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ShanonSinn

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Here are some quotes from the Irish Peasantry of 125 years ago regarding Samhain, or modern day Halloween. This 1887 book titled, 'Ancient Legends, Mystic Charms, and Superstitions of Ireland' was originally published during a difficult period for the Irish people. The last witch burning in Ireland is usually said to have taken place in 1895, only eight years after the work was published. The book is often criticized - rightly so - for its depiction of animal sacrifice and torture:

"The dead walk on November Eve."

In Clare, stories are shared by the peasants who gather "round the fire on the awful festival of Samhain, or November Eve, when the dead walk, and the spirits of earth and air have power over mortals, whether for good or evil."

"The great feast of Bel, or the Sun, took place on May Eve and that of Samhain, or the Moon, on November Eve; when libations were poured out to appease the evil spirits, and also the spirits of the dead, who come out of their graves on that night to visit their ancient homes."

"The peasants in Ireland, wishing you good luck, say in Irish, 'The blessing of Bel, and the blessing of Samhain, be with you,' that is, of the sun and of the moon."

"These were the great festivals of the Druids, when all domestic fires were extinguished, in order to be re-lit by the sacred fire taken from the temples, for it was deemed sacrilege to have any fires kindled except from the holy altar flame."

"The ancient Irish divided the year into summer and winter Samrath and Gheimrath; the former beginning in May, the latter in November, called also Sam-fuim (summer end). At this season, when the sun dies, the powers of darkness exercise great and evil influence over all things. The witch-women say they can then ride at night through the air with Diana of the Ephesians, and Herodias, and others leagued with the devil: and change men to beasts; and ride with the dead and cover leagues of ground on swift spirit-horses. Also on November Eve, by certain incantations, the dead can be made to appear and answer questions."

"Divination by fire, by earth, and by water, is also largely practiced; but, as an ancient writer has observed, 'All such divinations are accursed, for they are worked by the power of the fallen angels, who give knowledge only through malice, and to bring evil on the questioner."


According to this text, these days of the dead originally lasted a full month!
If you're interested in more historically macabre visit the full post at: livinglibraryblog.com/?p=1353

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The Shadow Empire Art Contest is cancelled due to cheating and online bullying.

There have been numerous accusations of cheating and several incidents of actual cheating within the contest. I have tried to deal with these as best as I could as various issues have arisen and as powers that be have directed me to. These have included copyright infringement and contestents trying to influence votes by questionable means. The newest allegation is that people are now purchasing favourites (votes). There is no way for me to prove whether this is true or isn't true. I'm no longer confident that the rightful person will win in the end, despite the rightful people still being in the top positions.

There has also been a great deal of online bullying within the contest. Anonymous accounts have been targeting mostly the underage contestants directly and indirectly right from the beginning. A failed adult contestent has been publically making derogatory comments to and about these teenage artists and to other contestents since he was removed, as well. This has been well documented and Deviantart will be a part of correcting this situation. In light of other recent online bullying in the news, I do not feel comfortable continuing the contest for this reason, either.

I am forced to admit that this contest has been compromised and that it continues to shift in a very negative way. After consulting some of the artists, I've decided that the winners are the current top six entries:

#17 Elart (Philippines), #32 Shane (Canada), #37 Philip A (United Kingdom), #30 Lavinia (USA), #10 Tim (United Kingdom) and #33 Vinh (USA). Images: shanonsinn.deviantart.com/gall…

I truly believe that one of these six artists would have won the contest without unethical interference. The numbers will no longer continue to be accurate as I pull the ads for voting and start to make changes.

Instead of just walking away from the contest, I've decided to give each of them a conditional $200 award. I do not feel right just walking away from the artists who have worked so hard. In order to get something out of this, as well, I have proposed that these images be used to promote the Shadow Empire book. We're not sure what this will look like, yet, but one idea would be for a calendar, which would mean I would need 6 more images. This would be for 2014 at the earliest. If we do this, I will likely ask six other people (from this contest) based on how closely I think their image matched Ayumu and on their entry.

This award will NOT BE FOR THE COVER of Shadow Empire. I am doing this to show that I do not have ulterior motives. Instead, I will be asking some of my readers to choose the image for me from the listed top 6 in a closed setting. This would be for an old-fashioned, traditional, book cover contract complete with conditions and proper pay. This may still be a couple of months away, because I want to be able to pay the artist at the same time.

I would like to apologize for failing to create the healthy contest environment that I had intended. I will not be having another art contest again.

I will continue to share updates, writing, and some of my pictures. I'm sure nothing I could ever share, will ever compare to the images that the artists in this contest have allowed me to display. I'm honoured that each and every one of them participated in this contest. Thank you.

A special thanks to you - those same artists - for putting up with this ridiculous drama. If I had any idea I would've never set up shop. If you're an artist trying to enter the contest and you've been getting wishy-washy messages from me, or no response, this was why. I didn't want to bring anyone else into this mess.

It's not the end of the world I guess.
  
Until next time,
Shanon Sinn

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This is a contest about art not personal politics. It is unfortunate that for some people things are always personal. This contest will end on Oct 31 and will not be repeated or extended. What I may not see as cheating other people do. What am I going to do? Any further personal attacks on me in any way by artists will be seen as them quitting. I do not think that by offering this contest - in a way that differs from what others would like to see - should be a sin. It was my vision. Most people got it. Some didn't. I would never cry about something so little. Why would someone else you ask? I don't know. Not all people are created equal.

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Too melodramatic?

After speaking with several of the artists, I've decided to make a significnt rule change!  It's regarding the counting of favourites and I think you're going to like it!

There have been numerous accusations of cheating and I decided that for several reasons a change needed to happen! The accusation is that people are cheating by creating fake accounts to vote. Because this has been happening it is also making real votes look fake.

Now, the only favourites that will be counted at the end of the contest will be from those accounts that existed BEFORE the contest started.

An artist's family and friends can still come by and show their support, by opening an account and voting, but their votes won't count in the end that's all. This is the only way that the contest will be fair! It puts everyone back right now but it eliminates the cheating that may be taking place.

This means there will be a counting period after the contest closes on Oct. 31st. It may take me a day or two (week?) but I'm going to separate them.

I wanted to also remind the confused voters - that keep favouriting and unfavouriting the same entry - that I've noticed. As I've said elsewhere, I will be counting  the Activity Message Stack numbers in the end, which only shows current favourites. In some cases they're quite different!

If an artist submits the image (the actual one in my contest gallery) into the groups that other artists have, they will get a lot of votes! If you're an artist and you don't do this you probably won't have the same votes at all! This has been consistent with all of the people with the most favourites so far. It really has been that simple. Which groups you ask? Look beside their images in the contest. The groups are listed there.

With this announcement - and not so subtle hint - I can assure all of you that this thing is far from over! A lot of cool people from all over the world have been here voting! I've seen favorites from the United Arab Emirites to Brazil and everywhere in between! Very cool! I have the numbers and I have looked at the stats and they prove to me - at least - that the contest is not about Deviantart popularity. But it just might be about getting an image into a group gallery!

Not everyone will be happy, but we will include anyone in the contest who can live with it and still wants to be here! I will keep making changes until any perceived cheating stops! Hopefully they will not need to be this drastic again!

Hope all are having a great week!

Darkest nods,
Shanon Sinn

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The Shadow Empire Art Contest is now well under way!

There have been some interesting tactics, to say the least! These strategies have been so successful, in fact, that it only seems fair I share EXACTLY what these tactics are with everyone else! I feel I need to, as the contest may otherwise be on uneven ground! Some of the artists are not as familiar to Deviantart, as others! Some artists don't even have Deviantart accounts, as the contest was also advertised via postering and flyers! There are some AMAZING pieces in the contest, in fact, that are not getting as much love as I think they deserve! Hopefully, sharing these tactics will help some of the other artists become more competitive!

1) The artists with the most votes are responding to comments on their own entries. They are OWNING their work, knowing that I said I'll be trying not to comment! I do not want to sway anyone's vote one way or another. People do seem to like it when you comment on their comments though! Comments also show activity and interest.

2) These same artists have petitioned their own friends/watchers first and asked them for favourites! I have seen petitions on Deviantart (polls, journals, comments, etc), Facebook and Twitter. Ultimately the voter needs a Deviantart account, however.

3) These artists have also been very encouraging to one another even commenting on competitors work or giving "favourites" to their competition! I can honestly say that even if there's no such thing as karma, this level of CLASS makes me secretly root for these individuals even more! Is it still a secret? One might even say, that this level of class is an embrace of the samurai spirit!

4) Last but not least is the BIGGEST one! It does take a little work, however. All of the top artists right now have joined groups, and then added their own art (the piece posted in the contest under Shanon Sinn!) to such groups as #fantasy-art or #all-art-wanted, etc. There are more of these groups than a person realizes. A lot of these groups are all about supporting artists even when a person joined that day! This request (art added to that group's gallery) will then come to me in my messages under "correspondence." It asks me if I want to allow the picture to be part of that gallery. I choose "yes" because it is in everyones best interest. Some of them have asked independently, or have been added by a supporting friend (hint). Regardless, an artist will be competitive with this one step alone, even if they only had a couple of friends on Deviantart! I'm telling you. People in this community are very cool! It only sounds complicated but it's not. Join a few groups and try it out! :-)

As far as I know, no one on Deviantart has complained in any way. that is good because this is experimental! A member became offended from a petition on another site called 4chan. Those folk seem a little more cantankerous over there! Seem pacified for now, but we will see! We will raise these dark spirits of the Otherworld, and unleash pestilence-filled nightmares upon these petty fools! Whahahaha (my B-rated evil laugh)!

So there you go! These tactics will help you catch up! You think someone else has too much of a head start?! I do disagree!

a) These artists have already tapped into each of these groups! You haven't!
b) There are 2500 (pay by click) individuals being brought here to vote with no loyalty to anyone. I was saving this until Oct. 1st but have launched this yesterday. This is where some of the people are now coming from. A thank you to anyone who has stopped by to vote! An even greater thank you to those who have taken the time to comment etc! You are awesome!
c) There are still Contest ads as well! I thought these would have ended by now, but there will still be 2000 clicks to the contest and some of these will be voters! If these are not used in the next week, or so, I will probably change the ad to a "vote" one like the other one.
d) if these ads run out I will look at bringing traffic in another way, or do more of the same! Suggestions are welcome!

All of the above being said, these ambitious artists in the lead ARE spreading the word by bringing people here! They do deserve these votes! I just wanted to share some of their - not so secret - secrets with the other artists, as well! There's still over a month left to go! Lots of time for everyone! I would love to see a closer contest!
Good luck to everyone!

Darkest nods,
Shanon Sinn

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