Week Two.

Hello, Reader! Welcome to WEEK #2 of BLANKSPACE Weekly, where we basically take the camera, anywh— oh wait, sorry, wrong script.

I’ll have to be honest with you, this week was a bit of a blur. I spent most of my time trying to figure out how to balance university and personal life. But I did still manage to find some time to work on this blog and other projects!

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Since it’s still early days for this blog, I figured now’s as good a time as any to introduce “myself” …or rather, my two “personas”. These characters have represented different parts of me throughout the years, so let me tell you about them.

This is… Clip!

Looking back, I realize that Clip was a representation of myself and my insecurities at the time. He was a way for me to express myself without feeling too exposed. I think many people can relate to that feeling of wanting to hide behind something, whether it’s a character or a persona.

…Fast forward to 2020, and I learnt what a Furry was. That took me down a whole new rabbit hole.

It was, quite frankly, a bit of a weird time for me. I wanted a character that represented this new side of me— someone more outgoing and expressive. And that took me quite a while; believe me, I went through many designs, from Picrew to profile pictures stolen from Pinterest.

But then, in 2024, a friend of mine decided to draw a profile picture for everyone in our Discord server— me included. Rather than asking them to draw my VRChat Avatar, I asked them to draw something entirely new, from scratch.

And thus, Nori was born.

And this is… Nori!

I don’t have a proper full-body image of Nori to show you just yet, but I can tell you a bit about her design and personality.

They couldn’t have done a better job capturing what I wanted Nori to be.

But most importantly, she represents a fresh start for me— a chance to be someone new. Someone who isn’t held back by past insecurities or fears, and who’s proud to be herself.

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Yaps aside, I’m glad to have shared this with you. I hope you enjoyed learning a bit more about me and my characters.

I would end this post here and now, but I feel like I haven’t said much today, have I? So to wrap things up, here are my

Also known as the “stuff I found this week, and my two cents on them”.

Whatever the $%&@ is Bluesky Doing

If you’re reading this, you’ve probably heard of Bluesky. And, ICYMI, they’re just… doing whatever now. What do I mean by that? Let me break it down.

Idiotic things aside, here’s a quick summary of what’s been happening:

• They implemented $CRYPTO tags, similar to X/Twitter’s $TAGS, which allow users to tag their posts with cryptocurrency symbols.
• They introduced a new “LIVE” tag feature, that shows when users are live-streaming content on external platforms (e.g. Twitch), which makes decentralization harder to achieve, if not impossible.
• The Bluesky Moderation team has been verifying ICE accounts and seems to be siding with “American nazis” and cryptobros.

I’ve been on Bluesky since August 2023, and I was genuinely hopeful about the platform’s potential. But with these recent developments, I’m starting to question whether it’s really the right place for me anymore.

I guess only time will tell how this all plays out.

…if you want though, you may also find me on Wafrnet: @nori.wafrn.net 😉

Enclosing Horses

This week, I stumbled upon a game called enclose.horse. It’s a simple yet addictive puzzle game where you have to enclose a horse within a limited number of moves. Every day there’s a new puzzle to solve— the more optimal your solution, the higher your score!

If you have some free time, give it a try. It’s a fun way to challenge your brain!

Tenor is Doing WHAT NOW??

I received an email from Tenor this week, and I was quite surprised by what I read: on June 30th, 2026, Tenor will be shutting down its API.

Considering that my website— and many other platforms— rely on Tenor’s API to fetch GIFs, this is a pretty big deal. I understand that companies need to make changes to their services from time to time, but this one feels a bit sudden and unexpected. If you use Tenor’s API for your projects, I’d recommend looking for alternatives as soon as possible. Here are a couple options:

• Giphy, which is a popular GIF platform with a robust API. Though their moderation is incredibly strict at times.
• KLIPY, which is a new platform made by (allegedly) ex-Tenor employees. It aims to be a more developer-friendly alternative to Tenor. However, it does seem to allow and advertise AI-generated content, so keep that in mind.

Lastly, small promo!

I have two things to promote today:

• If you’re italian, or if you understand italian, my friend Rourie has started a substack called “Colosseo”, I highly recommend checking it out: colosseo.substack.com

• If you enjoy reading my blog posts, please consider supporting me on Ko-fi. Your support helps me keep this blog running and allows me to create more content for you to enjoy.

Final Thoughts

I still don’t feel quite used to writing these blog posts yet, but I’m getting there. Practice makes perfect, right?

That said, Reader, I want you to know that I really appreciate you taking the time to read my ramblings each week. It means a lot to me— and you (yes, you!) are the only reason I keep writing these posts.

Truly,
thank you.

Anyways, back to drawing cats.
See you next week!

- Nori