#because i've been tweeting way too much and this needs to be put elsewhere

[patroclws]

i burned myself cooking soup what is that kind of betrayal you are. supposed. to be GOOD. TO ME.

[fatherquesadilla]

Orion D. Black -They/Them · @DungeonCommandr

4th Jul 2020 from TwitLonger

my statement

"It's July 3th and I no longer work for Wizards of the Coast. I no longer work on D&D, the little that I did. This is going to be a long thread and my last for quite a while, so bear with me.

I took the job for two reasons. The first was for the dream. To escape poverty doing what I love, writing and making games. The second was to make D&D welcoming to the millions who are scorned by it.

A lot of people had hope for D&D that they carried with me. While some people were upset to see me work for a corporation that overshadows indie, others hoped that I would be able to make real change. I tried. I failed. And I lost a lot.

Liking a tweet or post, RTing, or even following people who speak ill of WotC can lose you your job in an instant. That's why you never see it happen. @Zbeg is 100% correct. It's a silencing tool. I can say more now.

Kindness doesn't replace respect. Working within your comfort zone doesnt support change. Most people in that group were not ready for me to be there, a nonbinary Black person who would actually critique their problems. Idk what they expected.

I worked hard for a very long time. I got a lot of smiles and vocal support, but it was followed by inaction and being ignored. My coworkers were frustrated for me, and still are now. I confided in them often, cried on shoulders on a few occasions.

I realized at one point that leadership had given me 2 assignments over about 5 months. It was mostly me asking project leads for work, searching out opportunities. Leadership didnt really care about me or my growth. I had to.

I firmly believe that I was a diversity hire. There was no expectation for me to do much of anything. I probably disrupted them by being vocal and following up. It didnt matter if I was supported by seniors and positive.

I think genuine people proposed me as an option and it was accepted because it would look like a radical positive change. It would help quiet vocal outrage. And because I had to stay silent, it was a safe bet.

I started to lose all of my confidence. I started to lose trust in myself. After finding out that I wasnt getting an extension or FTE, I resolved to just finish things out and take care of myself. To stop fighting and to just survive, quietly. But it just kept getting worse.

They would talk about how they're going to start working on treating staff better, retaining contractors, actually answering questions. How much they were invested in diversity and change even though they hired two cis white dudes into two big leadership positions during this. One of whom claimed that he doesnt know what he's doing. No shit. I never want to hear "maybe they just hire the best person for the job" again.

I found out that some of my work was stolen, which destroyed me. It lined up with a project they were going to do and I had sent it in to someone in leadership months ago. The project was announced and this person who contributed "forgot" that we had a meeting where I gave them my ideas, and then a follow up document the day after. I knew nothing was going to be done about it. Someone else told me that the person said sorry that they forgot. That's it.

I was really losing my ability to do much of anything. I have depression and anxiety and ADHD, all of which I manage pretty well. But those parts of me were under the pressure of being ignored, disrespected, "forgotten", and not being able to say a word to the world.

Then, as social unrest continued global due to BLM, the D&D team comes out with their statement. It was like a slap in the face. How much they care about people of color, how much changing things (that I and others had been pushing for months, if not longer) was just going to happen now. It took weeks of protesting across the globe to get D&D to do what people they hired have been already telling them to fix. You cannot, CANNOT say Black lives matter when you cannot respect the Black people who you exploit at 1/3rd your pay, for progressive ideas you pick apart until it's comfortable, for your millions of profit year over year. People of color can make art and freelance, but are never hired. D&D takes what they want from marginalized people, give them scraps, and claim progress.

I spent my time in that building worrying about how much people hated me for working there. I spent a lot of time thinking about how much it hurt to work there. I had and still have supporters, and many. Thanks to you all for being my voice and speaking out when I could not. But I felt so isolated and alone. If not for some coworkers who checked in on me, who were going through the same things? I would've quit. Every angry statement about D&D felt personal because I couldn't fix it. Because I failed, whether it was my fault or not. I felt like I was being trashed by everyone because I could not disconnect what I set as a personal responsibility from the state of the game. That part IS my fault.

But I wound up as I am now because of all of this and much, much more. I am depressed. I am unable to write. I constantly question if anything I create is worth anything. I feel like I let everyone down, and no matter how much people tell me I didnt, that doesnt change. I feel guilty for not being what y'all needed me to be, what I wanted to be, and betrayed for how I was treated at that company. It's an exceptionally kind place on the D&D team. People are very nice to each other in a very genuine way that I truly enjoyed. However, that doesnt replace respect. That doesnt delete how I was treated. It doesnt change the fact that I honestly never want to play a trpg again and am definitely not working in that field anymore.

I know that I'm probably losing a ton of opportunities writing elsewhere because of what I've said here, as well as what I've sent in internally. It may mean that I will return to poverty, which makes me feel like a failure to my race, my family, and my partner who I want to provide the world. But under all these things, I have my integrity. I worked my ass off. I did my best for as long as I could. And I didnt let them treat me like that without telling the world what needs to be said.

Trust actions, not words. Not "look at how much we freelance so and so", because freelancing is exploitation of diversity with no support for the freelancer. Not "here we finally did what we KNOW we should've done a long time ago", because they only care about how optics turn to dollars. EVERYTHING involving D&D will continue to farm marginalized people for the looks and never put them in leadership. They wont be put on staff. They will be held at arms length. I hope they prove me wrong.

A lot of BIPOC and other marginalized people are trying to make their way by using D&D. Dont shame them for that. Think about how much, and when you wield your anger, that it is done righteously.

That said, I dont recommend to anyone, working for the D&D department of Wizards of the Coast."

https://www.twitlonger.com/show/n_1sra9pq

[topicprinter]

I have a few projects / small businesses I run and I've had issues staying consistent on their social media channels. This has to an extent held back some of the projects after good initial growth. A part of that is getting through the honeymoon period and staying motivated but I think there's a few other things I was doing that started to act as a barrier to consistency.Some people seem to thrive on social media and enjoy using it both personally and for their business. They’re predisposed to reaching for their camera or their phone, they’re energised by the effort and attention instead of being drained by it. If that sounds like you, you probably don’t need to read this post! Social media just feels more like work to me. It just doesn't come naturally.That’s compounded by the fact that I value privacy and being present in the moment over sharing publicly in my personal life.. values which are becoming more and more out of place in this modern world. If I could delete all my social media, live comfortably, and surf every day, I would! But that doesn’t gel with running a small business or the way I do live my life so I have to find a balance.So having said that, this post is as much about ways I’ve found to help me stay consistent on my business’s social media channels as it is about ways to avoid it consuming your life and time.What’s the goal of your social media marketingIt’s for your business right? The goal is to make money. You need your audience to buy your products or service.Buuuut, social media is playing the long game. The number one function of social media for a business is to build a relationship with its audience. And it’s hard to build a relationship if you’re always trying to sell them something.You want your audience to have a good feeling about your brand and get to know and trust you, so that when they need or are in a position to buy what you’re selling then they will come to you.Why social media consistency is important for your businessYou are trying to cultivate relationships. I’m sure you have that friend or acquaintance who you don’t hear from for months on end and then hear from out of the blue and they ask you for something.. how do you feel about that person at that moment? That is why social media consistency is important above all else. Don’t make your business that person.Your audience is bombarded by advertisements and information all the time. There are other businesses and distractions always fighting for your audience’s attention. Keeping on top of social media keeps you in the front of your audience’s minds.There’s an old adage in marketing called the Rule of 7 which states that a business has to reach its customers seven times before they’ll take action and buy. The number isn’t important but the idea that you have to have consistent positive contact with your potential customers is.To stay consistent is to stay relevant, and to present as reliable. So, without further ado, here are some things I’ve learned.Don’t put too much pressure on yourself for quality and perfectionA big problem I had with my social accounts for my surf photography business is that I set the bar for content too high. I was only posting images that I was ready to print and sell. It was a vicious cycle because I’d feel like I’d created an expectation in my audience for the type and quality of content that I would post and I felt pressure to live up to it.This meant I wouldn’t post photos taken with my phone or other content I could create and share quickly and easily, even though I’m sure those kinds of posts would have contributed to the goal of building a relationship with my audience.I still want to post quality content, but I’ve realised that that can come in different forms. This lets me relax and have fun with it a lot more.Only use as many social media channels as you can handleThere are so many platforms. In an ideal world, your business would be present and active on them all to make sure you reach aaaall your potential customers. But if it’s just you behind the scenes, it’s not realistic. Social media can be a full-time job and you’ve other business tasks to focus on, never mind actually having personal time too!It’s made worse if you have multiple projects. I run surfpreneur.co, a surf photography business, I’m a surf and SUP instructor, and I do a couple other things.. At first, I was determined to have separate social accounts for all my projects. That quickly adds up. Am I going to run three Instagram and Twitter accounts, two Facebook business pages, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Snapchat…? Absolutely not! It’s overwhelming.I’m lucky that most of the things I do online are related and can be grouped together in a ‘personal brand’, so I’ve recently changed my strategy to mainly running only one Facebook business page and one Instagram account. I’d rather be able to focus on one or two channels and give them the attention and effort they need than to spread myself thin over multiple channels and end up neglecting them all.Instagram is most relevant to my core audience. I’d be quite happy just using it.Make coming up with post ideas a breezeEver get the feeling that you should post something but you don’t know what so you give it a few seconds thought and then put it back on the to-do list to be ignored for another day? I do the easy stuff on the list first and then procrastinate instead of doing the difficult tasks. But I still feel like I’ve accomplished something! You know..It’s all about making it easy. I have a list of different post types for my social channels that I can mix up and have a constant variety of different post ideas. For example, my Instagram account’s list is:Prints on the wall / customer photosQuality water photographsLifestyle phone photos (behind the scenes)GoPro clips of surfingPhotos taken of me surfingI combine having a list of different post types with keeping an eye on competitors and industry leaders in my niche for inspiration on how they use social media. I’m never stuck for ideas!It’s also a good idea to keep a couple posts in reserve so if you’re having a slow week (normally for me when there are no waves), you’ll still have something to post.Make it as easy as possible to make a postIf you make posting on social media easy you’re more likely to actually do it. We’ve all got our phones on us all the time, so if you’re not setting a restrictively high bar on quality you can have a convenient and quick process from idea to post.For phone photos, I do a quick edit on my phone using Snapseed and then post directly to Instagram. I’ll do the same for Facebook. I have a Twitter account but it’s not my favourite platform by a long way so I’ve set up a Zapier process to automate posting my Instagram posts to Twitter. I don’t think this is ideal but if it means I post more and spend less time on social media then I’ll take it! I can still make posts unique to Twitter if I have a post that suits that platform better (like blog posts!).You can make use of other online tools to make the process easier as well depending on your needs. I’ve used Buffer in the past and I found it helpful for scheduling posts on multiple platforms in advance.Once your post is done, it’s doneI can’t help it. When I post something I’ll check over and over on how it’s being received. Likes, comments, shares. Refresh. Likes, comments, shares. I’m trying hard not to do this.It’s worth remembering that when it’s done it’s done. It’s just one social post in a constant stream of thousands of posts all over the world. There are apparently 500 million Tweets sent each day or 6000 every second.I like to think of Twitter as a big theatre completely filled with people all screaming their opinions out and ignoring everyone else.Just let it go and get on with something else!Keep a schedule / content calendarThis is something I’ve not yet committed to for social media as my channels are more in the vein of a ‘personal brand’. I’m getting away with posting whenever I have shareable content from the various things I do. But it would allow the right kind of small business to set aside a little time every week or month to schedule all their social posts at once. That would be a significant timesaver and almost guarantee consistency.Consider hiring someone to helpAt the end of the day, you can spend as much or as little time on social media as you like. But to do it well, spending more time intelligently is the way forward. If your business or project is making money it’s worth considering the cost of the time you spend updating your social media channels. Could you spend your time better elsewhere? It could well be worth hiring a freelancer to do some or all the work for you. But then you’d have to give up some control..As small business owners, we often have a perfectionist, almost obsessive, personality type. We do all the work and make everything happen ourselves. We are extremely invested in our own success. Combine that with social media and you have a dangerous combination when it comes to mental health. Find a balance that suits you.Here’s an interesting piece from Forbes about social media fatigue in small business owners.This was originally a blog post which you can read in full here if you are interested: https://surfpreneur.co/stay-consistent-social-media-marketing/Anyway, thanks for reading. I hope you've found this helpful. This is a problem I'm always battling with as I'm not really a social media person. I see it as a necessary evil as opposed to a guilty pleasure or anything like that.I'd love to hear different opinions on how you folks deal with social media fatigue or burnout and stay consistent? Cheers!