secretsofthemasquerade - Tumblr blog

secretsofthemasquerade · 3 months

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Mhhhhh paradox should still ask permission to showcase fanwork in their promo sections, or request a specific # ("send us your fan work and we'll showcase it" is ok, "we'll take any fanart we find and showcase it" isn't)

'Vamily Spotlight': WoD Brand Team is Taking Art Without Permission

Recently, I was informed by a friend that some work of mine had shown up in the World of Darkness’ official ‘Vamily Spotlight’ section of their latest video. In this they talk about the gameplay reveal of Bloodlines 2 and generally drum up hype for it, which is largely what you expect from company channels when they’ve a new product out.

There’s a problem with this: I was never informed, or asked. No consent was given to use that work, or any others.

Through some excellent efforts by friends I also found that my work was in two other videos, with the earliest being well over a year ago-- totalling three, and they were up on both Twitch and YouTube.

Now, you’ll note that I’m a professional artist with two separate art degrees and well over a decade and a half of training. I’ve also a basic understanding of copyright and fair use.

The Vamily Spotlights are little to do with the review and news section of the video and therefore do not really have bearing on the main point of the video. To this end, I’d assume they’re there as a draw to viewers, maybe to see if their or their friends’ work has turned up in these official videos. And nominally that’s a valid tactic for engagement, if you have permission to use these pieces of work.

They do not however have permission, and certainly not from me.

As of writing, (5th of February 2024) I’ve issued a DMCA request for all three of the videos my work shows up in on both Twitch and YouTube, and takedowns are pending but I would urge people in the WoD tag here on Tumblr to check the available videos for themselves, if they are as concerned as I am. The screenshots of art in the videos they use to spotlight seem to come from Tumblr, as well as whole TikTok videos and other social media posts. If this makes the rounds elsewhere, do check your stuff wherever you are, WoD fans.

As the videos are also present on the Twitch VOD platform, this means they are actively charging money using our work without permission. I am unsure if their YouTube channel is monetised.

If they use your work for their spotlights, they are making advertisements and revenue off of your work without any reimbursement or prior consent.

I don’t know if other artists were asked, but I definitely wasn’t, and by now we all know the issues with ‘exposure’ and how that does not keep artists fed or housed.

And Paradox Interactive, having artists, they should know that you do not take for free from any of us-- at any level of influence or professionalism. The WoD community is not a free for all for companies to pick and choose free art to use like a bowl of cute little multicoloured sweets, it’s a bunch of creative, inspired and crafty people who come together across any edition of the many worlds in the setting to create as is our fair right to do so. Without being taken for granted, and without being cynically harvested for ‘content’. How vampiric.

Additionally I would like to note that all of my World of Darkness fanworks are based on legacy books; Vampire 20th Anniversary Edition, Mage the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition and Hunter: the Reckoning First Edition most often, though there are appearances from others. You’ll note that not one of these books is the territory of Paradox Interactive or their World of Darkness brand management team-- looks to me like they’ve simply trawled the tag without reading what they’re looking at, which means they certainly didn’t take the time to ask permission to use these works. Not only were these actions tantamount to theft, it was also not even their fanart to begin with. And once again, they’d have known this had they contacted me at all, which they did not. It’s a failure on their part on several levels and not only do I want the videos taken down, I think the community is sorely owed an apology for this frivolous theft of art under the banner of ‘community content’. I didn’t opt in to having my work taken, and it should not have been assumed that it was okay to take my work just because it’s using a tag they also use!

I want everyone to know I have had zero benefit from their use of my work-- no money, no notes and no dialogue. This does not help artists. This does not help the community.

I’m willing to talk about this should anyone want to ask, but this is a gross abuse of artists and creatives’ rights for the sole purpose of gain by the World of Darkness brand team, and I expected better. I know I personally deserve an apology for this at the very least, as well as the WoD team to commit to actually contacting artists and sourcing permission in future-- and to set up an opt-in or out system for whether people want to be featured. I know I don’t, and I never asked to be. My work’s lovely, and they’re right to have said so. But it’s not for Paradox, and it’s not for Outstar or any of the other Brand team.

It’s for me, and people here on Tumblr who like it.

I’m disappointed, in PDX and in the WoD Brand team, because they should know far better than this.

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secretsofthemasquerade · 4 months

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I think February vacation is regional, so I'm curious:

In the tags if you could put your answers and general area. Please reblog for more votes.

#two weeks around the middle of feb before the easter holidays #french system is 6 weeks school and two weeks off #october and february holidays don't start on the same day everywhere in france tho so there's three schedules #no holidays between easter and end of the year in early july but plenty of bank holidays so that's fine

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secretsofthemasquerade · 4 months

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Me: oh yeah, if you think school photography is hard now, try imagining doing this with film.

The new girl: what’s film?

Me: … film. Like… film that goes in a film camera.

New girl: what’s that mean?

Me: … before cameras were digital.

New girl: how did you do it before digital?

Me:… with film? I haven’t had enough coffee for this conversation

#this is soooo god damn important #seriously kids 20 and younger have nooooo basic literacy anymore it's awful #tech stuff

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secretsofthemasquerade · 6 months

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#ilu :)))

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secretsofthemasquerade · 6 months

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thinking about ideas of ownership and dracula's castle. When does something become a threshold Dracula has to ask permission to cross? whose rules? i believe in squatter's rights i believe they should count... if dracula kidnapped me to his castle i would simply move into an abandonned wing and put up cardboard "this building has been SQUATTED" signs while he was out. maybe spraypaint a charming little anarchist A on the parapet while i'm at it. man comes home and has to ask permission to enter his own building part of which has lain empty for so long it started counting as abandonned property during a housing crisis (irresponsible). i say no.

#I adore this

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secretsofthemasquerade · 7 months

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#perfect #dracula #does this deserve the meme tag?#yeah i think so lol #meme

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secretsofthemasquerade · 9 months

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Happy crab day!

pffft lol thanks :D

#crabs

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secretsofthemasquerade · 10 months

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So all my books are on sale this week!

Wanna check them out?

Also I did two lists of things you might want to check out during the sale way back when. Waaaaay back then. Sorry I've been out of the loop for a while because Life has been kicking my life.

Please consider using my link to buy other things, it really helps a lot with my current situation.

(long story short, my life is in shambles, bad housing cohabitation, lots of mourning, lots of horrible things happened, but I'll eventually do an explainer, but I'll manage, I'll always manage)

#christmas in july sale #drivethrurpg sale

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secretsofthemasquerade · 10 months

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French native here: "chat" as cat and "chat" from chat gpt aren't pronounced the same. GPT as j'ai peté / I farted is correct though

("chat" as in chat gpt is pronounced the same as in English, while "chat" the cat is "sha", like the sha of Iran)

“French is such a beautiful, romantic language.”

“Cat, I farted.”

#french

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secretsofthemasquerade · 10 months

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It’s that time again! I’ll only accept bust commissions for now. I have changed some of the things I am willing to draw, so please read every single thing carefully. Details under the cut!

Before we get started, afew things worth noting:

Commissions will generally take WEEKS OR MONTHS, especially if your turn is very much later, and now that I have a 15 month old daughter to take care of. If you are IMPATIENT or you can’t wait or think commissions will be done in just hours, it’s not. So if you are any of the above, please think twice before placing a commission.

All payments will be done through PAYPAL and I only accept USD.

Please collect all the references you plan on using.

I’ll ask for FRONT VIEW, ¾ VIEW, SIDE VIEW & BACK VIEW of your characters/OCs, HEAD SHOT and FULL-BODIED are very much preferred.

If you want a specific fashion/clothing/hairstyle for your character(s), have them ready as well.

Specify if you want me to have full control of the art. If not, please provide reference and details as much as you can.

Please understand that I have the RIGHT TO REFUSE a commission that I am not comfortable to do, even if I didn’t state it in the terms below.

One last thing; this commission will generally take quite a bit of time. I have a 15 month old daughter, sometimes my weekend is taken, sometimes I crash after her bed time. My daytime will be focused on taking care of her, so I'll work on your commission after her bedtime. YOUR COMMISSION WILL TAKE A BIT LONGER. I’m sorry, but that’s inevitable. However, YOU WILL GET YOUR PIECE, that I shall try to never compromise. Just at a longer time. If you still want to commission me, THANK YOU, from the bottom of my heart. <3

What I do best:

SOLAVELLAN

I can draw for other fandoms as well, just provide me references.

I will gladly accept drawing your OC’s as well! Again, provide references.

I can draw NSFW art, but nothing explicit. I prefer sensual and tasteful 😉

Minimal background, starry background.

What I will NOT draw:

I will NO LONGER ACCEPT TO DRAW NSFW ART. I am absolutely sorry about this, but I have my own personal reason for this that I cannot/am not ready to share. I humbly ask for your understanding.

Smut and/or explicit sexual content. Nipples, dicks, vaginas and buttholes are not allowed.

Anything that depicts an alteration or amendment of a character’s CANON sexual orientation. I’m sticking to canon, guys. Sorry.

Anything that depicts racism, abuse, pedophilia, rape.

Mechas, robots, Sci-Fi & Zombies. Just.. No.

PAYMENT METHOD, REFUND POLICY & DELIVERY METHOD will be presented and discussed privately through email.

If you are interested in commissioning me, please send me an email to [email protected] stating your Tumblr URL, so I can update and organize. Once I have, we will start discuss about the commission!

I hope that is clear. If there are any information I might have overlook, don’t hesitate to send me an ask or DM!

If you can’t commission me, I have a KO-FI if you’d like to donate! I also have a REDBUBBLE if you’d like to buy my merchs, or you can always reblog and boost this post! :D Thank you so much for all your support my lovelies ♥

#I'd throw you all the money but alas #signal boost

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secretsofthemasquerade · 10 months

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Stickers I made for fun (and to have something small but finished XD). You can use them for whatever, except maybe don't sell them u know...

Also available as telegram stickers! Tumblr hates external links so I'll add it in a reblog

#these are cool!#art

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secretsofthemasquerade · 10 months

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figured out a way you can search for posts that are tagged TWO things on a blog!!! feeling clever

for anyone else who didn’t know, this is the format!:

https://[blogURL].tumblr.com/search/%23[tag1]%2C%20%23[tag2]

remove the [brackets] when using it!

#tumblr #oh nice

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secretsofthemasquerade · 10 months

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I would make "best stuff first" an op IN and not an OPT OUT.

Here's what I would love:

Be able to have a "follow from sideblog" (so i can have dashboards separated by fandom and let people know we're moots even if I'm using my sideblog lol). Or at least divide my dashboard up? like "this person I follow I want to see them in this dash with other TTRPG stuff, this one for misc activism people, this is the artists i follow, this is the writers and industry professionals..". No need to make those public, but just let me sort them lol. Idk, attach a personal hidden tag to the blogs i follow so I can search "ok, here's your dash with the people you follow you tagged as feelgood" or something.

Be able to "follow this person but only their og posts, or their og posts + their reblogs with comments"

Be able to filter someone's blog (tumblr.com/blog) with only those ("only reblogs with comments" and/or "only original posts").

Expand IM (make it bigger, because on desktop it's bad ;'( )

Thanks!

Tumblr’s Core Product Strategy

Here at Tumblr, we’ve been working hard on reorganizing how we work in a bid to gain more users. A larger user base means a more sustainable company, and means we get to stick around and do this thing with you all a bit longer. What follows is the strategy we're using to accomplish the goal of user growth. The @labs group has published a bit already, but this is bigger. We’re publishing it publicly for the first time, in an effort to work more transparently with all of you in the Tumblr community. This strategy provides guidance amid limited resources, allowing our teams to focus on specific key areas to ensure Tumblr’s future.

The Diagnosis

In order for Tumblr to grow, we need to fix the core experience that makes Tumblr a useful place for users. The underlying problem is that Tumblr is not easy to use. Historically, we have expected users to curate their feeds and lean into curating their experience. But this expectation introduces friction to the user experience and only serves a small portion of our audience.

Tumblr’s competitive advantage lies in its unique content and vibrant communities. As the forerunner of internet culture, Tumblr encompasses a wide range of interests, such as entertainment, art, gaming, fandom, fashion, and music. People come to Tumblr to immerse themselves in this culture, making it essential for us to ensure a seamless connection between people and content.

To guarantee Tumblr’s continued success, we’ve got to prioritize fostering that seamless connection between people and content. This involves attracting and retaining new users and creators, nurturing their growth, and encouraging frequent engagement with the platform.

Our Guiding Principles

To enhance Tumblr’s usability, we must address these core guiding principles.

Expand the ways new users can discover and sign up for Tumblr.

Provide high-quality content with every app launch.

Facilitate easier user participation in conversations.

Retain and grow our creator base.

Create patterns that encourage users to keep returning to Tumblr.

Improve the platform’s performance, stability, and quality.

Below is a deep dive into each of these principles.

Principle 1: Expand the ways new users can discover and sign up for Tumblr.

Tumblr has a “top of the funnel” issue in converting non-users into engaged logged-in users. We also have not invested in industry standard SEO practices to ensure a robust top of the funnel. The referral traffic that we do get from external sources is dispersed across different pages with inconsistent user experiences, which results in a missed opportunity to convert these users into regular Tumblr users. For example, users from search engines often land on pages within the blog network and blog view—where there isn’t much of a reason to sign up.

We need to experiment with logged-out tumblr.com to ensure we are capturing the highest potential conversion rate for visitors into sign-ups and log-ins. We might want to explore showing the potential future user the full breadth of content that Tumblr has to offer on our logged-out pages. We want people to be able to easily understand the potential behind Tumblr without having to navigate multiple tabs and pages to figure it out. Our current logged-out explore page does very little to help users understand “what is Tumblr.” which is a missed opportunity to get people excited about joining the site.

Actions & Next Steps

Improving Tumblr’s search engine optimization (SEO) practices to be in line with industry standards.

Experiment with logged out tumblr.com to achieve the highest conversion rate for sign-ups and log-ins, explore ways for visitors to “get” Tumblr and entice them to sign up.

Principle 2: Provide high-quality content with every app launch.

We need to ensure the highest quality user experience by presenting fresh and relevant content tailored to the user’s diverse interests during each session. If the user has a bad content experience, the fault lies with the product.

The default position should always be that the user does not know how to navigate the application. Additionally, we need to ensure that when people search for content related to their interests, it is easily accessible without any confusing limitations or unexpected roadblocks in their journey.

Being a 15-year-old brand is tough because the brand carries the baggage of a person’s preconceived impressions of Tumblr. On average, a user only sees 25 posts per session, so the first 25 posts have to convey the value of Tumblr: it is a vibrant community with lots of untapped potential. We never want to leave the user believing that Tumblr is a place that is stale and not relevant.

Actions & Next Steps

Deliver great content each time the app is opened.

Make it easier for users to understand where the vibrant communities on Tumblr are.

Improve our algorithmic ranking capabilities across all feeds.

Principle 3: Facilitate easier user participation in conversations.

Part of Tumblr’s charm lies in its capacity to showcase the evolution of conversations and the clever remarks found within reblog chains and replies. Engaging in these discussions should be enjoyable and effortless.

Unfortunately, the current way that conversations work on Tumblr across replies and reblogs is confusing for new users. The limitations around engaging with individual reblogs, replies only applying to the original post, and the inability to easily follow threaded conversations make it difficult for users to join the conversation.

Actions & Next Steps

Address the confusion within replies and reblogs.

Improve the conversational posting features around replies and reblogs.

Allow engagements on individual replies and reblogs.

Make it easier for users to follow the various conversation paths within a reblog thread.

Remove clutter in the conversation by collapsing reblog threads.

Explore the feasibility of removing duplicate reblogs within a user’s Following feed.

Principle 4: Retain and grow our creator base.

Creators are essential to the Tumblr community. However, we haven’t always had a consistent and coordinated effort around retaining, nurturing, and growing our creator base.

Being a new creator on Tumblr can be intimidating, with a high likelihood of leaving or disappointment upon sharing creations without receiving engagement or feedback. We need to ensure that we have the expected creator tools and foster the rewarding feedback loops that keep creators around and enable them to thrive.

The lack of feedback stems from the outdated decision to only show content from followed blogs on the main dashboard feed (“Following”), perpetuating a cycle where popular blogs continue to gain more visibility at the expense of helping new creators. To address this, we need to prioritize supporting and nurturing the growth of new creators on the platform.

It is also imperative that creators, like everyone on Tumblr, feel safe and in control of their experience. Whether it be an ask from the community or engagement on a post, being successful on Tumblr should never feel like a punishing experience.

Actions & Next Steps

Get creators’ new content in front of people who are interested in it.

Improve the feedback loop for creators, incentivizing them to continue posting.

Build mechanisms to protect creators from being spammed by notifications when they go viral.

Expand ways to co-create content, such as by adding the capability to embed Tumblr links in posts.

Principle 5: Create patterns that encourage users to keep returning to Tumblr.

Push notifications and emails are essential tools to increase user engagement, improve user retention, and facilitate content discovery. Our strategy of reaching out to you, the user, should be well-coordinated across product, commercial, and marketing teams.

Our messaging strategy needs to be personalized and adapt to a user’s shifting interests. Our messages should keep users in the know on the latest activity in their community, as well as keeping Tumblr top of mind as the place to go for witty takes and remixes of the latest shows and real-life events.

Most importantly, our messages should be thoughtful and should never come across as spammy.

Actions & Next Steps

Conduct an audit of our messaging strategy.

Address the issue of notifications getting too noisy; throttle, collapse or mute notifications where necessary.

Identify opportunities for personalization within our email messages.

Test what the right daily push notification limit is.

Send emails when a user has push notifications switched off.

Principle 6: Performance, stability and quality.

The stability and performance of our mobile apps have declined. There is a large backlog of production issues, with more bugs created than resolved over the last 300 days. If this continues, roughly one new unresolved production issue will be created every two days. Apps and backend systems that work well and don't crash are the foundation of a great Tumblr experience. Improving performance, stability, and quality will help us achieve sustainable operations for Tumblr.

Improve performance and stability: deliver crash-free, responsive, and fast-loading apps on Android, iOS, and web.

Improve quality: deliver the highest quality Tumblr experience to our users.

Move faster: provide APIs and services to unblock core product initiatives and launch new features coming out of Labs.

Conclusion

Our mission has always been to empower the world’s creators. We are wholly committed to ensuring Tumblr evolves in a way that supports our current users while improving areas that attract new creators, artists, and users. You deserve a digital home that works for you. You deserve the best tools and features to connect with your communities on a platform that prioritizes the easy discoverability of high-quality content. This is an invigorating time for Tumblr, and we couldn’t be more excited about our current strategy.

#staff #tumblr

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