP character ever, and although I have the general expertise to develop style that works here, I don't feel like I'm there yet. So, any thoughts are definitely I'll try to finish the first draft by tonight.

Name: Rue Sex: Female Age: Filly Species: Unicorn Pelt Color: Periwinkle Mane/Tail/Markings Color & Style: Wavy grape, with a bold lilac streak Eye Color: Blue Cutie Mark: A Rue Flower Physique: Soft Origin: Canterlot Roleplay Type: Main RP Occupation: Part-timer seeking work. Motivation: Surface: To have fun and be free. Srs Bsns: To seek redemption and to help others do the same. Dear Diary fodder: Her path to improvement as a friend includes learning to let other ponies in, sacrifice for the sake of friendship, "you can't tell a book by its cover," learning to accept help from others. Likes: She loves foals, outcasts, experiencing new things Dislikes: Snobs. Stiffs. Ponies who frontin'. Ponies who can't acknowledge their mistakes. Character Summary: The Hoofington Elementary Equinerer: Local Pony Profiles: Rue By News Flash Hello Everypony! This is your school reporter News Flash with this weeks Local Pony Profile! We're looking at Hoofington's mysterious newcomer: Rue! With rumors and speculation swirling here at Hoofington Elementary, we're digging up thez TRUTH and delivering it to YOUR FRONT DOOR! Rue, at first glance, is an intimidating figure. Small, but with a carefully cultivated "edge" maintainted to send a message: Dark eyeshadow, Red hoofpolish, and a carefully sloppy beheaded mane. When at peace, her movements are calm, her expressions detached, but when excited, I noticed she would become more animated in expression, and move with more deliberation. She has a disarming directness that sometimes borders on intrusive or rude, but I never felt that she was paticularly agressive without provocation. Interview below the fold. * * * News Flash: Rue, it looks like you attended the prestigious Hoofvard academy in Canterlot. Tell us about that. Rue: It sucked. NF: Ah. Well... Okay then. Reports say that you were admitted on an academic scholarship? You must have shown some aptitude then. Rue: Yeah. But to the other kids, it just meant I wasn't admitted by the usual means: money or contacts. NF: So you were an outsider? Rue: Yeah. I was too cool for those spoiled rich brats. NF: Huh, that's funny, because various accounts suggest otherwise. Your first grade teacher's meeting notes read "Rue seems eager, but unable to form friendships with her peers." Rue: Hey! How did you get a hold of my records? What sort of school paper is this? NF: Here at the Hoofington Equinerer, we believe in journalistic diligence. You just keep your answers honest, and we'll keep these records to ourselves, capiche? Rue: Why you little! [Rue Sighs] Whatever. Yeah, I wasn't a popular kid, and I caught heck those first couple years. But it wasn't long before I found some friends. We had eachothers backs, and they taught me how to be tough. Still wouldn't call us popular, but at least the bullies had to think twice before they tangled with the Dark Horses. NF: So you formed a gang? Rue: A gang? That makes us sound like monsters. We called it a "social trust." We didn't need violence. We had a bad reputation, and that was usually enough. NF: Usually enough? Rue: Usually. Sometimes, somepony wouldn't get the message. We did what we had to do. Our pranks were legendary. NF: Oh? I'd like to hear about that. Rue: Yeah? Well, you'll get to experience one first hand if you get too cocky with those records. NF: Well! Let's move on then! Uh, tell me about your family life. Rue: What family life? Once dad got his break in Canterlot High Society, he was too busy for anypony, and mom was constantly involved in planning parties, managing the household, and schmoozing big wigs. I wasn't the sort of child that impressed those fancy types, and they were the sort of ponies that impressed me, so I kept to my bedroom a lot. I didn't really have any friends until I met the Dark Horses. NF: You got into a lot of trouble, it would seem. Rue: It was summer. We were bored. NF: You got your cutie mark that summer. Rue: Look, I'm warning you, kid. NF: D-don't worry! We couldnt dig up any facts about 'the Incident at the Castle! Rue I can't imagine you could! But I can tell you this much: I have never regretted anything as much as that. Which is how I got it. NF: Your Cutie Mark. A Rue Flower. You got it for your regret? Rue I've regretting things before, but always for the wrong reasons. This time, I had made a deliberate decision to do better. I apologized to the Viceroy, as sorry as I'd ever been, and that's when it appeared. Now some kids get easy cutie marks. They fix a table and get a hammer on their hip. They go on to be happy little carpenters. I screwed up and got a flower on my flank, and I'm still not sure what to make of it. A cutie mark is a major event, and it doesn't happen without a reason. The Viceroy understood this, and forgave me. Hoofvard did not. NF: They expelled you. Rue: [Rue Nods] Mom and Dad were livid. They sent me away to live with someone who would give me some "tough love": Auntie Hemlock. NF: Oh my. Rue [Rue Shrugs] It's no fur off my flank. I never needed them anyway. And Hoofington isn't full of snobs. I'm better off here. NF: Still, I can't imagine that it was that eas-- [Rue interrupts me here] Rue: That's enough questions. You've got enough for an article, kid. NF: But -- Rue: No more questions. * * * After a calm and reasonable discussion, we agreed to end the interview here. Cutie Mark: Character Sketch: Original arts ^ Clockwise's Rendition, 20% cooler ^^

8 votes down, 2 days left. There are still votes to be made. It's looking grim, but there's a chance that truth and justice will prevail.

To be honest, I don't get why they haven't just become youtube partners already. Stick some adds on the those episodes, and they could be making tons of money and bronies could still get their episodes for free. Everypony wins. Hasbro seems kinda stuck in the 20th century. They're a HUGE company, so I suppose they'd be slow-moving, and they can afford to be conservative, but I think we'd all like to see them get savvy to the 2010s, and it'd probably do them a few favors as well.

Same.

It comes down to the wishes of the creators and publishers. There are potential benefits and drawbacks to various means of distribution, and the factors in play can be quite complex. I think of a personal situation: when Lady Gaga's new cd came out, it was leaked early. In my eagerness to hear the album, I downloaded it, but swore that I would buy it when it came out. Real life intervened and I just didn't have the 15 bucks or whatever to buy when it hit. Had I been unable to buy it for a month or two, I might have gotten my fill from the pirates alone (although even here, "pirating" is a questionable term, since all of the tracks were released in a farmville promo for free). I lucked out, and amazon offered the cd for a dollar as a promotion for a new feature, so I searched the couch cushions and ponied up. Still, there are circumstances where sales ARE lost, and in some cases, they can be significant. One thought that fills my speculation is that in the era of consolidation, piracy offers a check to replace the dwindling role of competition in the free market. True, there is no competing with the price "free," but people's reasons for buying instead of pirating go well beyond price. I must say, this is a much more interesting discussion than the usual piracy talk, which is "pirates are all thieves who are destroying the world. All things in moderation applies here, I think.

Well, yes and no. Toy sales are another measure of the show's succes, but yeah, hasbro is in the cable biz now, so viewed ip is still very important. They're in their rights, and there is some sense, to blocking YouTube views, but I wonder if this show would be half as successful without it. Mlp sales are up, and the brony phenomenon seems barely to have scratched the mainstream. Their core demographic, little girls, are probably onboard either way. Adults? I'm sure they'd like more of us. It'ultimately a judgment call as to when they shouldmkill you tubes, but I agree that it's smartest for them to do it at SOME point.

Ruqyo, you're killing me. Killing me. Pinkie pie tends to understand friendship in morally stark terms. She tends not to see shades of grey. In "Green Isn't Your Color," Pinkie Pie was obsessed, to a fault, with the idea of secret-keeping. In "Griffon the Brush-Off," Pinkie is so loyal to Rainbow Dah, that she extends Gilda far more grace than most would, because friends try to get along with Friends' friends. In both cases, it took a lot to overwhelm Pinkie's ideological rigidity about what a friendship entail. Likewise, in general a rule about friendships is that friends don't lie to each other, yet Pinkie is increasingly faced with a situation that confronts reality as she understands it. If her friends are running around behind her back and lying, then they must not be friends, because friends are honest with one another. When reality confronts our most deeply held beliefs, it's very difficult to deal with. For pinkie, it puts a break in her reality, and she loses her connection to the real world. While a bit of an exaggerated response, this is the cartoonist character in a cartoon show, this sort of extreme response to perceived betrayal, much less cognitive dissonance, is fairly common. In addition to losing grip with reality, pinkie pie regressed to a mode that helped her feel secure as a child, represented literally By her physical transformation to Pinkamena. She had a lonely and depressing childhood, and in times of stress, reverting to the paradigms of our childhoods isn't terribly uncommon. And this all on the "simplest" character on the show. Party of one isn't just one of the funniest episodes, it's a stylized, but in essence, fairly accurate analysis of well established psychological concepts like cognitive dissonance, regression, psychosis, and of the moral concept of ideological rigidity (which is a common theme in the show, tbh). It's ridiculously well written, and has layers of meaning. AND it's ridiculously funny. Sonic Rainboom is good, but and I like that it adds an unseen dimension to a character that had until then been a bit one-dimensional, but its just not as deep. It may have the best action in the show as well. But IMO, it was more surface than substance (and theres nothing wrong with that at all).

From "Griffon the Brush-Off," after Spike hiccups all the scrolls to Celestia:

Augh, it's tied up again! This controversy will TEAR THE COMMUNITY APART. In the first post I said they'd share the title, and that's how I've set tie behavior for previous rounds' potential ties. There's no reason why 2 episodes can't be the best. Otherwise, potential tie breakers would include past head-to-heads (they only faced once, and it was a tie), total vote tallies in semifinal rounds (more semi votes would win), and total votes in all polls. But making a call like that after the game is underway is a bit shady. Shared victory is how I explicity said this situation would have been handled in past rounds, so shall it be for this round.

I'm about to go to bed, but if you catch me around tomorrow night, remind me and I'll give it a closer look. I liked what I read for the most part. Lil things here and there, but yeah, sleep.

Finals resulted in a tie! Tiebreaker poll: http://canterlot.com/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=2661! Also updated the bracket.

The runoff vote: http://canterlot.com/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=2661

Ah, not much to say here. Same as before. Party of One. I encourage ponies who favor another episode not listed in this poll to just go ahead and choose one anyway, or we'll get similar results to last time. Vote for: :Pinkie: :Pinkie:

So the finals were a tie. This is the runoff vote, and the last possible official vote in the Best! Episode! Ever! poll. If they tie, that's all there is to it. It would remain a tie, and the two episodes would share the title. The usual text at the top of these things follows: This post is the FINAL final part of a multi-post polling bracket (we swear!), the full details of which are here: http://www.canterlot...&p=25724#p25724 Pick a favorite. You may change your vote as many times as you wish, but polling will close 3 days after this posting, after which your vote is locked in, and for that matter, the fate of Equestria of the entire poll. Links to episode videos here: http://www.canterlot...php?f=13&t=1870 (recently broken, as I've been told, either by parasprites, or Hasbro. Let us pray it was the former).

Twilight Sparkles', no doubt, though Celestia's bedroom is pretty fresh too.

The episodes will be findable. Given the passion and work ethic of this community, there will bep lenty of illicit copies floating around. The real downer, if this is legit, is that it's harder to get NEW people interested. Easy Youtube access meant that all you had to do was send a friend a link, now it's money. Thing is, much of the community will probably be buying the DVDs anyway. Not only are there a lot of people who actively want to support the show, watching it on television without a purchase requires burning DVDs, which is an annoying process. The potential for DVD extras makes it even more tempting. Eliminating youtube access would come with a risk of alienating some of the fanbase and dampening enthusiasm. Certainly, I think it will be smart for them to kill youtube vids at SOME point, but this show ahas a lot more growth potential, and marketing the show (in this case by facilitating word of mouth, which is the wet dream of any marketing team) will pay off more in the long run. I sure do hope it's parasprites, but I don't fear being unable to see new episodes (and i have all the old ones on my hard drive in 720p).

Cool! I was kinda hoping the filly contest would generate new users (and moar art ponies!). I can't get over how cute Taliesin is.

Aargh! Sonic Rainboom is so overrated!

I'm guessing those captcha dealies just don't to the trick by themselves anymore, huh?

Yeah, 3 is good. 5 was too many.

The nature of the poll (the bracket) means that for many ponies, this already is a "favorite of what can win" contest. If one episode is polarizing, and another is everypony's second favorite, a case can be made that that second favorite is the most popular, all things considered. That was my reasoning when I left vote changing up, anyhow. This is almost like a runoff bracket between the frontrunners now. Sad to see CM Chronicles go down though. It's my second favorite.

Sounds like your best laid plans have failed. it happens. Only thing to do now is go FULL BRONY MODE. The truth is out. Just stand up and shout at the dinner table "YES. I LOVE PONIES. AND THOSE OF YOU WHO CAN'T FIND IT IN YOUR HEARTS TO UNDERSTAND THIS, I REJECT!" Pause. Take a moment to collect yourself. Then say "if you watch an episode and can still, in good conscience, look upon me with scorn, then I can respect that. Those of you that would call yourselves men should have nothing to fear. Those of you who wither before the sight of a pony, whose masculinity is so fragile that you fear a cartoon might exempt it, unzip your testicles now and deliver unto me their contents. And let a man of self-assurance find a better use for them!" Then sit down quietly, and resume eating your potatoes.

Oh, it leaves a little doubt at least. When was the last time you checked? Either way, welcome to Canterlot!