Nightly Roundup #928

Seemed appropriate after today's events that this header be dedicated to Button Mash. Game on little guy. Game on.

Sorry there was no Roundup last night guys! We were short on stuff and I had to wake up early to help with Science Olympiad at the college. Enjoy a slightly longer than usual Roundup tonight and chill out in the comments.

PS Play this game here if you want to lose control of your life. Please blame Cereal.

Music of the Day #284

I hope you keep a dream diary, cause your next sleep will be filled with Luna dreams. If saying that actually works, you owe me 5 bucks.

We have 12 songs today! Go listen below.

Comic: Dream Counseling / Patch Job / Button Adventures No More / Maud is Nothing if Not Thorough / You See Nothing

As per tradition, with the new episode comes the new comics!

Click for full!

Twitter: Calpain 

Spotlight Music: Find the Music in You (8 bit Remix) / Get Your Hooves Up (TAPS Remix) / Endeavor

Whoever thought of that dance over at DHX is a genius.  Have Fluttershy doing that in the first one 8bit style, followed by a remix of Get Your Hooves Up from Taps, and finish with

1.) Find the Music in You - (Mush 8-bit cover) (Remix - 8 Bit)
2.) Get Your Hooves Up (Remix)
3.) Shurrikane - Endeavour [♫] (Instrumental - Orchestral)

Story Updates - March 22nd

Story updates! Luna has a moon hoodie, fractals are a thing, and Pinkie Pie is solid snake. Only in FANFICTION!  Go read below.

Drawfriend Stuff #1113

I'm going to sit back and hope this is what Maud Pie will be doing on her research journey. If earth had stuff like that as a common sight in a career in geology, I'd do it in a heartbeat.

Onward to art! SO MUCH ART.

[1] Source
Monolith

Short Animation: Dashity / Dinkylicious / Derpy Fishing

Longer version HERE

Shipping! Or almost shipping.  We start with that, get some dinky, then finish with some Derpy.  These are short, so don't expect anyhting too long! Click the images for full.

Equestria Daily, Fanfiction, and You (The Unrated Sequel): Where We Were, Where We Are, And What We Want To Be

Boy, do we know that feeling, Twi. Boy, do we know it well.

Couch posted a writeup last week announcing some changes to how Equestria Daily handles fan fiction, chief among them the switch from review-by-bullet-points to a no-feedback yes/no system. Much of the response to this announcement was positive (avoiding 3 month review times is a good thing), but here and there we noticed some dissenting opinions. That's nothing new to us. Many things the pre-readers have done for the last couple years have been met with some degree of derision and scorn. It comes with the territory, and we've always said that we've done our level best to be open and honest in public, as well as in replying publicly to criticism.

There comes a point, though, when we need to make a stronger response than just a one-off email or forum comment. Since Couch's last editorial went up, the pre-readers have agreed that that's the point we've been at for some time. This isn't a case of a broken clock being right twice a day. This is a case of us admitting that the clock was broken because we never took responsibility for letting it fall apart, and that we should've tried harder to fix it a long time ago.

In short: we messed up, and the yes/no system alone won't make that go away. This post won't fully do the job either, but hopefully it'll be enough to give it a good start.

Custom Compilation #117

Now that is a marvelous looking Hoity custom! In fact I think it's the best one I've ever seen of him to tell you the truth. Simply fabulous!

Custom ponies after the break guys.

[1] Source
My Little Pony Custom Hoity Toity 2

Livestream Saturdays and Drawfriend

Man, what a chaotic day. Hopefully things start getting better from here on out! At least take some time and relax with some streams today to get your mind off things.

As always with this event, if you want to partake in the madness make sure to send an email to me at [email protected] with your name, the type of art you'll be doing, a gallery link (optional) a link to your livestream and a banner (also optional). Make sure that your stream follows our content guidelines as laid out under our submit tab and also make sure to that you can be ready to stream at our standard time of 4pm EST / 1pm PST on Saturday. Also, if you participated in this week's stream event please send me the art you made so I can include it in next week's Livestream Drawfriend.

Twitter: Calpain

Courage is Magic - Dungeons and Dragons MLP Style

We are all geeks here, at least the cool among us. What better way to celebrate that than some good ol' tabletop!

Courage is Magic is a complete ponification of Dungeons and Dragons for all of you looking to grow some hooves in your next adventure. With a whopping 87 pages in the player handbook, it covers just about everything.  Some of the more recent additions include Bat Ponies as a race, as well as a Spirit of Chaos class. 

If that sounds fun to you, head on over here to grab the PDF!

SFM: Fluttershy's Dream

Seems reasonable to have a Fluttershy dreamscape thing with today's episode, even if Luna isn't involved in this one.  If you have seen Ferexes past SFM animations, you know what to expect here! Head on down below the break to check it out.

Mike Vogel Looking Into Concerns About Fan Work Takedowns

Coming from the wonderful world of Twitter, Hasbro Studios VP of development (who you may recognize from the various Comic Con pony panels he has hosted) Mike Vogel tossed this message up in response to the overwhelming amount of people asking about yesterday's Jan Animations take down.  While this doesn't guarantee anything, It's frankly awesome to see someone with a title like that digging around for what is going on over there.

If the EQD mailboxes are any indication, a lot of you are pretty worried about what is going on in the fan work arena. Hopefully we can get to the bottom of it soon! I can't imagine the free advertising on something innocent like Button Mash would really be something they are gun-ho to take down. Princess Molestia was understandable, but Jan's stuff hasn't been inappropriate in the slightest so far.

Cross your fingers for a legal free future!

For Whom the Sweetie Belle Toils - Episode Discussion

I HEREBY DEDICATE THIS POST TO MOONBUTT.  We rarely get to see her, and when we do, she is overshadowed by Celestia! This is an outrage! Best princess will RISE AGAIN.

You know the drill by now, at least I hope you do. 

As far as I know, there wasn't a big call to arms for live tweeting this time around.  I'm sure Meghan, Dave Polsky, and MKtoon will be saying something about it though!

Jan Animations (Button Mash, Picture Perfect Pony, Ect) Recieves C&D from Hasbro

Source: 4chan thread

We have some bad news coming out of the woodwork from Shadyvox (Button Mash's VA) over on the /mlp/ section of 4chan.  I don't think there is a person out there in this fandom who hasn't at least glanced at one of the major animations Jan and his team have created over the years.  Button Mash went from a background pony with only a few seconds of air time to a superstar with his own mini series.  Unfortunately that seems to be nearing it's end thanks to a C&D from Hasbro's 3rd party legal counsel.

With only Equestria Girls to hold us over during half-year long seasonal haituses, these episodic animations really help keep the fandom train going.  While we do well with art, music, fanfiction, and the other usual stuff, they rarely spawn mini-cultures for people to join in between breaks.  It's a huge shame to see another animator get the legal axe. 

Shadyvox has been answering various queries over on 4chan in regards to the takedown.  A few interesting questions have come up in regards to fair use and parody.  Fighting on that grounds would still require loads of money and time to go after, which isn't worth it to them.  Poking the bees nest is pretty dangerous for a small team of fan animators and voice actors, who could potentially be absorbed by a company like Hasbro to do this professionally. On the bright side though, Buttons Mom is technically still fair game, sans the FiM style.

Expect an announcement video with the specifics as they get everything together for it.

Note: As of 11:20 PM PST, all videos have been removed from the Jan Animations Studio Youtube channel. 

Update: A Vocaroo explanation has been released from Shady Vox