It's very old, but I love an ancient anime called Unico.

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LED white or natural light is what I use.  It's bright, pleasant on the eyes, and as Firefly mentioned, no heat and no UV.

There is an episode of G1 where the ponies encounter Princess Porcina.  She has their hair cut for a magic cloak and it magically grew back.  It seemed reasonable at the time, but my old Applejack proves real ponies aren't as fortunate- she's missing 1/3 of her forelock.

   There is no proper emoticon for this.

1) Got to agree, this isn't the fair staff's doing, fault or any part of theirs.  And honestly, it kind of bothers me to see threats toward the Hasbro reps here.   They will undoubtedly get the message by the amount of commotion already going up in so many forums, as well as by the amounts of 'unsold' and 'unsaleable' product.   

2) Divided between "Yes, disappointed too," and "Yeah I'll pay $25-$100 extra for a pony cause it has slightly off blue eyes instead of purple... or a hk/china differentiation...... so WHY not Discord?" 
My gut says it isn't worth $50.00 to have open eyes and I'm really wishing they'd throw in something like a pin or button..... a sticker even- to make it more unique.  Even so, I paid for it, going to the fair, and it will come home with me and be added as a memory.  (Whoever it was that made the comment about the cheaping out on tf was correct btw- they're doing the same thing there.)

Don't give up on Hasbro though.  They might just turn around next year and come up with something special after getting the message that these aren't satisfactory to the majority.  In the meanwhile, he *is* different to the store release. Plus, getting him at the fair will be a memorably fun time, and I'm not looking for resale value, so he'll come home to a shelf spot here- as nostalgia.  (And I will keep hoping for Big Mac for next year.)     



 

G1: Flutter wing attachments and "Princess" eyelashes...
G2: Non-existent US marketing.
G3/3.5: Names (or words) scrawled all over pony's sides, as if they didn't remember their own names.
G4: Ponymania - and the only semi-acceptable word that comes to mind with that is still vulgar. 

Those are SUPER cute!  I just ordered 4 and found there's an added bonus.  If you sign up for an account, you get $10.00 off your order.  If you buy more than $44.00 of stuff, you also get free mailing.  Thanks for the heads up Ashlyne!

There was a true sense of community... any old members of the Church of the Mint on Card Mimic still around?  It was a group of "tongue in cheek" folks who pretended to worship the holy grail - a mint on card Mimic  =o).  Had a website and everything.

Jeanne!  Bill!  Sure have missed you guys!   
I'm still here. A few more silver hairs in the red now, but still here in the background. 

Nostalgia trip... here we go.

I can perhaps go back a bit further than most folks here.  I began the Berry Patch in 1994 during university.  It was not meant to be an ID site so much as a collection website as a result of an education project.  My intention from early on was to eventually write a book for the ponies and to publish it, but my website was never meant to be part of that.  Back then, the internet was just starting to develop and Ebay was just coming into existence.  It may be difficult to imagine now, but most http addresses were very little other than text.  Pictures were not exactly digital, or upload-friendly.  I began with Polaroid pictures, then scanned them. 

Later, toward... 1995/96 a new place came about called Geocities.  You could literally "house hunt".  Addresses were shown, and you could see who your neighbors were.  I moved the Berry Patch there, and that was about the time Ebay began to explode and webrings did too.  I still have all the graphics I drew, and pictures of the webrings, but Photobucket seems to be down.  I'll try to pop some up later.

Anyway, I spent thousands of dollars trying to upgrade computer equipment to keep up.  Paid for AOL service too.  Mouse-drawn images turned to tablets, scanners became faster.  I bought a program called "Adobe Go-Live" and that helped immensely with html, but that also had a drawback.   
 The website eventually became too large for my poor mac Performa to handle, and too tedious to code the html by hand.  Macintosh and PC formats hated each other and making the website loadable for both was really hard.  I bought a G3, then G4, but technology was still moving too fast to keep up with glitches.  Dream Valley became the major ID site.  Being too shy and carrying too many credit hours to do much beyond graphics, I kept trading low-key to a handful of friends.  Money orders, cash hidden carefully in foil or within items.  There were too many fights, too much nastiness with people vying for positions as 'experts'.  Ebay was a bite-and-kick situation.  We could all see who was bidding, there were no sniping programs.  Everyone here was on dial-up modems, so it was "refresh, refresh, watch clock, refresh... get ready... BID!" --- and hope you didn't get kicked off.
 Some folks would run up bids just because they didn't like a person or were jealous.  That happened on a daily basis.  I remember the scammers too, and the shill bidders.  But it was because of those IDs being visible that I met and made some very good friends.  Everyone kind of recognized everyone else.

Then word came through one of my trading friends named Kristin (Icefeather) that there was going to be a huge gathering in Pennsylvania.   Pony Palooza.  It was a major gathering, and so much fun!  The first of its kind.  I had met up with a handful of local collectors here in town before, but it was bitty compared to Palooza and not really an 'event' so much as friends gathering.  It was at Palooza that Kristin and I made up the moc Mimic thing, and I made a stained glass picture of her for a mock website.  We were so sure none were left in existence!!!!!!!  hahahaha!  We were wrong.     She eventually did get her carded Mimic.

I began with my book photos in 1998, and continued to '01.  Hasbro employees and other companies making products were always searching and referencing the online websites still, because there were not very many resources out there even then.  In 1998, a group of folks from France contacted me for information because I had posted up scans of the UK pony magazines and they wanted more info and references for one they were creating.  Sadly, I had such a hard time with scanning back then on a primitive scanner that I was only able to send out a few more scans.  Each scan back then took 5-10 minutes and was massive in size.  I also scanned and posted up the Adventures in Ponyland gameboard that came with Baby Blue Ribbon at its full size.

I made a trip back out to visit Jeanne and Bill, Kristin, Heidi, and another friend who has since passed away.  I had been to England, France and Scotland in '00, and had accumulated hundreds of pictures and information for previously "unknown-in-the-US" ponies, and was looking forward to finishing with the rest on this particular trip.  Kristin was moving away from NY to get married, so I pushed my trip up a week.  I wanted to see NY.  I was there the week before 9/11.  For many reasons, this trip was one I truly cherish.  It was the last time I got to see another friend and Kristin.  I also got to spend a lot of time with Jeanne, a most marvelous friend.  For almost a week, she let me photo her collection.  When I went to photo that other friend's collection though, the collector had had a change of mind and had become fearful of others knowing about her ponies.  It was frustrating to say the least, but I understood.  It was still a wonderful visit with all of them.  Unfortunately, my ankle had a bit of an accident at the end of the trip, and then you all know the aftermath of 9/11.  I got home and woke the next morning to see the towers on the news. 

Collecting unites us, but it can also tear folks apart.  Too much drama, too many scammers, increasing cost and some trades that I sent off and didn't receive back the other trade made everything a bit sour.  Suffering from quack dentistry and in need of shoulder surgery and other medical things, I decided to stop trading and just purchase what I wanted.  Right about then the moc Greek and Argentina ponies popped up, Dutch too.  A collector's guide to ponies came out shortly after.  It appeared rushed, was factually inaccurate on many things, and could have used more care, but it happened.  I shelved my projects and took down the Berry Patch in late 2002, but joined here just after that time as well.  I guess the last thing my website did came in the form of a small email I have saved someplace.  It was from a Hasbro designer that had seen a graphic I drew and wanted to know how I created a light effect in Glory's eye when I drew her.  That little color stripe in the G3 eyes- that came after.   Then we moved in properly to the new house, I hosted a couple of pony meets here before I had too many medical and financial troubles to do it again.

I like the changes that have happened here in the last 10-ish years.  There isn't so much bragging anymore - it's more of just a friendly exchange of info and very refreshing.  There are still some obnoxious collectors but most folks are very sweet.  I've done a few purchases and a couple trades now and found the results very nice (thanks again Kelly!)  Wiki is very helpful, but still lacking so much info.  I see many old friendly names that have been around ages.  It's tempting to try again with more trades.  So many new items are out, and Summer's Pony Fair is always enjoyable.  Lots of nice changes!