Senn555

A bunch of stuff happened. That was all I wanted to write out, but because of the 100 character limit and the fact that science has not yet found a method for people to telepathically read the minds of others over the internet, I guess I'm going to have to elaborate on my thoughts a bit. Just a little bit. :3 I live in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. Every July for the past ten years my dad and I have gone on vacation to the northwestern US and western Canada, primarily for shopping and seeing family and friends who live in Vancouver BC. Shopping in Canada is kind of meh as the selection for the things I'm interested in (right now, film/TV soundtrack CDs and pony merch) is practically nonexistent compared to the US. Until Target starts to open up in Canada in 2013, I imagine it's going to stay that way, pretty much. This year is no different. Driving out of Saskatoon, through Calgary, the BC mountains, Kelowna, to Vancouver, I spent a mere $25 in shopping. I go to the Seattle/Tacoma area for four days - bam - I've spent nearly 400 quid on all sorts of crap I probably shouldn't have but I feel the desire to own anyway. Soundtrack CDs, animated movie/TV DVDs... and pony merch mostly for my sister because she really wants all of the pony figures. I've got the brushables of the mane six, and I'm interested in picking up Trixie/Lyra/Zecora/other standalone figurines that don't come in playsets, but aside from that I don't really care for most other MLP merchandise. I'd love to get the ponies with the molded hair set (Twilight, Pinkie, Applejack, Spike, Celestia), but I'd rather hold off on that until a second set is released for the rest of the characters - however, Hasbro has officially stated that that particular set hasn't sold very well, so it's not likely to happen. Boo. Anyway. I've taken lots of pictures of new pony merch I've encountered at Target and Toys R Us in the US and the like... as well as pictures of the celebrities I've met recently, but my uncle's crappy computer in Vancouver doesn't want to load my camera SD card for some reason, so I'll post a "condensed" (if you can call it that) version of my vacation summary for now. Pics or it didn't happen. Yes, those will come later. Here we go! Saturday, July 21st / Sunday, July 22nd - I left Saskatchewan. Nothing really interesting happened that day and the following day (unless spending all day driving on the road is exciting), except that I bought a green Yoshi figurine for Feld0 at a Walmart in Calgary. If you're in Canada and you want to shop, Alberta is the best place to do it. No PST... it's 5% on everything in Alberta. Sask is 10% and BC has HST (ugh) so it's 12% on everything. Monday, July 23rd - More driving. Stopped in Kelowna for an hour and a half so I could see my best friend, the one who introduced me to Friendship is Magic - we actually became best friends because of the show. Applejack's Favorite Entrance to the Mall My Applejack and her Rainbow Dash~ Tuesday, July 24th - My sister and her fiance were taking their own vacation to Vancouver and they had already been there for three days before my dad and I arrived. I walked around downtown with them for the afternoon to do some shopping (I bought some anime soundtrack CD for $4, nothing else... AND BOOK-OFF SHUT DOWN BACK IN JUNE. DAMN IT). I was wearing my Applejack shirt and a couple of kids brohoofed me as I went past, on Davie and Thurlow. About 30 minutes later on Granville and Smithe, my sister alerts me to the guy next to me at the walk light and he's wearing a Gummy shirt. I went "excuse me, brohoof?", and he went OH MY GOD at my Applejack shirt. Then he brohoofed me. He was with a couple others and I overheard one of them say "I wonder how many bronies we're going to see today?" My meetup with Feld0 happened that evening at a Red Robin. Lots of insider secrets were traded that no one else knows about because I'm in cahoots with him. Just kidding. We talked about forum stuff and MLP and other things, and apparently I'm the first person from MLPForums that Feld0 has ever met up with, so suck it everypony! Also, Feld0 is best alicorn~ Wednesday, July 25th - Left Canada for Tacoma. My dad and I stopped at Old Country Buffet in Bellingham to eat and I went into Hot Topic afterward. Ended up buying a couple of T-shirts that came from WeLoveFine - "Derpy is Best Pony" and Vinyl Scratch. My wallet was already hurting with $50 wasted. Went into the Target in Everett and they had six copies of the 2-episode "Celebration at Canterlot" DVD on clearance for $5 apiece in the toys section. I bought four of them. (also on clearance for $5 was a whole ton of Twilight Sparkle skirts/dresses sized for little girls) Also, chicken quesadilla at IHOP is SO GOOD. Central Canada really needs an IHOP. >:C Thursday, July 26th - Hit jackpot at the Target in Federal Way. This location had the most amount of pony merch out of all of the other targets in Tacoma, Seattle, and everywhere north of that. Target-exclusive Canterlot merch as well as brand new Crystal Ponies sets. Season 3 spoiler: the back of the Princess Cadance and Shining Armor crystal pony set says that they lead the crystal empire together. Went into the bedding aisle and found this Twilight Sparkle "pillow" as well as a Twilight blanket. I also went into the FYE in Tukwila, WA and looked in the kid's section for MLP DVDs just for the hell of it. Lo and behold... there was a copy of the Royal Pony Wedding DVD for $15. Only one, but it was legit. This was July 26th and it wasn't supposed to be released until August 7th. I nabbed it. I went into this CD store. It's pretty sweet. Pictures of MLP merch that I took throughout the day: Trading Cards at Target Blind Bags at Toys R Us (Tacoma, WA) Talking Pinkie Pie Birthday Card (Video) Talking Pinkie Pie Birthday Card (Pic 1) Talking Pinkie Pie Birthday Card (Pic 2) Talking Pinkie Pie Birthday Card (Pic 3) A Different Birthday Card (Pic 1) A Different Birthday Card (Pic 2) A Different Birthday Card (Pic 3) A Different Birthday Card (Pic 4) Twilight Sparkle Dress (Pic 1) Twilight Sparkle Dress (Pic 2) Twilight Sparkle Dress (Pic 3) Twilight Sparkle Dress (Pic 4) Ponies at Target (Pic 1) Ponies at Target (Pic 2) Ponies at Target (Pic 3) Ponies at Target (Pic 4) Ponies at Target (Pic 5) Ponies at Target (Pic 6) Ponies at Target (Pic 7) Coloring Book (Pic 1) Coloring Book (Pic 2) Twilight Pillow (Pic 1) Twilight Pillow (Pic 2) Friday, July 27th - Cupcakes? PINKIE PIE RUNS THIS HALF PRICE BOOKS. NOOOOOOOOOOOOO Found Twilight, Pinkie Pie, and Rainbow Dash plushies at the Target in Bellevue. They looked kind of ugly though - like a cross of the worst of G3 and the best of G4 mashed together, to create a "meh" product. It's a step up from some of the other merch Hasbro puts out (So Soft Baby Newborns? Celestia no), but not good enough for me to buy them just yet. Also found this Twilight Sparkle purse set at the Northgate Mall Target in Seattle, on clearance at 70% off. Plushies (Pic 1) Plushies (Pic 2) Plushies (Pic 3) Plushies (Pic 4) More Target Pony Stuff (Pic 1) More Target Pony Stuff (Pic 2) More Target Pony Stuff (Pic 3) Seattle Space Needle (taken from Half Price Books) Evidently the Twilight dresses weren't selling... Saturday, July 28th - The Marysville Target had a few MLP "MP3 Musical Microphones". The package says it has 2 songs, but I kept playing it over and over and it's only the MLP main theme on there. You'd likely get more out of the talking Princess Cadance toy that plays Love is in Bloom. Pic 1 Pic 2 Nearly every Target I stopped at has the new MLP Enterplay trading cards. They're $2 a pack and they're in the trading cards section near the cashiers. I couldn't find these cards at Walmart or Toys R Us in Seattle. I only bought eight packs in total - six for my best friend in Kelowna and two for me (the Target in Tukwila had only two packs left so I cleaned them out). I held off on buying cards otherwise until I got back into Vancouver. I went to the Enterplay online store and ordered $120 (2 full boxes of 30 packs at $60 each) + $20 shipping + another $20 in Canada/US customs fees, which almost NEVER happens when I'm buying things from the US. -____( Placed the order July 28th, shipped August 8th, arrived August 17th. Enterplay is completely sold out of trading cards now and they're ordering re-prints, but they won't have them in stock again until the end of September... Got back in Vancouver at 3:30 and watched the Vietnamese fireworks show that played at 10 that night from the penthouse of my uncle's apartment complex. Downtown gets real nutsy when the show is over. Crowds and police... crowds and police everywhere. Sunday, July 29th - Went to Langley and found an MLP pencil pouch in the back to school seasonal section at Walmart. This was near the main doors. $4. I bought it, but I'm not using it to store into, mainly because I haven't met up with him. Monday, July 30th - Walked over to the DHX building in downtown Vancouver to meet up with Daniel Ingram and Steffan Andrews. It's a brand new studio; Steffan was moved in 2 or 3 months ago whereas Daniel had just moved in several days prior, so some renovation work was still being done - but overall the new digs are VERY nice. Steffan and Daniel have their own offices/music rooms right next to each other on the 3rd floor. Dick and Roger's Sound Studio is also next to their offices - this is where the MLP:FiM sound effects production + post audio production and 5.1 surround sound mixing is made, after William Anderson (who resides in Los Angeles) finishes his scoring on episodes. DHX Media is on the 6th floor but I wasn't allowed up there. Film music composer Michael Richard Plowman apparently used to have a room on the 3rd floor but I was told that he moved to England. To my surprise, MandoPony was also there; I had expressed interest in meeting up with him but I didn't think it was going to be happening. Had a nice 10-15 minute chat with all three of the guys. I gave two of the four Celebration at Canterlot DVDs I had bought earlier to Daniel and Steffan as gifts. I also gave them copies of the Pound Puppies "Homeward Pound" DVD, another DHX/Hasbro animated TV series that they compose music for. They were very thankful and told me that they normally don't get merchandise or DVDs of their own shows. When I visited Daniel last year, he had given me copies of the sheet music for Giggle at the Ghostly and the CMC Theme Song. I neglected to get them autographed by him last year, so I finally got them signed by him now. (the sheet music is Hasbro's copyright and I can't scan or upload them, sorry) From left to right: Steffan Andrews, me, Daniel Ingram, Andrew Stein aka MandoPony Pic 1 Pic 2 I also asked them questions and here is some of the information I gathered: - The music for "Pinkie's Gala Fantasy Song" (season 1, episode 3, "The Ticket Master") was written by both Daniel and Steffan; Steffan also built the orchestral layer of the song. This is the only song Steffan was involved in where he co-composed the music with Daniel; for every other song he's been involved with on the series, he takes Daniel's instructions on the orchestral portions and builds them to overlay into the final track. - The "Junior Speedsters Chant" (season 1, episode 5, "Griffon the Brush Off") was an improvised ditty that Ashleigh Ball and Maryke Hendrikse did on the spot in the recording studio. William Anderson did the music for this piece. (I asked about this because apparently I miscredited Daniel as having done this one on my BGM rip of this song on YouTube) - "You Got to Share, You Got to Care" (season 1, episode 21, "Over a Barrel") was an odd situation where both Daniel and Will had no involvement; Steffan Andrews performed the piano. - "At the Gala" (season 1, episode 26, "The Best Night Ever") was the only song Daniel and Steffan did for the season 1 finale episode. The other two songs - "I'm at the Grand Galloping Gala" and "Pony Pokey" - were done by William Anderson. - Daniel says he does not know anything about Hasbro releasing a soundtrack album for MLP:FiM - or any other TV show / movie he's written songs / music for. He said two different mixes of all of his songs take place in post production - one mix in 5.1 surround that is heard in the final product of the episode, and another mix in stereo that sounds radically different and is meant to be used and heard only in case a soundtrack CD ever materializes. He writes a lot of material that ends up being cut out for the final versions heard in the episodes*, and the mixes made for a possible forthcoming soundtrack album apparently sound far better than their TV counterparts. If a soundtrack CD ever does come out professionally (one that does not slap all of the TV mixes of the songs together as a means of a quick cash-in), not only will a number of songs be heard in full as they were written and intended to be heard by Daniel, but their overall sound will be greatly improved and heard like never before. *An example of this was the "Piggy Dance" song in season 2, episode 13, "Baby Cakes". It was originally written for the season 1 finale episode but it was cut out due to time constraints. - I knew this fact before I mentioned it to Daniel, but he and Kristopher Gee took the same music course at Simon Fraser University together. Kristopher Gee works with William Anderson in co-composing MLP:FiM's background score. - Daniel and Clinton Shorter are great friends. Clinton is a film music composer who worked on Contraband and District 9. Daniel and MandoPony had things to do, but Steffan showed me around and we had a long, one-on-one 30-minute chat in his office about MLP, his other music composition work, what I do, and film music in general. Very laid back and very welcoming - I actually felt as though I was taking up too much of his time, but his workload for that day was very small from what I gathered. Daniel and Steffan will be doing some work for Michelle Creber's forthcoming CD album that MandoPony is involved with as well. (EDIT August 31st: This CD is now available: http://www.cdbaby.co...michellecreber8) Building Directory Tuesday, July 31st - Stayed up late at night to write nearly everything in this post up to this point, then went to bed. I met up with Blue at 4PM for lunch at Cafe Luxy; we then took a walk down Davie through Stanley Park. I got this picture of him by the public swimming pool. Later on, Blue attempted to stuff me with Derpy muffins, but I only had one. Muffins normally aren't my thing, but it had been years since I last had one, so, why not? We ended up walking back downtown and stopped in at Delaney's Coffee House on Denman Street, where I got a hot chocolate with whipped cream (it was SO GOOD). I was offered a muffin, but I let Applejack have it instead. We went on our separate ways at this point. More about our meetup (and the pictures he took) can be seen a few posts below mine in Blue's writeup. I only had one other thing written in my notes about this day, which is that I ate again at Luxy for dinner. Their pasta is unbelievably amazing. Wednesday, August 1st - A rather uneventful day. Ate lunch at Stepho's on Davie - prices are inexpensive and their Greek food is some of the best you could ever get. I always have roast lamb with Greek salad, lemon roast potatoes, rice, and vege briami, and mix it all around in a massive pile of awesome. It's a *massive* plate. The Brazilian fireworks show was on that night, and I had dinner at Mary's Diner. Their Winnipeg style perogies + spinach salad with bacon vinaigrette dressing = best. Thursday, August 2nd - Had lunch at Mary's, I believe it was the same thing as last night. I hung out with my cousin afterward for a walk downtown to have dessert at True Confections on Denman and Haro. Stopped at Delaney's again. We went to the Scotiabank theater on Burrard to see The Dark Knight Rises. My dad and I tried a different place that night for dinner that we've never eaten at before, called Donair Dude, on Davie. Really good. I took these pics later that night; the aforementioned gifts for my best friend in Kelowna. MLP Trading Card Packs (Pic 1) MLP Trading Card Packs (Pic 2) Friday, August 3rd - My dad and I went shopping around at a few Value Village stores, and dropped by at another cousin's residence in Surrey for dinner and a visit (we ordered takeout from Swiss Chalet). There was a gay pride event downtown on Davie Street that night, with two DJs playing a block apart from each other (one by Thurlow and another by Burrard). Free condoms were being given out that night and I found five brand new ones on the ground (I took them, of course). It was all absolutely nuts. Saturday, August 4th - I guess I took this picture when I woke up. All those rainbow flags set up in preparation for the previous night. I took the SkyTrain for the first time. I didn't have a clue as to what I was doing at first, but I was to go to the Waterfront station and transfer to the Metro line (if I'm remembering that right). I was heading off to the MetroTown to meet up with the local Vancouver Bronies group... once I managed to get to the mall I had no trouble taking the train anywhere I wanted to go from that point forward. I don't get lost easily and I have an excellent sense of direction. My meetup with the bronies was at 1PM in the massive food court. It was only me and two others when I arrived, but then it started building up to a good 20-25 people over the next hour. I had two meals at Manchu Wok because god damn that shit is delicious. I didn't talk much... just kind of observed (I usually keep to myself when I'm in large crowds and let everyone else converse). I had my pencil pouch with me - the one that I had bought on the 29th - and everyone kept asking me about it, where I got it from. So someone else in the group eventually found it a little while later and posted it on Equestria Daily. Meetup Pics (1 of 4) Meetup Pics (2 of 4) Meetup Pics (3 of 4) Meetup Pics (4 of 4) I left somewhere between 3 and 3:30 so that I could shop around in the mall - Toys R Us, HMV, Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory, and maybe one or two other places that I'm forgetting. I also got a Cookie Cookie Dough Dough Cold Stone Blast from Cold Stone Creamery. $4.25 of absolutely fucking amazing. <3 (the only Cold Stone Creamery in my city is downtown and I never get to go there D:<) I bought this fudge from Rocky Mountain Chocolate. Yes, that is Oreo Cookies 'n Cream fudge. BEST DESSERT EVER. GO HERE NAO: http://www.rockychoc.com/ The Italian fireworks show was that night. Last one. Sunday, August 5th - My dad and I hung out downtown for most of the day to watch the gay pride parade. It started on Robson at the east end, going down Denman and ending at Beach Avenue / Pacific Street. Parade (1 of 13) Parade (2 of 13) Parade (3 of 13) Parade (4 of 13) Parade (5 of 13) Parade (6 of 13) Parade (7 of 13) Parade (8 of 13) Parade (9 of 13) Parade (10 of 13) Parade (11 of 13) Parade (12 of 13) Parade (13 of 13) We trudged through the massive crowd west on Pacific, north on Denman, and had lunch at a Vietnamese restaurant on the corner of Denman and Robson. Such amazing food. The parade had ended by the time we finished eating (it had ran for a solid two hours); we walked down Robson and checked out the massive, six-story Sears outlet on Robson and Granville that was on the verge of closing down. I really miss the HMV Megastore on Burrard. ;_; Back at the apartment, I gathered together all of the pony merch that I had bought for my sister: Pony Merch (1 of 2) Pony Merch (2 of 2) Monday, August 6th - A mostly uneventful day, started by lunch at Stepho's. I took the SkyTrain out to Burnaby to visit the Lougheed Town Centre (I had aimed to visit the Brentwood Mall as well but I got there when it was closing). Found Pound Puppies merch for the first time at Walmart (my post on that here: http://mlpforums.com..._20#entry644804). Dinner was at Mary's. Tuesday, August 7th - I went back to the same Walmart I was at the previous day to take a picture and a video. Pound Puppies Merch (Picture) Pound Puppies Merch (Video) About an hour before that I was at the Brentwood Mall to venture into Toys R Us Express as well as Zellers. TRU had nada for Puppies (though they had a 30% off sale on MLP toys priced $20 and higher), but Zellers had a ton of the same Puppies merch as well as some smaller mini-figurines: Pound Puppies Merch (1 of 8) Pound Puppies Merch (2 of 8) Pound Puppies Merch (3 of 8) Pound Puppies Merch (4 of 8) Pound Puppies Merch (5 of 8) Pound Puppies Merch (6 of 8) Pound Puppies Merch (7 of 8) Pound Puppies Merch (8 of 8) I then stopped at London Drugs to pick up a DVD release of Adventures of Chuck and Friends, as a gift for Daniel Ingram. $9 ain't too bad, even with the ridiculous HST which brought the total up to $10.07. The ride on the SkyTrain throughout the afternoon was fun. Went to Metrotown after to get myself a Cold Stone Blast, then headed back downtown at the Waterfront station. I went back to the DHX building for another quick meet-up with Daniel. Steffan wasn't present this time (they're both often running in and out of the studio for errands), but I gave Daniel the Chuck and Friends DVD I had just bought for him. Doing so resulted in this happening: https://twitter.com/...985232612139008 While I was there, I snapped a picture of the entrance to Dick & Roger's: http://imageshack.us...1/dscf1661f.jpg I had asked Daniel a couple more questions: Who wrote the melody for Pony Pokey (season 1, episode 26) and You Got to Share, You Got to Care (season 1, episode 21)? Daniel had explained that Pony Pokey was based on the traditional Hokey Pokey and therefore did not know who wrote the original melody. He was present at Shannon's vocal recording sessions - these vocals were then sent to Will Anderson and he arranged the traditional melody/music to make it fit in context of the episode. As I was somewhat confused on how to report back on this, I asked for clarification and credits should go as: Daniel did the vocal arrangement while Will did the musical arrangement. As far as You Got to Share, You Got to Care, Daniel did not know who wrote the melody - only that it came from a relative/cousin of one of MLP:FiM's producers - and that Will would be a better person to ask about this, considering he might have that information on his cue sheets. Did Cathy Weseluck perform on Ballad of the Crystal Ponies? No. While Cathy (Spike) performed for The Failure Song, she was not present at the recording session for Ballad of the Crystal Ponies. I clarified and the performers were Rebecca, Kazumi, Shannon, Andrea, and Ashleigh. Spike's mouth is animated to make it appear as though he sings, though his voice is not present. I had also asked if Daniel knew about MLPForums and he said he didn't. I told him about this thread and how Feld0 was a huge fan of both the songs and score. (apparently most of the links he checks out are ones sent to him via Twitter; he doesn't necessarily have time for internet surfing otherwise) I went back to that Ukrainian place on Denman and Robson for dinner that night. Way too much of it, and I was effing stuffed, but it was amazing. Had dessert at True Confections afterward. So good. <3 Wednesday, August 8th - I have an aunt who lives in Abbotsford and frequently does cross-border shopping in Bellingham. We left Vancouver for Abbotsford and spent the day in Bellingham to eat at Old Country Buffet one last time (FUCKING AMAZING) and to shop. I returned those two pony shirts I had bought earlier from Hot Topic as I felt they were too expensive (See Wednesday July 25th). I believe the Royal Pony Wedding DVD had just been commercially released at the time (the day prior, in fact), so I took this picture at Target. When we crossed the border back into Canada that night, there was this sign. Apparently this border crossing is only open four hours a day. (It's supposed to read 12AM, not 12PM) Thursday, August 9th - Dad and I left Abbotsford and got into Kelowna at around 12:30. Applejack loves the view on Highway 97C. I had lunch at Old Spaghetti Factory with my best friend. Our ponies got to see each other again too: Ponies Pwnies Ponies + Lemon = SHIPPING LOLOLOLOL On the way back to her house, she showed me her socks. I got to check out her computer setup: http://imageshack.us...8/dscf1681b.jpg http://imageshack.us...8/dscf1682l.jpg But we had to be off and we drove to Golden for the night. If you're ever there, you NEED to check out Apostoles, a Greek restaurant. One of the best Greek restaurants I've ever been to. Friday, August 10th / Saturday, August 11th - You definitely have to check out Legendz Diner in Golden as well. I have the tuna melt sandwich there every time adfasghaskdjfhgaf it's so good. ;-; We were off to Calgary to do shopping for the day. Nothing too exciting, although I did buy a couple bottles of liquor (something I've never done before) from Superstore. Boone's Snow Creek Berry and Strawberry Hill, to be exact: http://www.boonesfarm.net/flavors.html Lunch was at Swiss Chalet the next day. Why they closed down their only two locations in Saskatchewan (Saskatoon and Regina), I have no idea, but it sucks that they did. I miss the greek salad, rotisserie chicken and their flatbreads already. Rest of the day was spent driving back home to Saskatoon, a good six-hour drive nonstop. AND THAT'S MY VACATION. WERE YOU EXPECTING ME TO WRITE MORE ABOUT IT OR SOMETHING?!?!?!?!?! (I have no idea why I wasted two months writing this long-ass post. I secretly wanted to get the longest post ever written on MLPForums. It totals 18,264 characters, including these sentences. I HOPE I DID A GOOD JOB. BEAT THAT ARYLETT AND GOOD DAY TODAY :D )

I could probably do this meetup if it happens to take place before August 4th. I doubt it's going to happen that quickly, however. I'm in downtown Vancouver right now (on vacation from Saskatoon), and I have the honor of being the first MLPForums member to meet up with Feld0. Our meetup happened just this Tuesday! *runs away before the crowd with the flaming torches gathers*

I'm finding it extremely difficult to find or attempt to watch season 2 episodes online. The first two episodes of season 2 ("Zipper the Zoomit Dog" and "The Fraud Princess") can be viewed online at HubWorld.com, but they won't load for me, presumably because I'm in Canada. Absolutely nothing on torrent sites, iTunes, or YouTube. I really wish Hasbro and The Hub would get international licenses for their shows - they might think that 350,000 views for A Canterlot Wedding makes it a phenomenal success as its #1 program with the largest audience, but they could be getting so much more attention by not restricting their programming to US viewers. Sigh. So... would anyone happen to know where I could watch season 2? (By fluke, however, I did find the season 1 finale on YouTube, "Lucky Gets Adopted". Will be checking that out soon. http://www.youtube.c...dPuppies/videos) EDIT: For those outside of the US, you can catch the first 3 episodes of season 2 here: http://www.justanime.../pound-puppies/ 7 have aired so far for season 2, though I have no idea where to find them. :/

Oh, I misread. I thought your idea was they couldn't post *anywhere* outside of WP / CC until they get five posts, rather than not allowing them to post new topics. Still, I don't like it. And if there's ever a problem with memory issues I'm sure someone on staff will post about it, otherwise, I don't think any members need to worry about that.

How does a blank flank get five posts to their name if postcount doesn't increase in the Welcoming Plaza? Are they going to have to make five random posts in Canterlot Castle then? I don't really like the idea of restricting posting abilities until you have a certain postcount. It would probably only further encourage spamming and newcomers getting out of blank flank for the sake of not being a blank flank... or it would turn off those newcomers from bothering to post at all if they can't utilize the message board they just took time and effort to register for. Perhaps a better idea would be to encourage people to lurk around the forums a fair bit before registering/posting so that they can at least familiarize themselves with how MLPForums works and what its community guidelines are. They don't take up any space at all. I think Feld0 posted a while back that account data takes up only mere kilobytes, when his servers have gigabytes/terrabytes of data on hand. What if a person signs up, leaves for a while and then decides to come back and post again? It's not going to be very encouraging to them to find that their account was removed while they were gone.

Thanks for the plug, man! /)^3^(\

I'm way too busy with life and other things to post here! ;_; (that and I'm too shy to handle large group conversations. I much prefer smaller groups or one on one)