I don't think you have to worry about the fandom becoming overly sexualised. It always has been.
Given how we've been the punching bag of the internet since forever, it's inevitable that opportunist American politicians will do the same as there's really very little difference between them and internet trolls.
If you want to have a convention that's much more sfw go for it.
Funny that a site giving me this message when trying to reject cookies writes about software freedom.
"We offer you the option of rejecting individual data processing. If you have made a selection for all processing purposes, you can save it. Please note that consent to personalised advertising is always required for use without a Pur subscription."
Trash website.
Security through obscurity is generally considered terrible practice in the cybersec community. It's much better to actually find and fix the flaws than just put your head in the sand and hope no one notices the issues.
Exploits in games and the exploits used by hackers for various other purposes are very similar in nature if less often in effect.
That is how I learned to draw. You can also use existing bases that you just colour in, and some ugly sketches that you can give artists as reference material. They'll be thankful to have something to go off of rather than solely a description.
Finding an artist that is popular can be an exercise in frustration, finding one on Fiverr with commissions open is comparatively easy.
I might get crucified for this, but I think AI is a good brainstorming tool to see if various colour combinations and such work, as it can be hard to tell if the colours are something you actually like without seeing any approximation of what you imagine the finished design to look like in practice. You might not want to send it to an artist as a reference image though, I can imagine that not being looked at too kindly by many of them lmao
Try to make small steps. If you're comfortable chatting with people online, get to know a few before the meetup. If you become friends online there's a good chance they'll want to use the chance to get to know you in real life as well, at least in theory.
The important part is to just not stop trying. It will get better when you're 18 most likely, but beyond that the only way to get better at socializing is to do it. No one will break your shell but you, I wasted a lot of years thinking otherwise.
Making it a taboo for a furry to date a non-furry is silly, and thankfully that hasn't been my experience, and I'm sorry if you've experienced that.
As for the reason why it's common to find dates within the fandom? We have a culture that's very open, often intimate, and extremely weird to many outsiders. Also Tinder fucking sucks and Grindr isn't much better, the fandom is a better way to meet people than those apps.
I have a general dislike of Facebook which has kept me away from their headsets, however this actually seems like a great idea.
Wearing a computer on your face instead of on your back has been one of the most asinine design choices of standalone vr. Comfort issues from putting weight on your neck while you're expected to look around, the headset jostling around because of the momentum of the weight, the heat buildup from having both the screen and the computation on your face. Trying to solve these hurdles by making the computer itself more lightweight and cool has probably had other tradeoffs, likely regarding performance.
Repeating the same small phrase endlessly and getting caught in a loop is a very common issue, though it's not something that happens nearly as frequently as it used to. Here's a paper about the issue and one attempted methodology to resolve it. https://arxiv.org/pdf/2012.14660
I do wonder if there's any selection bias in the hardware survey steam does. I'm sure they sample randomly, but I think a user on Linux might be much more eager to participate in the survey than a Windows user, simply because Linux users tend to have a desire to be more vocal about their OS use than Windows users.
I've seen a general increase of scammers targeting furries, primarily with taking art commissions that they very likely won't fulfill at all (or maybe throw some ai gen thing at you, dunno). I think the furry community has just grown enough out of obscurity to be targeted more, and that probably includes barq.
I have set my socials to only be visible to mutuals, which seems to have prevented the spam you're experiencing.
Is there a programmer version of linkedin lunatics? Seems like there would be heaps of content for it with people like this being the software equivalent of the business major's motivational posting lmao.
Maybe I'm controversial but I'd rather not have kids around at furry conventions at all. While the fandom is not a kink thing like, say, the BDSM community, the sexual aspects permeate a pretty good chunk of it. I'd rather exclude kids than having to restrict self-presentation due to their presence, which I personally inevitably do even though I don't wear BDSM gear around at cons.
The pup gear absolutely is fetish clothing, and I prefer cons where there's a place for it, though even then I'd prefer it just being there at late evenings and events rather than in my face all day long.