If your are a fan of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, and you haven’t heard that episode 43^[1], “Hearts and Hooves”, was released to the iTunes store early this week, then I’m not sure what rock you were hiding under. It was released and I was really surprised to see the drama that sprung up around the early posting of the episode. I watched it the moment I could get my grubby paws on it, as is my nature, but I won’t begrudge anyone else a desire to hold off until the scheduled air date and keep the episode behind a veil. To that end I’ll let you know right now: this post contains no spoilers. This is not a discussion about the episode at all. We’re going to talk about release dates.

It’s not exactly clear what the channel is for these episodes to come to iTunes from DHX Media Vancouver to iTunes; we don’t know at what point the path from master to air/download differs between the episodes that show on The Hub and those that end up on iTunes. The release date for iTunes is anything but consistent. The email notifying me of a new episode has come to my inbox as little as 12 hours after a new episode’s air date, or it can take nearly a week. It’s entirely possible that the early release of “Hearts and Hooves” was  a mistake, since it launched simultaneously with “Read it and Weep”, the previous week’s episode. I can just picture someone in an cubical somewhere, highlighting one too many .m4v files and hitting “publish”. I certainly don’t have any reason to believe that we’ll ever see an early episode again.

But here’s the thing: we should see them early online. Every week.

I was mulling the way the most recent episode had a split release date on my way home from work^[2] and how it was splitting the audience and it started to seem highly appropriate. I think moving the official iTunes release date up to Friday or Thursday would actually an incredibly smart move on DHX/Hasbro’s part. It is seriously unlikely to happen, of course, but I think this is one of the few shows where it would actually work very well to help them gain some additional profit.

The MLP:FiM audience is now pretty well defined by it’s dual nature. You have the intended audience of young girls^[3] and then you have this separate group, not insignificant in numbers, of 18-30 year olds^[4]. The 18-30 year olds, us bronies, are pretty fervid audience members, who usually want to see an episode at the earliest available opportunity. But while this group may help a show’s Nielson ratings,^[5] they are pretty worthless to help sell ad time. Let’s face it, if you’re trying to sell Barbies or whatever the modern equivalent of Bubbletape  is to young girls, knowing that a few tens of thousands of under grads and young professionals are watching doesn’t really make the ad space more valuable. A TV show’s revenue comes from selling an audience to the advertisers, and you can’t sell the bronies.

However, you can sell the show to bronies. Give the secondary demographic, a fanbase that’s overflowing with enthusiasm and champing at the bit for more content, a compelling reason to purchase the show itself on iTunes^[6] and they will take you up on that offer in droves. You won’t be rid of the youtubers and pirates completely^[7] , buy you will definitely increase iTunes sales. If presented with the decision to get the episode early, even a day early, for the cost of a season pass I’d gladly pony up the dough.

And I don’t believe that this would touch their target audience at all, where they make their bread and butter. Some kids may watch the iTunes versions, but it would surprise me if that demographic made the switch to the digital format over something like an early release date, if they were even able to procure the content on iTunes. The only audience members I could seem being convinced to change format would be the older demographic, who already tend to watch the show digitally.

DHX/Hasbro would take an audience from a venue where they are essentially valueless and shunt them to a venue where they produce direct revenue, without additional cost. Pure profit.

It seems like a no-brainer to me. That being said: I’d be more surprised to see this really happening. MLP:FiM is produced in partnership with The Hub and, right or wrong, they would be worried about loosing audience and ratings numbers and would certainly nix such an idea. As it stands, we’ve heard no official statement on the episode release^[8] which means that it either was a mistake and they’d prefer not to bring more attention to it, or that little enough attention is being paid to this aspect of the distribution that they don’t really care. Either way, I’m inclined to predict that iTunes release dates will continue to fluctuate wildly with each episode.

1. That’s season 2 episode 17
2. High rate of speed, “Pinkie Smile” on full blast
3. and their parents
4. predominantly male but not so much that you can make assumptions
5. in which they would be severely underrepresented. Due to this group’s high technological familiarity and The Hub’s small market. share most bronies watch on YouTube or torrents
6. or any online video service, I hold no allegiance to Apple
7. Spoiler: you never will
8. so far as I know

We finally got the proper garnishes for the Pinkie Pie so here’s the write up.

• 1 and 1/2 ounces Cake Flavored Vodka
• 2 Teaspoons Nestle strawberry milk powder
• 12 ounces Milk
• Garnish with gummy alligator and cotton candy

The Pinkie Pie is very much not my cup of tea, unfortunately. It is very pink though; like really pink. There are some worries that looks a bit too much like pepto, but I think it’s highly appropriate. It’s the sort of cocktail you can drink all night to keep the party going. Smooth and sugary, it received wide spread positive reviews during the party. You can mess with the ratio of vodka to strawberry milk if you like, depending on taste and desired intoxication level.

We did a test run of the lastest revision of the Rainbow Dash. Our process isn’t perfected yet, as these were the only four of a batch of nearly thirty to come out in^[1] one piece. The recipe is good though, as each one ounce cube is delicious and deceptively alcoholic. We will do another run later in the week with some tweaks and hopefully be able to produce more consistent results and I’ll post the recipe then.

Once we get a good Twilight Sparkle rolling, we’ll need to work out a Scootaloo and some Princess ones. I’m not even sure where to start with a Discord drink though^[2] .

1. nearly
2. LSD?

Applejack

• 1.5 oz of Applejack
• Easiest drink in the world to pour; just put it into a glass.

How surprised was I that our local supplier had actual applejack. We gave some consideration to coming up with an actual cocktail, but if the character is named after a hard liquor, then who am I to mess with that. Applejack turns out to be a pleasant drink, with a definite taste of… well… apples. What did you think it would taste like? It’s good; I’d probably get another bottle when this one is finished^[1] .

The Big McIntosh

• 3 oz of applejack
• 18-24 oz of apple cider
• 1 apple half
• Put 3 oz of applejack into the biggest glass you can find. Then put in half an apple. Then fill the rest up with cider.

The Fluttershy

The Rarity

1. Should be a while, we did some major damage to it at the party, but a large part of that is that it’s also part of the Big McIntosh.

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On one horizon, the towering expanse of a mountain range, thousands of meters high, like the backbone of a great, desiccated beast pushing through through a skin of verdant green plant life. On the other horizon, natural pillars of stone rising from a turbulent grey sea; objects carved by the sea, made by it, and yet ultimately doomed to be consumed by it. I walked through this world under azure sky, feeling the earth shift under my feet and looking back to see my footprints become part of the landscape itself, another brush stroke on an ever changing picture. I was taken back inside the dream, found myself unable to continue on but just sit and gawk at that which surrounded me.

I stretched out my hands in an attempt to touch the world around me, to connect more completely with this ethereal beauty my own mind had created, and I felt remorse that nothing I would experience in my real life would be able to compare to what I now knew my imagination was capable of.

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- George Lucas

George Lucas's 1988 Speech About Preserving Films, and Maybe Not Adding a Bunch of CGI Shit to Them | I Watch Stuff