|
Post by Shadow of the Lotus on Apr 5, 2016 2:22:45 GMT
Well, it's about time that this forum refuge got its first poorly thought-out thread. I was actually going to make this thread in the forums during this week as something sort of fun to do on my own end. I think it will be less effective given the circumstances, but let's give it a shot all the same. First off, hello! I'm Shadow of the Lotus. You most likely don't know who I am because I have not actively participated in the forum for a few years now. But, back in the day, I was really involved with the community and, if you'll allow my modesty to slide, fairly well known back in the day. Seeing as it is the end of Homestuck coming up, I figured that I wouldn't be the only active-in-the-past-but-not-anymore character looking to come back for one more talk about a comic that we all, at one time or another, really enjoyed and were a part of. And, seeing as I bet I'm not the only old timer around, I thought it might be fun to create a thread focused on those old-time experiences. Everyone is welcome, certainly. But, the general idea of the thread, is to sort of create a time machine to older days. To talk about how the forum was back in the day, to talk about how the comic has evolved from its start to its finish. So! if you feel like you're a little too new to talk about how things were, feel free to ask questions or just generally comment! If you're much older, especially if you haven't posted in years, let's jam and talk about how things were in the past like old people with well manicured lawns. Special encouragement to old friends who may have fallen out of touch. If it's a failure of a thread, oh well. I had made plenty of those in the past. To start the discussion off, I've brought up all my old homestuck files to post and enjoy. I'll eventually post allllllll the avatars I've ever had as well just to show the sheer ridiculous number of avatars I did end up having. I started, god, probably a good 30 avatar trends during my days. That used to be such a fun thing. Look at what Lotus does with his avatar and everyone in the entire god damn forum would copy it. My first one being the 'shadow' shadow of the lotus avatar. I'll start with that and my first fan-art post. Watch out, it's Dr. Tran! 'Corrupt' Lotus. The oil imps seemed so menacing at first.
|
|
|
Post by mementovivere on Apr 5, 2016 4:11:56 GMT
I think this is a good thread. I hate that I didn't get involved in the fandom earlier. I started reading in 2011, but didn't really start posting stuff until 2012 or so... and even then it was pretty limited. There were a few things I did though. I'll put it all in spoilers. First avatar I had on the forums: First Homestuck fanart I ever put online: First Homestuck manip giffy thing I made: First time I drew myself as a God Tier (I have since decided I'm more a Rogue of Space) A more recent forum avatar with me as Rogue of Space: There was also a whole 30+ page Homestuck fan adventure I made starring my brother for his birthday one year, complete with a few sound pages and an animated flash at the end. That was a lot of work but a lot of fun. /spoilers]
|
|
Holly
Gadabout Pipsqueak
How do I......get through one night without you....
Posts: 129
Pronouns: she/her/hers
|
Post by Holly on Apr 5, 2016 10:31:52 GMT
|
|
|
Post by Shadow of the Lotus on Apr 5, 2016 12:20:03 GMT
Ah man, looking through those old romart pics brings me back. I didn't catch the first John/Rose pic in that set though. I'll have to see if I have that saved somewhere in my files. Ah, nope, nothing saved. Though I could point it out if it was posted. It wasn't much of a shippy picture, just John and Rose walking down a sidewalk and smiling with backpacks on. Notable for being the first explicitly made John/Rose picture that was posted on the forums.
|
|
|
Post by Shadow of the Lotus on Apr 5, 2016 12:42:15 GMT
One more post before I head out to work. An old Sb&HJ comic I made. Not sure how spoiler tags work here. Here's an attempt at one.
|
|
|
Post by Blaperile on Apr 5, 2016 14:31:54 GMT
Oh hey this is a cool thread. I don't really have immediate access to old stuff I did (it was hosted on imageshack and all that is down now, I guess it's somewhere on one of my backups though). But if we gonna talk about old times, I'm so up for that. I miss the times that people like mysteriousOutsider, mythicalWashrag, colwag, ArmsAreLoud, Doom Zero, P_equals_NP, bloodyEmissary, AceOfDarkHearts and other people like them used to be active on the forums. Some of them are still around on the Skype chats (colwag and Doom Zero for example) and I really like that. I'm so happy that now that the end is coming old people like you, Shadow of the Lotus, are popping back up again. Things used to be so different on the forums, what with how different moderators and admins were running the show. Who remembers the quote/spoiler pyramids? And Esrever, the pyramid slayer? And all our silly avatar fads (god bless Holly for using that particular avatar here )? Or our endless Vriska discussions and the silly laws we came up with? I miss the times that Esrever, Drillgorg, tynic, Andrew and the like used to be omnipresent. It's just weird to see how much has changed the past 5 years.
|
|
|
Post by therationaldove on Apr 5, 2016 15:52:50 GMT
I only joined the forums very, very recently, but I'd still consider myself an older fan (pre-Gigapause) relatively speaking. Don't know where we are placing the distinction between old and new. Anyway, while i can't speak to the forums, I can speak to the Homestuck fandom culture on Tumblr back then. There are some memes I remember with fondness: Nepeta is dead, "with Equius", This Week On: I didn't realize it was Homestuck, Homestuck is an anime, Fandomstuck, Keshastuck, all of those gifs with the character's heads replacing people's faces (although that was bigger before my time), that one time when the "shows up fifteen minutes late with coffee" meme was really popular and someone made the joke that John hadn't showed up yet after the Alpha Kids went God Tier, even though Jade had, which lead to Hussie putting in a coffee cup in the next panel showing John so that he had indeed arrived 15 pages late with coffee, THE TRICKSTER ARC HOT DAMN, no one knew what to make of that, the controversy around the CAUCASIAN page (of course, that wasn't a good thing, but I was very much aware of that bit of nastiness), the rare times when Hussie would, you know, actually use Tumblr. The weirdness of the Gigapause and all of those shenanigans. I also distinctly remembered how shocked everyone was when Gamzee was gunned down by Caliborn and seemingly murdered for ever and everyone was like 'The clown is finally dead." but then he ended up not dying and everyone was pissed by it.
Man, even though I only started reading in 2012, this has all been such a wild ride.
|
|
The One Guy
Rust Maid
Posts: 1,148
Pronouns: he/him/his
|
Post by The One Guy on Apr 5, 2016 18:15:33 GMT
For a while, Homestuck was just one of the comics I read, albeit one of my favorites, but when I finally got into the fandom, I participated in the image manipulation thread ... and that's it. I later moved on to forum adventures, and only started to venture into the rest of the forums during Act 6.
But anyway, remember the image manipulation thread back in the day? All sorts of memes, like babydave and "what's in the box, Jack?" And of course, the endless arguments about nominations for best of thread leading to voting on a thread leader who would set the nomination rules and manage the best of thread. My avatar kept getting more and more cluttered as well...
As for the Forum Adventures section, I feel like I missed the peak of it's golden age, but I did get to see the later part of it, getting to see a lot of big name adventures and an actual forum adventure community. To be fair, forum adventures are still going strong, but it's not as big as it once was, and the few big name adventures left tend to have small communities of their own rather than being part of a larger forum adventure community. I remember when a lot of the old members were dissatisfied with changes in forum policies making things impersonal, so they moved on to Eagle Time Forums.
Speaking of which, remember when the forums had multiple "skins" to view things in? If I recall correctly, you could view the forums with a dark theme, a light theme, a scratch (green) theme, or a "classic" theme. Those were the days when there were actually people maintaining and working the forums. Then they took away a lot of stuff to do a big update and abandoned the site in an under construction state, let it fall into disrepair and apparently getting hacked and shut down just as Homestuck started updating again...
|
|
|
Post by Shadow of the Lotus on Apr 5, 2016 21:59:14 GMT
For a while, Homestuck was just one of the comics I read, albeit one of my favorites, but when I finally got into the fandom, I participated in the image manipulation thread ... and that's it. I later moved on to forum adventures, and only started to venture into the rest of the forums during Act 6.
But anyway, remember the image manipulation thread back in the day? All sorts of memes, like babydave and "what's in the box, Jack?" And of course, the endless arguments about nominations for best of thread leading to voting on a thread leader who would set the nomination rules and manage the best of thread. My avatar kept getting more and more cluttered as well...
As for the Forum Adventures section, I feel like I missed the peak of it's golden age, but I did get to see the later part of it, getting to see a lot of big name adventures and an actual forum adventure community. To be fair, forum adventures are still going strong, but it's not as big as it once was, and the few big name adventures left tend to have small communities of their own rather than being part of a larger forum adventure community. I remember when a lot of the old members were dissatisfied with changes in forum policies making things impersonal, so they moved on to Eagle Time Forums.
Speaking of which, remember when the forums had multiple "skins" to view things in? If I recall correctly, you could view the forums with a dark theme, a light theme, a scratch (green) theme, or a "classic" theme. Those were the days when there were actually people maintaining and working the forums. Then they took away a lot of stuff to do a big update and abandoned the site in an under construction state, let it fall into disrepair and apparently getting hacked and shut down just as Homestuck started updating again... I can certainly remember the image manipulation thread. I think this image sums up nicely some of the earliest of early memes in the forum regarding Homestuck. I definitely remember baby Dave getting thrown all over the place. There had been speculative fanart before on what Nanna and Hass (Grandpa Harley my ass. He's always Hass Harley to me) would look like as kids even before the ectobiology reveal. However, there was a lot more of it after the babies were seen. Here were my two cents on the idea at the time. Not too far off, really. I'll start working on a post about my avatars and the trends that were popular in the old days.
|
|
|
Post by Shadow of the Lotus on Apr 5, 2016 22:15:26 GMT
Oh hey this is a cool thread. I don't really have immediate access to old stuff I did (it was hosted on imageshack and all that is down now, I guess it's somewhere on one of my backups though). But if we gonna talk about old times, I'm so up for that. I miss the times that people like mysteriousOutsider, mythicalWashrag, colwag, ArmsAreLoud, Doom Zero, P_equals_NP, bloodyEmissary, AceOfDarkHearts and other people like them used to be active on the forums. Some of them are still around on the Skype chats (colwag and Doom Zero for example) and I really like that. I'm so happy that now that the end is coming old people like you, Shadow of the Lotus, are popping back up again. Things used to be so different on the forums, what with how different moderators and admins were running the show. Who remembers the quote/spoiler pyramids? And Esrever, the pyramid slayer? And all our silly avatar fads (god bless Holly for using that particular avatar here )? Or our endless Vriska discussions and the silly laws we came up with? I miss the times that Esrever, Drillgorg, tynic, Andrew and the like used to be omnipresent. It's just weird to see how much has changed the past 5 years. (I'll stop double posting, I swear. These are just distinct posts and all and I don't want to get too bogged down with multi-quotes) Some of those folks I remember, certainly. I think my super active storm was the first two years of homestuck though so they don't quite stick out as much as they might. Gankro, Marelo, Elementoid, Telamon, Portal, Michi, Rei; those are the names that ring out to me as "never seen again." And Wheeeeeeatthins, though he stuck around to some extent. There are plenty of names I'm forgetting to call out. Oh geez, what was the name of that mod with the fox avatar. And Leaf, of course. Mr. Bear was a classic. And Waustara. Or... something spelled like that. Was always a little sad I never became a mod. Though I'd have lost my temper with BKEW or Varin and gotten myself in trouble, probably. And on to another old time reminisce which gives me an excuse to post all my terrible fan-art: avatars! I had quite a habit of changing avatars and it seemed like whenever I changed mine, everyone else changed theirs to match! I had a blast with it and loved the trends that followed. Folks might notice a trend or two that stuck around from people who stuck on one particular trend. First, one's made by others! Alright! Now, my main lotus avatar. I had different variants and I'll post them by that. Original Lotus: Not a whole lot of these. Next up, what I called "self Lotus" because I made it myself. And it was terrible. I think about this time I started to animate my avatars. I clearly remember having some animated self-lotus avatars. I'll just stick the animated ones at the end. Next up, what I called "lava Lotus" because I made it out of the sburb logo that showed up in the lava from the meteor that landed where Jade's house later was. This ended up being my most used avatar style. I think I have a few more that are spread elsewhere for that one, but that's enough as it is. Last, my animated avatars. And looks like I should have just checked animated first since I had an animated avatar with nearly all my avatars. All well. So there you have it. A look at some of the most prominent avatar trends in the first three years of homestuck in the forum.
|
|
|
Post by Blaperile on Apr 5, 2016 22:21:07 GMT
Gankro, Marelo, Elementoid, Telamon, Portal, Michi, Rei; those are the names that ring out to me as "never seen again." And Wheeeeeeatthins, though he stuck around to some extent. There are plenty of names I'm forgetting to call out. Oh geez, what was the name of that mod with the fox avatar. And Leaf, of course. Mr. Bear was a classic. And Waustara. Or... something spelled like that. Was always a little sad I never became a mod. Though I'd have lost my temper with BKEW or Varin and gotten myself in trouble, probably. Out of that list I remember Gankro, Marelo, Elementoid, Wheeeeeeatthins, Wesley Fox (the one with the fox avatar, they still regularly showed up after that), and Leaf (mostly from seeing old posts of them about their whole coma story).
|
|
The One Guy
Rust Maid
Posts: 1,148
Pronouns: he/him/his
|
Post by The One Guy on Apr 5, 2016 22:34:22 GMT
Things used to be so different on the forums, what with how different moderators and admins were running the show. Who remembers the quote/spoiler pyramids? And Esrever, the pyramid slayer? And all our silly avatar fads (god bless Holly for using that particular avatar here )? Or our endless Vriska discussions and the silly laws we came up with? Somehow I missed this earlier, but oh yeah, I remember quote pyramid shenanigans! At one point I made a joke image of Esrever killing my avatar because it's pyramid-like.
And I was always a bit of an outlier to avatar fads, I participated in a few of them (babydave most significantly, as I never got rid of him), but I remember feeling like one of only a few who did not have a scratch-ified avatar at one point!
|
|
wheals
Mr. Snoozyprince Mcsleepypants
Posts: 170
|
Post by wheals on Apr 6, 2016 0:53:44 GMT
Oh man, these bring back memories of ComDisc 100. I think I ended up being neutral on Team Sleuth between Team MC and Team Felt. Still impressed by how they pulled off the flashing background on the page with Lord English's OP.
|
|
cookiefonster
Dead
TAKE US THEIR FRESH JIMMY
Posts: 723
Pronouns: he/him/his
|
Post by cookiefonster on Apr 6, 2016 1:50:46 GMT
Man I don't really have old time Homestuck memories.
I started reading in July 2014, about nine months into the Gigapause, and finished right around the time of the giga-almost-unpause announcement. I joined the forums a bit before last 4/13, a few days before Caliborn's Masterpiece and just before the start of the Davekat Debate Era. I guess I can remember before there were all those unpleasant debates over that ship?
|
|
|
Post by Shadow of the Lotus on Apr 6, 2016 1:53:24 GMT
Man I don't really have old time Homestuck memories. I started reading in July 2014, about nine months into the Gigapause, and finished right around the time of the giga-almost-unpause announcement. I joined the forums a bit before last 4/13, a few days before Caliborn's Masterpiece and just before the start of the Davekat Debate Era. I guess I can remember before there were all those unpleasant debates over that ship? Being newer doesn't mean you can't participate though! Gaze at the museum pieces of the past and wonder. And hey, plenty of stuff going on other than ship debates too. No need to be a one-horse pony. Or some sort of thing like that. One show pony? One... something with horses.
|
|
cookiefonster
Dead
TAKE US THEIR FRESH JIMMY
Posts: 723
Pronouns: he/him/his
|
Post by cookiefonster on Apr 6, 2016 1:56:16 GMT
I guess you could say I experienced the stretch of updates from Caliborn's Masterpiece to Remem8er and participated in discussions as that happened. Plenty of debates on, well, all the most debate topics. Davekat, Vriska, the retcon, and timeline stuff.
|
|
|
Post by karkat on Apr 6, 2016 2:05:26 GMT
why do you have to bring that up when you have nothing useful to contribute to the thread
back on topic, it's weird thinking about all this history considering i still feel like a "homestuck newcomer" even though i started reading in 2010, but i really didn't start looking for places to talk about homestuck until right before cascade, so i missed a lot of "fandom history" that happened in 2010-11. Being friends with people who started reading in 09 probably doesn't help matters either. it felt a whole lot bigger back then, probably b/c there was a lot more intermingling between different groups of homestuck fans and the forums felt a lot more important and more of the center of things. i think with a fanbase the size and breadth of homestuck you can't really have one unified center of discussion. there were some _severe_ growing pains and a lot of users left to talk about hs/other things elsewhere
also its weird looking back and seeing names i barely remember next to names of people i continue to interact with to this day. everything seems so splintered now
|
|
sporkaganza
You are the Star
Posts: 221
Pronouns: he/him/his
|
Post by sporkaganza on Apr 6, 2016 2:33:43 GMT
It's funny you should bring up the Davekat Debate Era, as though arguing about shipping is something we've only sunk to in 2016. In 2011, you know what it was? The Johnkat Debate Era. Yeah, I think it's safe to say I'm glad we've put those days behind us.
And yeah, I feel the same way. I caught up in January 2011 so I still don't feel like a true old guard fan, but statistically I really kind of am. The majority of the active fandom nowadays joined 2012 or later, which is honestly hard to believe.
|
|
partymember57
Gadabout Pipsqueak
Best Fraymotif
Posts: 126
Pronouns: he/him/his
|
Post by partymember57 on Apr 6, 2016 2:35:30 GMT
I remember so many people. It was just all about the community for me. I remember when I really used to have a ton to say, but now my life is a little busier and I haven't found the time. I regret going dark for a little while, I wish I had said more of what was on my mind back in the day, even if it was just simpler stuff what other people had already said.
Does anyone remember that time the Syrians hacked us? That seems like so long ago. Or that time Caliborn got a deviantart account? Or when we candycorns in our sigs? If we could bring that back, I'd have a lot of corns I'd need to swap out for other things. I'm a very different person after those 4-ish years.
|
|
sporkaganza
You are the Star
Posts: 221
Pronouns: he/him/his
|
Post by sporkaganza on Apr 6, 2016 2:42:34 GMT
Here's a "kind of old timey but not really" reminiscence: I remember how in the timespan between our first glimpse of the trolls' ancestors with Mindfang's journal and being told about the rest of them in Doc Scratch's speech, a whole bunch of headcanons sprang up about the ones we hadn't seen yet. The one that sticks out in my mind is a very cute ask blog with Aradia's ancestor, who was like an Indiana Jones-style adventurer archaeologist, who had kind of a romance thing going on with Equius's ancestor... which is a bit ironic and sad to think about knowing what the Handmaid's life was really like.
|
|
partymember57
Gadabout Pipsqueak
Best Fraymotif
Posts: 126
Pronouns: he/him/his
|
Post by partymember57 on Apr 6, 2016 2:46:19 GMT
I wasn't around for that. I caught up pretty as soon as 2012 ended. Some people were actually still a little wary of the Alpha kids and Act 6 in general, because it just felt different. I kind of felt that way too. There are some characters I used to hate but ended up warming up to (Dirk), and some people I used love that I still feel a little different about (Dave). Now I think I've mostly made my peace with everyone as the new character developments about them cooled off, and I looked at things with better hindsight.
|
|
|
Post by Shadow of the Lotus on Apr 6, 2016 2:46:21 GMT
It's funny you should bring up the Davekat Debate Era, as though arguing about shipping is something we've only sunk to in 2016. In 2011, you know what it was? The Johnkat Debate Era. Yeah, I think it's safe to say I'm glad we've put those days behind us. And yeah, I feel the same way. I caught up in January 2011 so I still don't feel like a true old guard fan, but statistically I really kind of am. The majority of the active fandom nowadays joined 2012 or later, which is honestly hard to believe. First it was John/Rose v. Dave/Rose and no one cared about Jade. John/Jade was relatively popularr, but Dave/Jade was sort of the forgotten one. With the obvious splits in the camps. Dave/Rose always had the advantage, but John/Rose was next most popular out of those four. John/Terezi quickly became a thing before vanishing. Rose/Kanaya was a fan favorite very early on in that conversation. Though Sollux/Kanaya came first! Geez, I used to ship that legitimately and pretty hardcore. And then came the Troll/kid v. kid/kid shipping. John/rose v. Vriska/John and Kanaya/Rose, etc etc... with Terezi and Karkat playing game with Dave and Jade. I can still remember the victory gloating during the ectobiology reveals. And all the denial. "That doesn't make them siblings! It's not incest! Dave/Rose is still going to happen." Sure seems short-sighted now; all those John/Rose shippers celebrating.
|
|
sporkaganza
You are the Star
Posts: 221
Pronouns: he/him/his
|
Post by sporkaganza on Apr 6, 2016 2:50:47 GMT
It's funny you should bring up the Davekat Debate Era, as though arguing about shipping is something we've only sunk to in 2016. In 2011, you know what it was? The Johnkat Debate Era. Yeah, I think it's safe to say I'm glad we've put those days behind us. And yeah, I feel the same way. I caught up in January 2011 so I still don't feel like a true old guard fan, but statistically I really kind of am. The majority of the active fandom nowadays joined 2012 or later, which is honestly hard to believe. First it was John/Rose v. Dave/Rose and no one cared about Jade. John/Jade was relatively population, but Dave/Jade was sort of the forgotten one. With the obvious spits in the camps. Dave/Rose always had the advantage, but John/Rose was next most popular out of those four. John/Terezi quickly became a thing before vanishing. Rose/Kanaya was a fan favorite very early on in that conversation. Though Sollux/Kanaya came first! Geez, I used to ship that legitimately and pretty hardcore. And then came the Troll/kid v. kid/kid shipping. John/rose v. Vriska/John and Kanaya/Rose, etc etc... with Terezi and Karkat playing game with Dave and Jade. I can still remember the victory gloating during the ectobiology reveals. And all the denial. "That doesn't make them siblings! It's not incest! Dave/Rose is still going to happen." Sure seems short-sighted now; all those John/Rose shippers celebrating. See, all that stuff is "old timey Homestuck" now, but now it's split into "old stuff" (2011-2012ish, I refuse to accept any year after that as "old") and "REALLY old stuff" (pre-2011). I was around for the Troll/kid vs. kid/kid stuff, and anything after that point is pretty much getting into Act 6 shipping - Dirkjake vs. Not Dirkjake, essentially, although back in the day I totally thought Jane/Roxy was gonna go somewhere. But there's still stuff in there that I've only ever heard of through lore, such as how popular Dave/Rose and John/Jade were, and then the ectobiology stuff happened and everyone was like "oh shit".
|
|
|
Post by Shadow of the Lotus on Apr 6, 2016 2:58:30 GMT
Don't let people misguide you. John/Jade was the 3rd most popular of the 3 popular kidships. And Dave/Jade took it over 2/3rds through its active shipping. It's biggest claim to fame was the heart shape on Dream Jade's shirt for the flash with Ballad of Awakening.
It was definitely a show-down between Dave/Rose and John/Rose. And Dave/Rose was the most popular definitely.
I can still remember reading threads about how Homestuck sucked and how Problem Sleuth was better. I can remember submitting commands through the command box instead of in the forum (Problem Sleuth era).
Still proud that I named a few characters in Homestuck too. I was actually pretty involved in creating a lot of the troll names.
The Pyrope part of Terezi was my favorite contribution. I pushed for Latula which ended up being used for the dancestor.
Oh god, what other ones was I involved in... I mostly just remember pyrope because I was damn proud of it.
There was basically a collective of about 10 people who were heavily successful in naming the trolls. We all sort of agreed to collectively decide on a name to push and flood the suggestion box with it. I was among those who were part of that.
|
|
|
Post by scarodactyl on Apr 6, 2016 5:20:46 GMT
What ever happened to the cutesie names? I never paid much attention to shipping, but john/rose is a lot less fun to say than "grimdorks."
|
|