boundless-ennui

[boundless-ennui]

Trying more subtle-ish pride things. I think this one came out really good for a first try! I'll put it on a chain today to sell as a necklace. I might post it in my shop but these days I do most of my sales talking to folks directly and I gotta say it's much nicer.

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“Men at Arms is a direct attack on the idea of monarchy and aristocracy that so much “high fantasy” is based on; Jingo is a fantasy war story that denies the reader the “fun” of seeing a war break out and ends up attacking the concept of war; the character of Rincewind is a subversion of the whole idea of heroism. Monstrous Regiment is a meditation on feminism, Cherry Littlebottom and other female dwarfs a commentary on gender identity and trans people, Thud! a statement against ethnic hatred. But all this deconstruction and subversion didn’t come across as having to eat your vegetables, the way literary fiction often does. And it didn’t come across as a bitter, guilty pleasure either, the way people geek out about the horrifying viciousness of “low fantasy” worlds like A Song of Ice and Fire’s Westeros. Pratchett somehow made his progressive, subversive work as tasty a snack as any of the high fantasy he was subverting. Much of that candy coating was humor–the ability to laugh, as he once argued, being our brain’s way of extracting pleasure from the otherwise painful process of recognizing uncomfortable truths.”

—

Arthur Chu breaks down the importance of Discworld in his farewell tribute to Sir Terry Pratchett, A Guide to Escape from Escapism (via landunderwave)

Part of why it worked was because Pratchett didn’t sneer at heroism or idealism, he showed how good intentions go bad and over the course of centuries things fossilise and need to be replaced, and most importantly, he showed the heroism of the small.  Yes, he showed the other side of the coin, the darker side of the heroic and epic, but he didn’t use that as an excuse to go Martin’s way of “this is what it’s really like: murder, rape and treachery under all the fine words”.

People like Vimes who stuck to duty even in his worst hours, when he was sunk in self-loathing and alcoholism, a dangerous man who sabotaged himself half-intentionally, because it was in his bones and because (as we got to know in “Night Watch”) he also had his own ideals and idealism that he doggedly held on to, even when half-ashamed of that.

He permits honour to exist in his world, even if it’s not kings and knights in shining armour.

It may be low fantasy, but it’s never vile.  Even when he’s showing us what real evil looks like.

(via tartapplesauce)

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At some point I'll set up a tripod thingy so it's not me recording with one hand and trying to show off something I've made with the other.

Today is not that day.

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Have I stopped making things? No. Am I better about posting them online to sell? Also no. Is rent due? Only the gods can say.

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This is what I use to show necklaces at markets. It's not the nearest method but it sure is eye-catching when it's kitted out! Also easy to transport.

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As a resin artist this is knowledge that needs to be spread far and wide. I had no idea when I started working with resin that it was dangerous at all and even now I catch myself being far too blasé when working with it.

On the list of things that you need protection to work with safely, lest you develop reactions to lifesaving medical equipment: 3D printers, gel nails, toys that were marketed to children

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Another one finished! This white pen is so fun. I pretty much use up one full pen for each abstract made though. These are the sacrifices made for My Art. I'm so very cool.

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When I'm left alone this is what happens.

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Trying my hand at new patches. One being for an oppressed people and the other for a dear friend and her husband. I'm still tweaking both but I'm pretty happy with these first passes!

Shopify is magical and awful. Help. boundlessennui.myshopify.com

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Hi hi! First and foremost your art is really, really cool! Secondly, I was browsing your website and noticed your Beribboned Pendant was listed as 0 dollars. Idk if that was done on purpose or not, but I just wanted to send you a heads up just in case. Sorry if this is a bother, and I I hope you have a wonderful rest of your day!

You're not the first to notice! Shopify is a strange magic and I'm not very good at it. I've tried setting the prices but some listings insist on being free. Much as I'd love to be able to give things for free I do gotta pay that rent.

Thanks for telling me and I'll go hit the site with sticks tomorrow!

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I've been meaning to write this down for some time because there are some fundamental errors that people keep making in crowdfunding/sales that shoot their campaigns in the foot. So here's a list of easy principles.

Who am I and why should you listen to me? I am a freelance chaos marketer who has raised well over $100,000 when totaling up various crowdfunding campaigns, mostly for aid to Afghanistan. In addition I've managed to successfully market everything from stuffed plush koalas to hydration salts. Why am I putting this out here for free? Because despite a years long track record of success in social media marketing no one will hire me because I don't have a college degree, so I might as well help people out who can't afford to hire full time marketing. 

If you'd like to hire me to help you evaluate your marketing and sales and teach you better skills on a 1 to 1 basis then hit me up, I am often willing to barter, esp with artists in a variety of mediums! 

Anyway on to HOW TO CONVINCE PEOPLE TO GIVE YOU MONEY:

TL;DR: use positive messaging that humanizes everyone involved and make it as easy as possible for people to give you money.

1. Shame and guilt are demotivators. They will not inspire people to give you money. “Why aren't people helping” “I guess people don't care” “This isn't getting enough shares/donations” etc etc. Online fundraising is often frustrating, heartbreaking, and will make you angry, especially when there's a humanitarian crisis involved. It is critical that if you are raising funds for someone else that you have a place to vent that is not the audience you would like to donate to the cause. 

2. Use motivating messages instead! “You can help!” “Even a small donation is important because it tells Recipient they're not alone, and people care” “We can't fix the whole world, but we can make this one thing right, and that means something”. Emphasize that this is a problem that the reader can help fix with even a small effort. With items for sale, tell a story. "I drew this thinking about how safe I always felt under a tree in my childhood backyard". "I chose the colors in this shawl to remind me of sagebrush and piñon pine in my favorite place."

3. Make it easy for people to give you money. Never talk about your product or cause without a link that leads directly to where people can give you money. They should be able to click one link on your post and land at the fundraiser or your shop. Every required click is going to lose people, so minimize the number of them required. This also means if you have a list of fundraisers for people to choose from the ones at the bottom will be neglected - people will hit the ones at the top. Be sure to take those off when they're met or periodically shuffle the list around to make sure everyone gets a chance to be in the first 5 spots. In online stores people will often only look at the first page or two of items so be sure to shuffle things around and remove out of stock items that are taking up prime real estate.

4. Humanize the recipient - this can be tricksy when raising charitable aid because you don't want to be exploitative. But to use my last Afghan campaign as an example, “We need to raise $500 for an Afghan family” is less effective than “This Afghan family's home was damaged in heavy rains that caused extensive flooding. They only need $500 to repair and rebuild so they can stay in their home and not become displaced.”  If possible, tell as much of the recipient's story as they consent to. Eg “Fred is seven and loves dinosaurs. His favorite is brontosaurus, and he carries a stuffed one with him everywhere. He wants to be a paleontologist when he grows up and discover a complete brontosaurus skeleton that he can give the same name as his stuffed friend. Unfortunately he's also a trans boy living in Texas and his family needs $1500 to rent a Uhaul and get to Colorado so he can grow up in safety and do that.”

5. If you're not the recipient, humanize yourself while you're at it! “I'd be really grateful if you all could share or donate” “This fundraiser really means a lot to me because…” “Thank you so much for any help, whether sharing or donating” 

6. Treat the audience like humans. Speak to them like they are people you're having a conversation with, not ATMs. This ultimately is the goal of not using shame/guilt and humanizing yourself and the recipient. 

7. Set low goals and bump them up when met. One of the weird things about people is they prefer to give to successful fundraisers. Yeah I don't know either. So you're more likely to get the full amount you need if you set a partial goal initially and then raise it when that's met. Raise it in small increments and raise it repeatedly as those goals are hit to keep momentum going. You can't always control this so if you're boosting someone else's fundraiser you can do it artificially via asks like “Hey y'all can we get together and put $500 on this?”

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Trying to sell handmade crafts in this economy is so. Like. Hey guys I know we're all broke as fuck but do you want my silly little things. I'm very good at it. For the time it takes to make them + skill + materials it's gonna be 30$ per silly little thing. But also shipping costs 12$ for reasons outside my control so it's actually 42$ now. Sorry. No I really can't charge less than that. Yeah I know. Ok. Bye

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Do ya like eyeballs

Do ya

It's in my shoooooop: boundlessennui.myshopify.com

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Finished!

A strange thing about these is that to me they're far easier than anything else I make. It's just shapes, over and over. Pick any one section and you can see this is lines or triangles or circles or waves and such.

Yet and still people talk about how they could never make such as this. You can indeed! Shapes! Just shapes!!!

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I made some pins! These were originally buttons but I've always found those useless as a way to enjoy a fandom thing. Pins, however, are another story.

They're in my shop! boundlessennui.myshopify.com