BlockGryph0n: New Year, New Drama

That's right ladies and gentlemen, not only one day into 2016 and already the drama has started to unfold!

In a poor, shameful display of how to handle people who disagree with you on the internet, fan musician BlackGryph0n has gone the way of such great reasonable role models as OsakaJack(off) and Nash in blocking any and all opinions contradicting his own.

Gather 'round the campfire, kiddos! It's time for the cautionary tale of Gabriel Brown, better known as BlackGryph0n, in how not to handle critics on the internet.

Now the first thing many of you all might be asking is "Who the fuck is BlackGryph0n and why should I care?" BlackGryph0n is a fan musician, as mentioned earlier, known early on for such hits as "Proud to be a Brony" as well as a number of the ________-licious fad animations from a few years back. More recently, he has been in bed (figuratively and quite possibly literally) with the Creber family, releasing a few songs with Michelle and even getting a few roles in the chorus of some of the songs in season 5 of My Little Pony.

But while all these indications point to BlackGryph0n as being a shining star on the rise, he has been on a seemingly downhill spiral since the beginning of December. For those of you who have already forgotten, it all started with a little bit of merchandising.

"buymymerch.com"? Oy vey, all it's missing is a "goyim" at the end of the URL!

But hey, the man's a musician. There's nothing wrong with a musician trying to sell his music for money, and there's certainly nothing wrong with wanting to support an artist you enjoy by purchasing their music to make up for the rest of us pirating it like normal human beings. The problem, however, started with a different product available for purchase on the website:

♫If I had a million nine thousand one hundred dollars...♫

Yep, you read that right. $100 for a 30-minute consultation. And, just in case you wanted a reference on that kind of hourly price range...

I think this guy's response summed it up pretty well:

But don't worry, he's willing to make an exception for the right kind of fan. ;^)

As can be expected, we here at Horse News were all over this. After all, BlackGryph0n certainly does not have the credentials to be charging that high a consultation fee. The extent of his show business experience, as mentioned previously, was being in the chorus for a couple of My Little Pony episodes and writing a theme song for some small-time Pac Man show.

And here, ladies and gentlemen, is where things really start to blow up. BlackGryph0n decided to pay our fine little website a visit following our article. The comments are still up there, but really it didn't look too bad at this point. He made a few points here and there and was willing to defend the high price at the very least, but even then signs of a bad side were beginning to show up:

Well shit, between ME, Monique, and Michael Creber we have decades of experience gleaned from professional performances put on by experts in the industry. But attacking YouTubers turned out to be a sore point for some:

Well hot damn, looks like BlackGryph0n had made some enemies in his time. And, in just a perfect stroke of irony, BlackGryph0n has all but taken the place of Sibsy's husband (MandoPony) as being a fan musician in an uncomfortably close relationship with Michelle Creber.

But, as with all drama, this was going to blow over. Right?

Wrong. Turns out this whole ordeal was enough to earn BlackGryph0n the recognition he deserved in /mlp/'s 2015 End of the Year awards:

And oh boy, it did not take long for the damage control to start setting in...

In the words of a fallen comrade, "IS LIKE SIT IN GIANT CIRCLE AND PULL DICK OF MAN NEXT YOU."

But, as this fandom usually goes, it didn't take long to stir up the ol' drama pot once again...

BlackGryph0n's tone had begun to change greatly from his defense in the comment section of our article. Maybe it was the post-New Years hangover, or maybe (the more likely reason) something about being named "Worst Fan" really rubbed him the wrong way.

Why do I say that's the more likely reason?

Means you can charge $200/hr for consultations, apparently...

"I wasn't really part of the fandom! It was just a hobby! S-see, I was just pretending!"

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And so the salt continued to flow.

Again attacking YouTubers...

And, naturally, some began to take offense at BlackGryph0n's handling of the situation and the fandom as a whole...

But just when you thought it couldn't get any better, OH BOY DID IT! Here comes the hypocrisy!

Well now I'm just confused. I thought that YouTube stuff was worthless and unimportant.

But speaking of unimportant, BlackGryph0n really, REALLY wanted us to know just how unimportant this horse fandom really is and how he had been doing just fine without us:

What kind of journalist would I be if I didn't check? (>inb4 "a Horse News journalist")

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm6437354/

Well what do you know? Now let's just see what he was up to "long before the fandom:"

A quick little "sort by age" reveals that he was up to a whole lotta nothing. I guess they don't count touring around with the Navy as "showbiz."

But wait, surely if he had a grand, successful career before this fandom we would see signs of it somewhere, right? Well let's just go check out his YouTube page!

Well isn't that interesting. While he does have a number of videos released before joining the fandom, the highest number of views he has on any single one was 6,153 views. Most of his pony-related videos, meanwhile, have view counts in the hundreds of thousands, with some even in the millions. But I'm sure this is just a hobby and in no way springboarded what would otherwise be a low-profile dead-end career.

Anyways, I'm sure you get the picture. But before I leave you all, I would like to offer my own two cents on the issue. BlackGryph0n, I'm sure this article will make its way to you eventually, and I really do hope you can learn something from this experience. Sure, you may have made some kind of career without this fandom, but you cannot ignore the reality of how much this fandom and your fans within it have caused it to grow. Face it: Your fandom work is exponentially more popular than non-fandom work, and the artist who you have done your most successful work with and who has arguably launched what could be a future career for you is a voice actress for the show.

Instead of acknowledging that and treating your fans with respect, you have cast them and the fandom that made you famous aside like it was meaningless and unimportant; fans will take notice of that. I can assure you that only a select few like being talked down to and called petty or meaningless, and it's probably a weird fetish for them.

As this continues to unfold, I'm sure we will be able to see firsthand why you shouldn't spit on the people who got you into the position you are in. And, since you blocked me and can't see it on Twitter anymore, I wanted to make sure you know my offer still stands:

When you're ready, please send payment directly to my PayPal account.