The State of the @NoNamesLeftToUse Address: A Strange New Land

^{Nearly seven months has passed since the last edition of my art and thoughts.}

The Writer/Artist Himself has a new home.

The State of the @NoNamesLeftToUse Address gives me — the man behind the scenes — a chance to step out of character, ramble about current events in relation to my blog, then jam all recent art productions into one post as a method of cataloging my creations so you — the viewer — can browse my work much more efficiently.

A lot has changed in seven months.

So here's a bit of a history lesson.

The Steem blockchain and Steemit had been my home for roughly three and a half years.

When I started, I wasn't certain how much time and effort I'd put in to this blog.  After a couple of months of learning the ropes and gaining traction, I had decided to go 'all in' with my content and make that platform the official home of this entity and all things @NoNamesLeftToUse.

Being able to work using a pseudonym and the 'fact' my work could never fall prey to a panel of censors were the two strongest selling points for me.

I required a platform to develop a distinct style — separate from anything else I had ever attempted in the past or even now in another life — and the solid foundation necessary to build a 'proper' brand.

A short series I never finished known as Haffanower — which I had developed as a test run — saw early success.  With Haffanower, I was attempting to break nearly every unwritten rule in publishing as a stress test of sorts.  It's jammed with absurd examples of off-color humor and the artwork was ridiculously cheap, intentionally produced to appear as if a child was at the helm.

Nobody complained.

From there I knew I could get eyes on my artwork utilizing things like fiction, humor, or alter egos, rather than depending on more traditional approaches such as a boring brief description about what you're looking at and here are the pricing options.

So I spent some money on tech and decided to put on a big show for everyone.  Always raising the bar higher and higher, consistently spending more and more time on each production and post.

That effort led to having one of the most lively blogs with actual human engagement on the entire platform, consistently.  An achievement I was both proud of and also nervous about because it meant I'd have to work even harder in order to maintain that level of success.

Working harder goes hand in hand with getting tired and eventual burnout.  So I'd take my yearly breaks, then jump back in, pick up where I left off.

But then we broke up.

Majority of the community who had always welcomed me back with open arms... moved away.

The viewership I had worked hard to earn over the years was now suddenly looking elsewhere.  The stage I was on was ready to collapse.

I thought about retiring.

But instead I've decided to rebuild, alongside nearly everyone else.

I didn't leave the old place due to political reasons.

It's not a political speech or just an opinion when I say, "There's the chance of being censored on Steem."

That's a fact and I simply cannot work under those conditions.  Just the thought of having over three years of work wiped away without an explanation is disturbing and makes me cringe.

That censorship concern extends beyond the platform.  As I stated earlier, I had joined this community to build a brand and go 'all in' with exclusive content.  Therefore, if you search my account name, it points straight to me.  I wanted this name to be known beyond the confines of a blockchain interface and community.

If my content gets wiped, all those links I managed to place high up on Google point to dead space.  All of my artwork you can see in the images section when searching my account name on Google point to Steem and would therefore vanish.  All of the links I strategically placed over the years here and there to help bring outside eyes to my work and the platform would lead nowhere, if that content was wiped away.

I did far more than just sit here and collect cryptocurrency over the years.  Back when Steemit had a view counter, one could watch the views on my old work rise consistently.  Slow and steady.  Those were random outside eyes.  I made that happen.  Wasn't a fluke.

It would be ridiculously irresponsible of me to publish content on a platform that can decide to erase it whenever they feel like it.  Far too much effort goes into much of my work to risk losing everything under your noses and there's no point in the behind the scenes efforts if eventually all those links lead to nowhere.

At times, the planets align.  If I publish what I think is a hit, and that post gets a good response on the platform, I'll want to approach a few folks I know with large followings on social media and ask them to share my work on their accounts.  From there it could take weeks, months, even years for that post to gain traction on the outside.  Enough folks have to play the game of pass it on, sharing on social media.  That's how this online entertainment industry functions so if it reaches that 1000th potential share and the link is dead, that means 1000 links are dead.  Not cool.

This is supposed to be my store.

I'll use this fresh never before seen image as an example:

That was produced by me.

It has a name:

I Drilled It Into Your Head (But I didn't think it would make you dead.)

On a platform that will actively censor and remove content, all it takes now are a few people to complain, and something like that could be removed from the store shelves.

I've always treated my blog like a business.  I'm free to decide what goes on the shelves.  If people don't like it, that's fair, because that's the life I signed up for, and even if I produced a picture of a glorious sunset with ducks and horses, not everyone will like it.

But just because someone doesn't like something, that doesn't mean they can waltz into my store and take it off the shelves.

It would be ridiculously irresponsible of me to open up shop in a community that allowed that sort of behavior.

People acting like thieves all while disguising themselves as the righteous protectors of all things humanity will never float my boat.

It's my store, these are my shelves, and you can enjoy it without even paying a fee.  Hive is the only place I know of where I can do things my way, without living in fear of petty differences cultivating nonsensical consequences, so on Hive I'll post exclusively until it's no longer wise to do so.

I hope this project becomes a huge success.  Though it can be a little quiet at times, I realize it's still early in the game and that's just part of the growing pains I get to experience as I attempt to rebuild.  It's nothing I can't handle and to be honest, I don't feel welcome anywhere else, so I guess this is home, for now.

On with the show...

This is page eleven of this art catalog.  Links to all previous pages will be included at the end.  Another eleven page catalog exists of even earlier work but you'd have to dig pretty far to find that one.

At this point I've lost track of exactly how many artworks I've produced over the years as @NoNamesLeftToUse.  I'd guess high hundreds, maybe more.

It has been seven months since I last put all the work into one post so you'll see some of Season Four here along with what's new in Season Five.

Enjoy:

^{Some Place Different}

^Nothing

^{Eye Was Trapped}

^{It Was All A Blur}

^{The Nonsensical Award}

^{Self Explanatory}

^Tomaters

^{The God of Funn}

^{Help Me}

^{This Won't Hurt a Bit}

^{Muderous Myron}

^{You Took My Beans}

^{You Took My Beans (remix)}

^{My Thoughts Exactly}

^{One Thing}

^{Raffle-Coppin}

^Head

^{What a Mess}

^Strangled

^{The Stocker}

^{Untitled Mystery}

^{My Head Exploded}

^{A Picture of an Animal}

^{Captain Catastrophic}

^Eyesore

^{Purple Popsicle Licker}

^Beaten

^Taniqua

^{Another Artifact}

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All Previous Editions:

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_{The State of the @NoNamesLeftToUse Address: Another Month Down With Some Time Off In Between For Thinking Purposes}

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_{The State of the @NoNamesLeftToUse Address: The Art of Self-Sabotage}

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_{The State of the @NoNamesLeftToUse Address: Finding that Groove Again}

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_{The State of the @NoNamesLeftToUse Address: 25 More Days of Being The Only Me You Have}

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_{The State of the @NoNamesLeftToUse Address: I've Produced Over 200 New Works Of Art This Year — Probably Published Over One Million Words}

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_{The State of the @NoNamesLeftToUse Address: Looking Back to the Invisible Sights While Moving Forward to See What's Next}

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_{The State of the @NoNamesLeftToUse Address: Another Month Worth of Sights To See}

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_{The State of the @NoNamesLeftToUse Address: Staring at This Box, Wondering What to Write}

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_{The State of the @NoNamesLeftToUse Address: Still Willing to Work for Your Support}

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_{The State of the @NoNamesLeftToUse Address: What Two Months of Hard Work Looks Like}

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To Conclude

It never ends.

Have a nice day.

Credits:All art and images seen here were produced digitally, by me. ^{All content within this blog is 100% organic ACTUAL CONTENT and contains no paid vote additives!}
_{"Overstimulating your senses since 2016."}

^{© 2020 @NoNamesLeftToUse.  All rights reserved.}