An exploitation of community values

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I have for years purchased T-shirts from Redbubble, their tagline being

Artists make money every time you shop

Not only did I get designs I liked, consistency in product, I was buying from individuals who were using their artistic love to turn into a way to make a living.

Mostly I had a good experience, however one or two I bought were not brilliant, did not feel it was made with the love and care of an artist, more cheap mass produced low quality printing presses. You win some you lose some, such is life.

I left my coporate life just before lock down due to SARS-CoV-2.

This enabled me to do was 'be more me', no coporate restrictions on my appearance, so now with dyed hair, I started wearing earrings again (after 20 years without), and even painted my nails to match my hair - this was more me.

I searched a site called Etsy, their tagline being

Find things you'll love. Support independent sellers

I had some great finds, handmade furniture, handmade boxes, items obviously made by talented people who loved what they did.

Then I looked for earrings. Not sure what style to go with, I ordered many (about 10 pairs) from many different sellers.

My experience here far more hit and miss than before with larger items, and far from the consistency of Redbubble.

Not impressed

Mostly arriving in cheap plastic boxes, some in 'baggies', some of the quality was not great, some I did not want to put in my ear.

This was not really what I was looking for, it did not really feel like these were made handmade by loving artists.

The diamond in the crowd

I ordered from a seller named CookOnStrike From opening the package and seeing the box, this was different experience from the start.

THIS is what I was after!

I thought this person loves their work, already it was obvious, the product was beautiful, high quality, head and shoulds above the others I had bought.

I bought a couple more items from CookonStrike, and then asked if she could make me a bespoke item.

Not something she normally did, however within 24 hours I received photos of the prototypes, different scales, different dimensions, detailed description of the issues, and that it did not seem possible to do without certain tools that although possible, were not her main skillset and did not want to produce a low standard product for me.

Honesty, effort, and amazing to have just collaborated with someone talented and passionate on a design I had come up with, for a bespoke piece, just because I asked.

The point of this post

I have started moving away from automatically turning to Amazon to find items, I look for independants, individuals, another way to find items that I can pay toward a passionate person following a path that many do not.

This seems to come from the impact of lockdown on me. Being more aware of what is important, helping communities and indiviuals, and having more time to be more aware of your own actions and impact, the ripple effects you have.

However, how do you find a diamond amoungst the noise in these market places?

It seems communities like Etsy are being exploited by those looking to jump on a 'hand made by artists' branding, and then those like CookOnStrike are hidden in the marshes of a market of pretenders.

This does not seem fair, however the complexity of running your own standalone business where you are the artist, means that the cost of increasing advertising, SEO, and pushing forward alone does not seem realistic, the easy option, use sites like Etsy or Redbubble, and hope that you are found in the pages and pages of results.

In building my own website, from zero knowledge, after 7 redesigns, learning about various marketing methods, I see some headaches - I tried initially to build my own LAMP stack, fully control and go full Open Source - I see why thats not the usual pathway now.

I have seen digital marketing consultants, web developers, technology consultants, who make it all sound so complex that you must pay huge rates for them to be successful for you, it almost feels like a technology and digital cult, keep complexity and pricing high, dont let the masses look behind the curtain.

I learnt Google Analytics and Data Studio from zero knowledge and built 25 reports, all in one evening. I know companies that have charged 10's of thousands of GBP for this type of output, I have seen simple API scripts cost companies several days work at >£1000 per day, go on any consulting / freelance directory, and how to you find those who actually are worth working with? Something does not feel right to me.

I have time, I have passion for learning, technology, problem solving, and its still a hard slog. So what chance does the artist with a skill and passion have other than go join the market place and hope their stall stands out?

This extends not only to artists, it goes into all industries where there is high supply, big complex words and a fear of people not to admit they do not know. There seems to be a drive to make you think you need to pay them £1000s for their unique hard to find complex skills.

So, asking the question, there has to be an easier way for individuals to succeed online without having to rely on consultants who sell their skills and snake oil for large fees, or some other new way of ensuring a community is set up with an ethos and it is through self regulation able to remove those that do not live to its values.

Look at Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn - its noise, its all the same boilerplates and repeated mantras, how on earth do you stand out? Pay more, post more, say more.... ?

I have scraped out (legally) the websites of technology, digital, and professional IT consultants. I then built word clouds from their websites. They are all replications of each other, using the same words, terminology and complexity, in a line up they all look the same.

It seems those with the most money and the most words and acronyms win in these market places - however you only need to dig in a little to see how fragile the mask and illusion.

Examples:

• if you offer IT security as a service, make sure your own website and online vulnerabilities are not a gapping wide hole
• If you 'care about your customer' dont leave your CRM login open to the world to find with whitelising your IP address to access is by answering the difficult security question "what is the email adress of #####" which can be found online with one google search.
• Dont lie about your abilities, experts do not say they are experts, knowledgeable people know how much more there is to learn.
• Google Analytics is free - there are many free tools out there being packaged and sold to you by 'experts' - Do not let fear stop you asking questions. There is no shame in not knowing, learn to question, learn to watch people respond.

I dont know the answers, I just feel it a shame that many good intentions become exploited, and that people like CookOnStrike suffer and it takes some luck to find the gems in crowded markets.

There are interesting movements in the deep web, collectives (eg P2P wealth distribution for local areas) and positive support and environments (the noise though being quite different).

There are collectives working on other projects like freenet based on a new approach to the internet on privacy, and GNUnet, a network protocol stack for secure and distributed applications.

Growing FOSS communities, and movement in other areas of the internet, there is a change to the world, we are seeing it with SARS-CoV-2, even if you do not admit it.

It feels like a time for innovation and new ways of working, and people that work for love and have values that differ to the 'old normal' surely there are ways to support them and bring them into a level playing field.

I just dont know what, how, or when....

Those crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones that do.