Admin Post: Discussion: Jake Parker and Inktober

[goss]

The Inktober Brand

So ever since drawesome got started, we've been using the annual Inktober challenge as an incentive to not only get more familiar with inking techniques, but also as encouragement to practice drawing through daily/weekly word prompts. It's been awesome to see the productivity and creativity of everyone inspired by this challenge each year. :)

Yesterday during our monthly chat post, olivermoss mentioned Inktober coming up, but also the fact that its originator Jake Parker has become quite protective of the brand name and its use by others online.

Re-naming Our Challenge

As an art comm, we would still like to engage in a month-long ink challenge, but we're thinking of simply re-naming the challenge itself, in order to avoid using a trademarked word without permission. Two options so far are:
1. Drawtober
2. October Ink
Which do you prefer? If you have any other suggestions, please let us know.

This month-long challenge would be to create art using ink, or an inking style. Traditional and digital art would both be welcome. :)

Well, this is...icky.

Er...I was just about to put up the above discussion post, when I stumbled upon this video on YouTube this morning. I think it might be worth it to share with you all:

Watch on YouTube

So in light of all this, I'm conflicted about whether we should even be promoting this particular challenge anymore. I mean, a month of prompts for doing ink drawings is a GREAT challenge, and I would hate to have to abandon the idea altogether, but now it feels all weird to be giving this guy more exposure through the comm.

Here are some options:
(1) Abandon the Inktober challenge altogether
(2) Re-name the Inktober challenge to something else
(3) Keep the inking idea, but move it to a different month - maybe November?
What are your thoughts?

Comments

[green_knight]

After learning of the plagiarism thing (I'm a copyeditor, I Have Opinions [*]), I was getting ready to do Artober...

November is a bad month for challenges - it's NaNoWriMo, and lots of people will be writing, so an art challenge on top of that would be too much.

Overall, October is not a bad month for it, and I've been looking forward to concentrating on art for a month, so I'd love to have the 'everybody does art for a month' vibe going, just without the Inktober tag.

[*] I don't read enough art books to judge this for certain, but given how popular Alphonso Dunn's book is, there's no chance Parker wasn't aware of it. Parker's defense is that that what he wrote has been 'common to the craft for decades', so I googled one topic and the two books are very similar, while every other explanation/example I found has a much wider range. At this point, I'd have flagged it for the editor.

[goss]

November is a bad month for challenges - it's NaNoWriMo, and lots of people will be writing, so an art challenge on top of that would be too much.

Thank you for your input on this. I know about how hectic NaNoWriMo is, and was wondering whether it would be a clash for that month.

Overall, October is not a bad month for it, and I've been looking forward to concentrating on art for a month, so I'd love to have the 'everybody does art for a month' vibe going, just without the Inktober tag.

*nods* I'd like that too. For me, being a teacher, September and the start of the academic year is...not ideal. December has a lot of challenges going on. October does seem like the perfect fit.

[mific]

Wow. I haven't had time to watch the whole of Alphonso Dunn's vid, but the bits I saw did look worrying, re Parker using very similar content. And some of the comments condemning Parker are from artists I admire, like Liron.

I think we should dissociate Drawesome from the whole Inktober thing, but I agree it's a good type of challenge to do. I agree with a name with no correlations, a different prompt list, and to moving it away from October to November unless the majority of people just can't manage that timing. Drawvember? Or just call it the November inking challenge. Novinks?

I'd be happy to put together a poll with, say, 40 prompt words, and we could vote to determine the 30 we prefer, and suggest others in the comments.

[goss]

I think we should dissociate Drawesome from the whole Inktober thing

Yeah, it's really disheartening. :/


to moving it away from October to November unless the majority of people just can't manage that timing

November does seem like a busy time for fandom in general though, so keeping the pace of regular ink drawings mightn't be feasible.

I'm veering more towards keeping it in October, but completely re-naming. Drawtober would work, because it doesn't even have the word 'ink' in there. And we could change the scope of the challenge to be more than just ink drawings. Thoughts?

[the_shewolf]

Personally I think keeping the challenge in October and renaming it something like Drawtober would be great. This year Im taking a break from the challenge overall but Drawtober sounds very fun, and I don't think Parker should take away everyone's month of fun because of his behavior and protectiveness :P

[goss]

I don't think Parker should take away everyone's month of fun because of his behavior and protectiveness :P

Agreed.

Thank you for your input on this issue and on the naming as well. :)

[minoanmiss]

I vote for Drawtober. That makes it Drawesome! :D Seriously, Drawtober links it to us, not him Do we want to come up with our own prompts list?

[goss]

Yay! I like the Drawesome-Drawtober link too. :D

Do we want to come up with our own prompts list?

*nods* We should definitely create a community list for the challenge, but of course I know there are lots of cool themed lists out there, so people can use whichever one inspires them.

mific above suggested creating a poll for choosing our words, so we'll probably get that going soon. :)

[olivermoss]

I am very into the idea of thumbing my nose at Jake Parker deciding he owns doing inks in October or can disallow digital artists. I'd had some of his defenders up in my face since years ago when I ran an event on an LJ comm and allowed digital.

I am endlessly confused as to why people took his self proclaimed ownership of inktober seriously enough for all this harassment and legal BS to happen.

So, I like #2. Doing a Drawtober or October Inks, but am down for whatever. I plan to do some inking in October. I enjoy it, it feels cozy. I think inking in October is a community thing and art stores are going to be full of tempting displays and events.

Also I am going to buy Dunn's book when I can.

[Edit - also I have a lot of inks and brush pens that need to be used more]

[goss]

It's not like drawing digitally detracts from developing your visual art skills in any way, so I don't quite get the resistance to its inclusion. :b We want to make the challenge as inclusive as possible, while also encouraging the exploration of ink as a medium for those who would like to delve into it.

So our October challenge will definitely be for both traditional and digital art, as well as open to any art medium, not just ink. :)

[syntheid]

FWIW, the term itself is still okay to use for non-commercial use, without the logo, as far as I know, but it's also free advertising for him, and personally I don't want to help him profit. Kind of like the idea of Drawtober as it's potentially more inclusive which was also an issue people had with Inktober.

Not really sure how much I'll participate, work and health have been leaving me without much time for art. But what I aimed for last time I tried to participate was more about trying to come up with creative/unsettling prompt fills as I don't really care that much for inks as a medium or as a method hah.

[goss]

Kind of like the idea of Drawtober as it's potentially more inclusive which was also an issue people had with Inktober.

Absolutely. :)

But what I aimed for last time I tried to participate was more about trying to come up with creative/unsettling prompt fills

This was one of the things I enjoyed most about other people's entries last year, because I personally wasn't able to participate.

[syntheid]

Oh I was reminded there is an actual drawtober hashtag on other social media, though it's a bit different with just six prompts for the month. But thought I'd throw that out since we're considering the name. :)

[mific]

I think we could still use it - maybe in the post about it we could call it "Drawesome's Drawtober Challenge" and tell people not to tag their works just as #Drawtober or (@)Drawtober on social media as there's another challenge called that. (in fact, this year's tag on twitter for the other challenge is #Drawtober2020, but there are a lot of Insta posts tagged with #Drawtober)

[goss]

Ah cool! Good to know that there's already people doing their own thing outside of the Inktober hashtag, but having the same kinda fun anyways. :D

[amberdreams]

I'd been wondering the same thing and had come up with my own list of prompts for a Supernatural themed month - but I'm more than happy to add another list - combining prompts is always fun. I'd vote for Drawtober because that keeps our own Drawesome branding.
Oh and if you wanted to use any of my words I'm not proprietory about this list at all LOL

[goss]

Cool that you made up your own themed prompt list! :)

Since so many of you guys seem to like Drawtober, we're probably gonna go with that.

Also, we'll be asking for prompt suggestions from members of the comm sometime this week, to make up our own list. So you can select a couple from your SPN list, or throw in some different ones too. It's so great that you already have these done. :)

[amberdreams]

I'm not usually this organised... LOL

[abyss_valkyrie]

So far I'm seeing Drawtober and since I always end up colouring some of my inktober works, it works for me!XD
Also yes,September is busy,November and December are also busy months so October seems like the only month where trying out some prompts seem doable. :)

[goss]

Good to know October, and Drawtober, works for you. :)

[chacusha]

I watched the video and wow, that is pretty damning. Definitely looks like Jake Parker was short on time and rather than figure out how to teach the concepts in his own way decided to just crib from Alphonso Dunn's book.

Anyway, I'm all for doing a challenge in October with a non-Inktober name. (Wasn't there a year where we community-sourced alternative Inktober prompts because the official ones weren't doing much for us, or am I misremembering?)

[goss]

Wasn't there a year where we community-sourced alternative Inktober prompts because the official ones weren't doing much for us, or am I misremembering?

Yup! I went back and found the 2018 post here: https://drawesome.dreamwidth.org/73554.html

I think we're gonna do the same thing this year, so if you want, you can start thinking up prompt possibilities. Stay tuned for a post soliciting prompts later this week. :)

[mekare]

That is a sad thing indeed. But I like the solution of calling it Drawtober and doing it in October anyway! I have been looking forward to it again, now that temperatures have dropped. I am also looking forward to our own community prompt list (I already have one or two I‘d like to suggest).

[goss]

Great! I'll be posting up a call for prompts soon. :)

[sexycazzy]

Following the majority and saying Drawtobter as well although I like October Inks too! Agree to keep it in October too!

Last year (or is it two years ago??!!) I used a mixture of the "official" Inkobter list and a Witchy list so quite like the idea of having an official Drawesome list but with the flexibility of using different prompt lists during the October month as I know that many people create their own prompt lists and share on various social media platforms etc

[goss]

quite like the idea of having an official Drawesome list but with the flexibility of using different prompt lists

Yeah, you could definitely mix and match prompt sources. Using the community list would be totally optional. :)

[syble4]

While I am not so sure it is truly a case of plagiarism, I do agree that until it's researched and resolved, distancing is a good call.

I love the name Drawtober, but if you want it to still be a inking challenge, Drawtober sounds more like a drawing challenge.

[goss]

Plus regardless of the plagiarism thing, even last year members of the comm had brought up the issue of Jake Parker's ownership of the name and his known displeasure at its use by others. So we'd probably have changed the challenge title this year anyway.

if you want it to still be a inking challenge, Drawtober sounds more like a drawing challenge.

Yeah, we'd like it to be an ink-focused challenge, but not exclusive to ink. I guess the "draw" part of the name is more indicative that it's a drawesome challenge than about the type of medium. :)

[green_knight]

There are multiple list of AI-created prompts at this link (under the name of 'Botober')

For October 1st, you thus get a choice of

This angry space station
A farm animal with purple spots
Four-dimensional objects
A rock

depending on which list you pick.
Go and read; they're hilarious. I hope people do them.

[goss]

Hee! The random weirdness makes for fantastic prompts. But for some reason "a rock" cracks me up the most. XD

You should choose a couple of your favourites and contribute them to our Drawtober prompt suggestion post, which I will be putting up sometime soon. :)