THE FLASHFINK PHENOMENON

After reading and enjoying several Google blogs (most notably Kirk Demerais' SECRET FUN BLOG, I reached a point a couple of years ago when it seemed like a good idea to start one of my own. Anybody who has done this knows that Google requires all new bloggers to come up with a unique username.

My first choice was "That Guy," but it had already been taken. This was no big deal. I just came up with another one.

It had been taken too.

So I thought up a third one and then a fourth one.

They had both been taken.

Slightly annoyed by this point, I stopped to think for a minute.

At the time I was working at an animation studio making animated cartoons for TV using Macromedia (now Adobe) Flash and I've been a longtime admirer of the hot rodding cartoon characters created by Ed "Big Daddy" Roth and his associates. Roth's characters often had names that ended with "fink" (like Surfink, Scuzfink, Angelfink, and his most famous creation, Rat Fink).

So, as an acknowledgment of my occupation and a tribute to "Big Daddy," I combined these two pieces of my psyche and came up with Flashfink. Google accepted it. In fact, I couldn't find the "name" anywhere on the internet, so Flashfink was "born."

But at this juncture I'm trying to make some money on the net and it doesn't seem professional to hide behind a nickname.

My real name is Bill Schwarz and I live in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

I've worked in the local animation industry since the 1980s. My first work in cartoons was as a cel inker (an occupation that has since practically disappeared) for several different studios, over a number of years.

When I was finally able to convince my employers that I was capable of doing more than tracing over other people's drawings, I held a number of positions which included: cel painter, checker, layout artist, character poser, character designer, assistant animator and animator.

It wasn't a smooth progression in one direction. The constant changes in the animation business during the past two decades made it necessary for me to ping pong back and forth between job descriptions depending on the nature of the production. The importance of being able to adapt to change in this fast modern world was made very clear to me by all of this and was the reason I managed to survive in the industry for so long.

Cartoon studios started getting rid of their drawing tables and replacing them with computers. After a lot of frustrating attempts to be given a chance in the new frontier of digital animation, I finally got a shot at it.

It was scary for the first couple of weeks, but I took to animating with Flash very quickly and found it to be the easiest and most interesting work I had done in a long time. More importantly, the computer I was assigned to had been equipped with a lot of graphics and website-building software to experiment with.

When the workday ended, and most of my older (i.e. my age) colleagues would go home to grumble about how the old ways of animation were better, I stayed late to learn more about Photoshop,Illustrator and Dreamweaver. While my friends saw animating with computers to be an annoyance, to me it was an opportunity - especially for the "little guy."

Nowadays, anybody with an idea and a willingness to do some work can make a movie - be it live action or animated - and get it seen by a worldwide audience via the internet. Most of the cartoons I've worked on over the years have been junk regardless of the technology used in their production. I can't see any harm in making junk as efficiently as possible.

What I'm trying to communicate here is that suddenly having access to a software-stuffed computer as well as a connection to the internet completely changed my way of thinking (I hate to use the overused and misused term "paradigm shift," so I won't). I no longer had to own a lot of expensive equipment, or live in the right location, or wait for some big shot to "let me" before getting things done!

My increasing dissatisfaction practically since my first day in the business) with the animation industry, as well as a burning desire to be my own boss and the web skills I've developed, has been pushing me in the direction of starting some kind of online money-making venture.

But website building and graphic design work still involve taking orders from other people. As an entrepreneur once told me:

"When you have a job you have a boss. When you own a business you have a hundred bosses."

It seemed like a tall order but what I was looking for was a way to sit down at my computer all by myself every day and make a decent living. I wanted my success or failure to rest entirely on my skills, creativity and hard work without office politics or butt-kissing (sorry for the crude expression) playing any part in it.

The most sensible option for making an online income that I've discovered so far has been in the field of affiliate marketing, so that's what I've set my sights on.

It seemed that gaining a better understanding of how to build a presence on the internet was a good place to start.

First, I built my two Squidoo lenses. Since this was meant as a learning experience, I chose subject matter that I thought would be fun. The positive response to these two lenses from the kind Squidoo community was startling, but very gratifying and encouraging, especially considering the trivial nature of their subject matter.

To add to the content of my two lenses, I included some links to Amazon. Much to my surprise, a few dollars were generated by this small action. My first online income!

Next on my agenda was to learn something about MySpace, so I got to work building a profile page and inviting some friends. Once again I based the design and content of this project on my interests. I also chose friends who seemed like kindred spirits rather than people who would help me to "get ahead" or whatever.

Once again, the response has been very encouraging and the skills I've gained are invaluable. Still, I started wondering what my niche should be when I actually got down to business. It's very important in internet marketing to focus on a group with a common interest or (better still) need.

One thing that a LOT of people are looking for online is a way to make more money, so my first "real" website provided reviews on downloadable products explaining how to earn an income through affiliate marketing.

Once the site was up and running, I sought feedback to it through a few online marketing forums. The general response was that it was a decent looking site, but that I had chosen a niche that was much too overcrowded for a novice like me to have any success with. This may have been correct. I can't say for sure right now because I've shut down the site for the time being, but I've learned some useful website-building skills from the experience.

After "bursting my bubble" the people on the forums suggested that I find a niche that had something to do with my own interests.

Meanwhile, my friends on MySpace were sending me messages saying things like "your page is the one I feel most at home in" and "I wish I could live in your page." Could what I was looking for be found within these statements?

Maybe cartoonists, punk rockers, hot rodders, tattoo artists, burlesque dancers, surf musicians and monster fans (all my kind of people) are my ideal market. I wonder how many of them own credit cards.

So I've set up another website, FLASHFINK'S FAVORITES (flashfinksfavorites.com) and am making my initial efforts to build traffic to it (like writing this Squidoo lens). It's dedicated to all of the crazy offbeat stuff that my closest friends and I like in the areas of film, art, animation, comics, music and everything else I can think of.

I've included my own Amazon store to the site to help visitors locate the stuff I write about and to put a few dollars in my pocket. As things develop, I'll be hooking my readers up with music and movie download sites as well as other resources that I think will be of interest to them.

New ideas are constantly bubbling up in my head and I can see that I have a lot of work (and a big adventure!) ahead of me.

During the next couple of weeks I'll be putting my animation experience to use by designing an official FLASHFINK'S FAVORITES mascot to put in the site's header. This character is sure to start showing up in my other internet locations (and possibly on T shirts and lunch boxes) in the near future.

There will be occasional posts where adult topics will be discussed, but the visual aspect will be more or less PG 14 rated. If you managed to make it through my EERIE PUBLICATIONS lens you should have no trouble with FLASHFINK'S FAVORITES.

I hope all of this has given you an idea of who I am and what I'm up to. I thank all of you who have read this far and invite you to visit my site.
Comments, criticisms and suggestions are all invited and appreciated, either at FLASHFINK'S FAVORITES or at the bottom of this lens. You can even Email me if you like.