Fark cruise and Fark codes

nperkins

http://m.fark.com/comments/7726777

I would be interested in comments from the home office regarding Fark booking codes and those of us who have already booked, and events exclusive to those who used the code.

We chopped KoKo's Kittens as an exclusive thing because it was exclusionary didn't we?

Grimoire

I also wouldn't mind getting a comment from @paulandstorm on this.

villicious

Thirded. One of the most amazing things about the JCCC world is its community. So inviting another entire established community seems like tricky business.

I know there's plenty of overlap in the JCCC/Fark Venn diagram, and that many Sea Monkeys are also Farkers. But the tone of the Fark world is quite different from the positive, accepting, inclusive-of-all tone of JCCC.

I'd have the same response if, say, it was Penny Arcade instead of Fark. Pretty much if it was any community other than Maximum Fun, since MaxFunCon and JCCC both have a really similar spirit of friendship/love/creativity/acceptance/welcome/enthusiasm.

Saint Toad

Yeah, I'm sure it's tongue-in-cheek, but I don't love the idea in the OP of the cruise being "crashed."  Or that some subsequent commenters are viewing it as a "Fark cruise."  But, as one of the people on the thread said, as long as everyone follows Wheaton's Law, it should be fine.  It's a done deal at this point anyway. 

 

ETA: I, for one, welcome our new Fark overlords!

Fizzgig

I'm on Fark, too.  Different handle, but it's an obvious one.

Misogyny is normal daily occurrence (40 lbs of rape seed gif is stereotypical, along with "Welcome to Fark" mean girls), though I have seen Drew intervene.  I use the ignore option quite frequently, due to trolls and just straight up rude people.

I think the crossing of the two streams will be a wild ride, but it would be hypocritical of me to say Farkers are bad people. *laughing*

BrettGlass

Hooboy. I'm not intimately familiar with Fark, but from what I do know it seems to be a community unto itself with, shall we say, somewhat different norms than the JoCo crowd. Will this be like two simultaneous conventions in the same floating "hotel?" Or will the Farkers be at all the same sessions/activities?

aliceandstuff

I am sure this will be just fine. And if not, either the home office will do something about it or the cruise will just become a different event. This was always possible, another group buying up a block of rooms to co-opt the event. Everyone can deal.

Saint Toad

Yep.  And at this point being anything other than welcoming is just ungracious and counter-productive.

mtgordon

Strange thought of the day: a portmanteau of snork and Fark would be either snark or fork.  Forking snarks?

BrettGlass

Snark is, in fact, Fark's stock in trade.

paulandstorm

Okay, here's the deal...

Drew Curtis (founder of Fark) is an old friend of both Jonathan and P&S. He and his wife attended JCCC3 as passengers, and had a wonderful time. Drew indicated to us that JCCC was something that many Farkers would enjoy as much as he did.

In addition, Storm and I have attended and performed at the past two Fark "gatherings" in Las Vegas. (Bill Corbett and Mike Phirman have performed there as well, among others) While the people we met there were not identical to the "average" JCCC passenger--there's a lower emphasis on nerddom, to be sure--we found them to be uniformly warm, friendly, engaged, sociable, and eminently compatible with the JCCC population. (That said, there were plenty of nerds there anyway)

As such, we arranged with Drew to put together a Fark invitation, which includes a specific booking code. Much of this is still very much in the initial planning/ideas stages, but the current plan is for there to be a few Fark-SPECIFIC (please note that that does not say "Fark-EXCLUSIVE") events over the course of the week--as Drew describes, possibly a pub crawl on shore, maybe some pre- and/or post-dinner drinkups, etc.--but otherwise, they'll be just part of the general JCCC population. There is no plan to make any of these events solely exclusive to Farkers; they should be thought of as more akin to, say, the LGBT drinkups from JCCC2 and JCCC3: of interest to a particular population, but not exclusive to said population.

As much as anything right now, the code will serve to help us on the administrative end: to give us an idea of how many Fark people are booked, and to know how large potential Fark events might be, so we can plan what venues to use accordingly.

So while we understand some initial reluctance on some folks' parts regarding this potential "invasion," we would ask that everyone take a deep breath, and please trust that we would never try anything like this if we thought it would "break" JCCC or make for an unpleasant experience for everyone.

Light-hearted message board joshing aside, we would hope people would not view this in an adversarial light, but as an additional opportunity to meet new people, make new friends, and to help show them exactly how awesome and special JCCC is. If you like, think of them as friendly snorks who like to drink. A *lot*.

P

nperkins

Thank you, Paul.

villicious

"[W]e found them to be uniformly warm, friendly, engaged, sociable, and eminently compatible with the JCCC population."

Thanks, Paul. That's really all I needed to hear, because ... well ... my work has been on Fark before.

paulandstorm

@villicious Fair enough. As a general rule, I try not to characterize any overall population by the contents of its comments sections. But it's hard.

P

villicious

@paulandstorm If only the results of being Farked were confined just to the comments section!

mikesphar

"If you like, think of them as friendly snorks who like to drink. A *lot*."

A CHALLENGER APPEARS

http://i.imgur.com/LESjUbl.png

Kvort_the_Duck

Having been on one JCCC I am completely hostile to new people! Especially people from sections of the internet I've never heard of!

...Wait...  pub crawl? Never mind - I'm cool with this.

----

I so wish I could quote "Blazing Saddles" right here...  It's so appropriate.

----

With the requisite ten lines of nonsense out of the way, I would imagine that people who are colossal asshats online have to be at least reasonably normal / polite in person. The fact that like 50% of the internet are said asshats and very few people I know act like that in real life seems to reinforce that fact. Having your subject in front of you tends to make a person realize that their words / actions have consequences.

I'm trying to be optimistic here and it's not my default setting. But I'm trying!

@villicious - I can't imagine what it would be like to have your creation mutilated by the underbelly of the internet. Unpleasant, to be certain. You can join my pessimists anonymous group if you'd like.  

SapphireMind

I think it would be great.  Maybe if two groups team up we could take over a whole big boat, and then while we might not all be from the same fandom, we would be far more similar than the average snork   

Heck, it could be people too who might not be interested in attending all the concerts, which books room on the boat but leaves more room for us at the concerts 

Jenipurr

I don't frequent Fark. It's not remotely my thing. I don't frequent Reddit for the same reason. But I also cannot see that it is worth any of us getting our collective panties in a twist because a few folks from outside our 'normal' sphere (whatever the heck that is) might also be joining us next year.

Cruises are quite expensive - especially when you factor in airfare, and all the additional costs that sneak in (drinks, hotel for those who fly in the day before / stay the day after, etc.). It seems like a lot of money and trouble to go through to try to deliberately ruin someone else's party. Therefore I have to conclude that the ones who will decide to come on this cruise with us would share at least some similar interests as the rest of us Seamonkeys (and of course that encompasses a rather wide range of things right there), and that short of them deliberately proclaiming I AM A FARK MEMBER to everyone they meet, most of us will never know (or, for that matter, care). They'll simply be Seamonkeys, same as everyone else. Hopefully with awesome fezzes. 

I have faith in the mighty power of Paul and Storm and the Home Office that they know what they are doing, and that JCCC 4 is going to be even more awesome than JCCC3, regardless of which websites all the attendees spend the most amount of time on. 

Lucky_LaRue

I am a Farker, and registered for JCCC4 after seeing Drew's post on Fark (and stopped by the other day to register here, too).  I do understand some of the concern from those that may only know us from our (sometimes) outlandish behavior that is often part-and-parcel of the Fark community, but paulandstorm have the right of it - when we get together in real life, we are warm, friendly, engaged, and... well "sociable" may be a stretch for some of the more awkwardly introverted of us..

I am looking forward to joining you all - not as a Farker, but as a (new) Seamonkey, and hope I can figure out enough of everything (Fez hats?) before we set sail.

Thalandor46

Welcome aboard @Lucky_LaRue!  I have every reason to believe that you'll fit right in with this little community that we have created, and it's sounding more and more like most of the Fark crowd will as well.  Thanks for the insight from the other side.  We can speculate about things all we want, but it does a tremendous amount to hear that perspective first hand

If you have any specific questions, feel free to ask!  We can almost certainly point you in the right direction.

stationary

Welcome, @Lucky_LaRue!  Joining the "JoCo Cruise Crazy 2014" and "Sea Monkey Fun" groups on Facebook is a good way to get a gentle(ish) introduction to our monkey ways, and learn at least a few of the names before February.  Repeating much of your post here in the related thread on JCCC 2014 would likely help to unruffle a few feathers, as well.

Lucky_LaRue

Thanks, @stationary!  I've put a request in to join "Sea Monkey Fun", but can't find "JoCo Cruise Crazy 2014" - I am pretty stupid about Facebook, but I am sure I will track it down before too long, and will cross-post once I do!

villicious

Here's the URL of the 2014 group. Kate or I get new members approved super speedily most of the time. https://www.facebook.com/groups/445038048903514/

Lucky_LaRue

Thanks, @villicious - I just sent a request.

Grimoire

Thanks for the clarification @paulandstorm!

Grimoire

One more question @paulandstorm.  As someone who has been an on-again off-again Farker for the past 10 years or so, is it possible (or even desirable for you guys) to add the FARKATSEA booking code to existing bookings?  At least one Farker forgot to do that.  I think it was our new friend @Lucky_LaRue actually...  

Lucky_LaRue

Yeah, @Grimoire - that was me.  I don't think it will matter much, though.  It sounds like the Fark events (if there are any) are going to be of the pub-crawl variety, and I think those will be for anyone that wants to tag along.

paulandstorm

@Grimoire No need to fret about using the booking code. We'll likely be using the sweet new User Accounts to allow all Sea Monkeys to express their interest in different events, including the Fark-themed activities (exact specs tbd).

And to reiterate/restate what's been said by Paul and others: we have exactly zero doubt that veteran Sea Monkeys and soon-to-be Sea Monkeys who join us from Fark (welcome aboard, @Lucky_LaRue!) are going to have a BLAST together. Probably an entire series of blasts. Possibly even a Blasty McNasty.

- Storm

Kvort_the_Duck

Hmm...  We could invent a Blasty McNasty drink... Not sure I'd want to drink / order one though.

stationary

Blasty McNasty sounds like something the non-drinkers should be putting together as something of a challenge.

I'm thinking we start with ouzo and Kahlua.

Fizzgig

Goldschlager and Jager need to be in that drink.

And Peach Schnapps...  for a fruity aftertaste...

BrettGlass

Blasty McNasty is the name of my _____________ cover band. (Go!)

stationary

I dunno, Fizzgig.  Jager sounds like maybe you're trying to kill the tastebuds so as not to taste the second half of it, and that's cheating.

Definite bonus points for fruity aftertaste, though.

Fizzgig

stationary:

BrettGlass -> the easy fill-in would be "punk"

But I'm going to go with "Dr. Demento's Midnight classics"

JJRRutgers

Blasty McNasty is the name of my P-Funk cover band.

BrettGlass

I was going to go with "Sex Pistols," but wanted to see what other folks would come up with.

Angelastic

@BrettGlass: Moneyshot Cosmonauts

Grimoire

I'm not quite sure what everyone is on about, but I am pretty sure @Angelastic just won the thread.

BrettGlass

Yep. And I'm pretty sure she's thinking of this song, in particular, by the Moneyshot Cosmonauts.

Angelastic

I was just thinking of the band name rather than any particular song, but that one works.

Yay, a thread! I will hang it in my trophy case.