Bye Twitter

I used to love Twitter. I used my account mainly to rant about politics and react to political comments. It was fun, but boy it was infuriating. It was an endless Internet debate. I was constantly trying to one-up or outsmart one commenter or another, constantly reacting to the news, constantly correcting other people’s bad takes. But then I got banned. I tried to get my account reinstated, but then I noticed how stress-free I was. It was like a weight has been lifted. I don’t have to fight anyone online nor do I have to constantly broadcast my point of view about everything. And for the record, I was banned for overstepping my bounds arguing with Laura Ingraham over the death of George Floyd.

Anyway, I didn’t feel like I was missing out the minute I stopped looking at Twitter every hour. I figure I am busy enough dealing with my Instagram account and Reddit, that I don’t need the negativity that is Twitter. And really, the vibe on those other platforms are very different compared to Twitter. On Instagram, everyone is being positive and supportive of my art. On Reddit, I get to read and give constructive advice on many things, or go on a wormhole and educate myself about a subject. On Twitter, it’s like being in the middle of a playground fight all of the time.

So when Elon Musk decided to buy Twitter, I really didn’t care that much. I already wasn’t a big fan of Elon Musk. For someone so rich, he seemed to be so thirsty for approval, so needy in proving his macho, edgelodrd Tony Stark vision of himself. The man is not Tony Stark. Also, Tony Stark is an awful superhero, a lazily-written deus ex machina of a character. “Oh I know how to save the universe, I’ll just use uhm… nanobots! Yes, that’s it!” But back to Elon Musk. He’s not a genius. He was born rich, and turned that privilege into even more wealth. He didn’t invent the electric cars Tesla is pumping out. His engineers did. If anything, all of the ideas that come out of his head, and not from his engineers or any expert, seem to be totally dumb. Self-driving cars by 2023? Highly unlikely. Travelling in a hyperloop? More like a long, single-lane tunnel that’s heavily backed up. Buying twitter to make it more free for free-speech warriors. Well, that just sounds like a disaster.

And what do you know? The minute he buys it, more n-words start popping up, hate speech increases, and advertisers started fleeing. There are many other ways he’s messing up Twitter, but I’m sure you can find that in other places in the Internet, and by the time you’re reading this, I’m sure he’s already done much more than I could list. That is, if Twitter still exists.

Now I feel bad for many of the people he’s fired in the company, but not all of them. To save money, he’s fired about half of the company’s workforce and has let go of anyone questioning his intelligence or expertise in technology or running the company. I feel bad for those people, but hey, if you’re in Silicon Valley and have coding skills, you’re already more employable than I am. You’ll be fine. Or at least, I hope you’ll be fine. It’s really callous of Musk to fire people right before the holidays. But I suppose that’s him being edgy. Who I don’t feel bad for is the CEO and the other executives he fired the minute he bought Twitter. They were the same people who forced him to buy the company in the first place. I’m sure they expected to be fired. And being executives, I’m sure they all had golden parachutes and was more than happy to be fired rather than stick around and see first hand how Musk sinks Twitter.

I really wish the old Twitter would come back but I think it’s all far gone now. Everyone is gleefully watching Musk fail to run the company. He wanted to be the king of free speech and an edgelord, but now it seems like he’s the one in the middle of the school playground being egged on and teased by everybody. Within two weeks of buying the company, Musk is already hinting at bankruptcy. It’s even affecting the stock price of his other company, Tesla. Unless something dramatically miraculous happens, Twitter will soon be dead.

Goodbye, Twitter, my old friend. It was fun while it lasted. Sometime, I’ll sign up and try to learn Mastodon. Maybe that’s where I can get my old Twitter fix back.

Getting Myself Out There

I’ve been looking at other ways to show off my work through an online networking service, and so far, there hasn’t been anything that’s excited me just yet.

I’m not sure if I’m alone in this, but I’ve had a bias against DeviantArt. For the longest time, I’ve always thought of it to be the place mostly for sexy anime drawings. I’m sure there are lots of professionals in the site who do great work, but can’t help but feel that bias. To my surprise, when I looked at DeviantArt now, things seem to have calmed down. They’ve properly categorized the artists and it seems like they’re trying to cater to more serious artists. Maybe I’ll look more into it if I have some time, but building up a following on DeviantArt seems like starting a Facebook account in 2022. Perhaps that ship has already sailed a long time ago.

I tried out Tumblr, made an account, and found that the community is mostly dead. I think most people left Tumblr a few years ago after they strictly prohibited adult content.

I can’t with Pinterest. I actually find Pinterest annoying and how their aggressive SEO keeps pushing Pinterest in my search results when it’s the last thing I want. I also find Pinterest not very intuitive, so I just can’t.

I’ve been using Instagram for a few years now and have developed a reasonable number of followers, and it has been alright with me. The algorithm seems to have changed and I no longer get as many new followers as I used to, but the fact that it pushes people to keep on posting content actually encourages me to make art more often. It’s dystopic because it is literally making content for a corporation that doesn’t reward me for my efforts in any way, but I find that my Instagram is a good way to catalogue my art, get some feedback from people, and even make new friends.

I looked at Dribbble. While they seem to be very serious about catering to artists, the fact that there’s a paywall also tells me that it would be closed off to the public when it’s the last thing I want. People can still access the site without paying, but because creators need to be paying customers, it also means that many people wouldn’t even bother engaging in it. It seems to be more like a Linkdin for artists, not so much a networking platform to meet other artists.

Similar to Dribbble, Behance seems to be like a Linkdin for artists. It’s free and I made a Behance account and I find that the format is for artists who don’t already have an online portfolio or their own Web site. The way to get a good number of clicks and followers seem to mirror Instagram as well: interact with people, follow others, be active, etc. The set up however is very static. Artists get to make “projects” with a number of images. It doesn’t work like Instagram and you don’t have to update regularly, so it’s very counter-intuitive to interacting with the site regularly and gaining followers to be noticed.

I used to be on Medium, but they changed the tools on the site and it stopped playing well with my Korean machine. I gave up trying to fix the issue thinking I wasn’t getting much good feedback from Medium in the first place. I think the platform is designed for long think pieces, much like Substack, and despite me occasionally having long spiels once in a while, sometimes, I have nothing much to write about, much like right now.

I guess I’ll stick around with Instagram and my own website for now. That is, until Meta completely messes up Instagram the way it did with Facebook.

SNS Content, Not Art

Looks like my team won’t be making it to the playoffs. Or even if they do, they won’t be making too much of an impact. It’s frustrating how the Winnipeg Jets was doing so well about a month ago, only to have so many unnecessary losses recently. The team just has a problem with consistency. I never know what kind of team will show up on the ice. And unfortunately, lately, it’s been a lackluster team that has no business making it past the playoffs. I enjoy watching and following hockey. It’s one of the few things that provide me with an escape and brings me back to my hometown. Too bad they can’t maintain their momentum and not fall apart right before the playoffs. Whenever I get asked about hockey, it can be very challenging explaining Winnipeg Jets’ situation to people and why I’m still following them.

…

I produce a piece of art every two weeks. This goes towards my Instagram feed, and the self-imposed two-week posting schedule keeps me motivated to produce works. It also forces me to keep on thinking and re-thinking ideas for works. If I don’t post, I feel like something was missed, like I dropped the ball. I mentioned this before, but during the pandemic, Instagram is a godsend. It gets me to post my art, get instant feedback, and even introduced me to people online who I can shoot the breeze with.

There are a few things that bother me about Instagram however. First off, it’s part of Facebook. As much as I have disavowed Facebook and try not to use any products sold by the company, I’m pretty much stuck with Instagram at the moment. I get pangs of guilt every time I turn on the app and see “from Facebook.” This is the company that is causing so many of the world’s problems at the moment, the company that fuels vaccine trutherism, instability in the Middle East, the rise of racism and nationalism, etc. It’s horrible. And every time I use the app, I kinda wish they weren’t bought by Facebook. Which makes me wonder why even bother putting “from Facebook” and remind users about Facebook? That’s not going to make people go back to their old Facebook account. If anything, it turns me off Instagram.

Another is that it kinda demotivates me from looking for real-world gallery opportunities. With the pandemic and everything, it’s very difficult to have shows in the real world. Even sending out works is impractical financially and logistically. It takes forever to send things overseas, if the postal service will even allow it at all. And with the instant gratification and interaction I receive off of Instagram, it’s very demotivating to even try with real-world galleries, especially with many of my past shows bereft of interactions with patrons due to me being overseas.

The third thing that bugs me about Instagram is that, I feel like my work seen online is ultimately just content for social networking services. It’s not high art or anything. My works, which I tell myself is the product of self-therapy and a means to cope with internal as well as external stresses, a personal means of expressions free from the pressures of selling work as an artist, they are all just images used to keep people in social media. Most importantly, they keep me in social media. I’m creating images, maintaining a schedule, all to produce unpaid content to a social networking company that doesn’t care about my time.

I’m not saying I’ll be stopping posting works on Instagram soon. I’ll just feel extremely guilty doing so.

…

I remember feeling a tremendous amount of glee when Donald Trump got banned from Twitter. I myself was banned from the platform due to my language against Newt Gingrich and Laura Ingraham. When Trump got banned, I was like, “ha! To think Trump and I are now on the same Twitter boat!” And now I learn that Trump is now essentially blogging as well. It’s a bit of a letdown compared to his announcement of launching a new communications platform. Well, technically, it IS a communications platform, for Trump, the same way WordPress and Blogspot are communications platforms for anyone who wants to blog. Again, we’re pretty much in the same boat, the same blogging boat. It’s like 2005 all over again and all of the kids are blogging.

Actually, it reminds me of an episode of The Office when Creed launched a blog at http://www.creedthoughts.gov.www\creedthought, which is really just a Word document a coworker set up for him, calling it a blog. I can just imagine an assistant at Mar-a-Lago just getting a WordPress account and calling it a “platform.” Trump might think it’s actually an SNS platform much like Twitter because his blog entries are essentially tweets. They’re not long drawn out articles like on would expect from an actual blogger. Or perhaps this just give us a window into how Trump’s mind works. He can’t stand reading more than a page; he probably can’t stand writing more than a page either. He is only capable of thoughts or ideas in small chunks.

On Artists

You are not your job. You are not your relationships. You are not your art either. As much as some artists like to sell their persona as part of their art, it is all bullshit. Only a few people can pull this off. You’re not Warhol. You’re not Dali. Stop it.

너는 너의 직업이 아니요. 너는 너의 관계들이 아니요.너는 너의 예술도 아니요. 일부 예술가는 자신의 페르소나를 예술의 일부로 판매하는 것을 좋아하지만 모두 헛소리요. 소수의 사람만 이것은 할수 있어요. 너는 살바도르 달리가 아니면 멈춰.

Buying a piece of art is not the same as buying a person. A person might be buying a piece of work, but the work should be able to stand on its own, without the artist. Again, I’m talking about artists who are relatively unknown, but I think it’s a mistake to intermingle the personal aspect of social media too much with art. I notice this particularly on Instagram. I think it’s fine to have an art page and have some of your personal life and even development process in your page, but I notice some artists get way too much into themselves and it stops being about the art and more about selling the artist, to which I say, calm down and think first if you really want to do that to yourself. It’s really doing a disservice to your own art and your growth, and probably contributes to perpetuating the image of artists being self-centered attention hounds.

예술품을 사는 것은 사람을 사는 것과는 다라요. 어떤 사람이 예술을 구매할 수도 있지만, 이 예술이 예술가없이 스스로 설 수 있어야해요. 저는 상대적으로 알려지지 않은 예술가들에 대해 이야기하고 있지만 SNS의 개인적인 측면을 예술과 너무 많이 섞는 것은 실수라고 생각해요. 특히 Instagram에서 이것을 발견해요. 아트 페이지를 가지고 있고 너의 개인적인 삶의 일부와 심지어 너의 페이지에 개발 과정을 갖는 것은 괜찮다고 생각해요. 하지만 몇몇 예술가들은 자신에게 너무 깊이 빠져들고 그것이 예술에 관한 것이 아니라 예술가를 판매하는 것에 대해 생각해요. 진정해요. 자신에게 그렇게하고 싶다면 먼저 생각해요. 그것은 정말 너의 예술과 성장에 해를 끼치고 있고 예술가들이 자기 중심적인 이미지를 영속시키는 데 기여할 거요.

One telltale sign of this phenomenon are pictures showing the scale or artworks. Of course this is all just my opinion, but if you want to show the scale of a piece of art and put yourself in the picture, and you take up more real estate than the piece, then maybe the picture on the Instagram page is not about the art at all.

이 현상의 한 가지 분명한 징후는 규모 또는 예술 작품을 보여주는 시진들이에요.물론 이것은 모두 제 의견이요, 하지만 예술의 규모를 보여주고 자신을 그림에 넣고 싶고 예술보다 더 많은 공간을 차지한다면 Instagram 페이지의 그림은 예술에 관한 것이 전혀 아닐 수도 있어요.

The second red flag for me is when I the viewer is constantly informed of the artist’s life and more effort seems to be put on creating the artist’s persona than the art itself. One infamous “artist” in Korea who is no longer in media used to be on TV selling herself as an artist but seems to be more focused on portraying a quirky persona, a dumb and lazy stereotype given to artists. And if one looks up her works, they’re really nothing to write home about. Thankfully, she’s now no longer showing up on television and is so forgotten that her name escapes me.

저에게 두 번째 위험 신호는 시청자가 예술가의 삶에 대해 지속적으로 알리고 예술 자체보다 예술가의 페르소나를 만드는 데 더 많은 노력을 기울이는 거에요. 더 이상 미디어에 출연하지 않는 한국의 한 악명 높은“아티스트”는 예전에는 자신을 아티스트로 판매하는 TV에 출연했지만 아티스트들에게 주어진 멍청하고 게으른 고정 관념 인 기발한 인물을 묘사하는 데 더 초점을 맞춘 것 같아요. 그리고 그녀의 예술을 보면 너는 실망할거에요. 고맙게도 그녀는 이제 더 이상 TV에 나오지 않고 너무 잊혀져 서 그녀의 이름이 기억이 않 와요.

On a similar note, if viewers kept getting reminded of the artist’s condition, be it depression, physical disabilities, or ailments, then I start getting tired, if not irritated. Van Gogh had a very well-established mental condition, but he developed his own style and grew as a post-Impressionist, selling (and at the time failing to sell) his works solely for their merit and not as a byproduct of his illness. Right now, the works stand on their own. We do not need to know he was mentally ill. The same goes with Munch, Goya, and O’Keefe. And while we’re at it, Picasso, Rodin, Michelangelo, Degas, and many others were assholes. But we do not need to know of their assholery to admire their works. The works stand on their own.

마찬가지로, 예술가이 자신의 상태, 우울증, 신체 장애, 질병 등을 계속 시청자에께 상기 시키면 저는 짜증이 나지 않더라도 피곤해지기 시작해요. Van Gogh는 매우 잘 정립 된 정신 상태를 가지고 있었지만 자신의 post-Impressionist 스타일을 개발여 그들의 예술품을 병의 부산물이 아니라 자신의 장점을 위해서만 판매 (하지만 판매하지 못함)했어요. 지금은 그 예술품들이 독자적으로 서 있어요. 그가 정신적으로 아팠다는 것을 알 필요는 없어요. Munch, Goya, O’Keefe도 마찬가지에요. 그리고 우리가 거기에있는 동안 Picasso, Rodin, Michelangelo, Degas 등 많은 사람들이 즘 나빴어요. 그러나 우리는 그들의 예술품에 감탄하기 위해 그들의 나쁜 성격을 알 필요가 없어요. 예술품들이 자체로 서 있어요.

And since we’re talking about asshole artists, I think there’s a difference between enjoying a dead artist’s genius and giving money to a current, living asshole. I think it’s perfectly fine to enjoy the works of dead artists who might have been assholes in the past. It’s the same way one can admire great ancient structures in Europe while completely ignoring about how Europe plundered so much wealth out of so many countries. It’s another thing however to pay for a movie directed by Bryan Singer, Roman Polanski, or Woody Allen. I do love watching the pirated version of “Rosemary’s Baby” however.

그리고 우리는 나쁜 예술가에 대해 이야기하고 있기 때문에, 죽은 예술가의 천재성을 즐기는 것과 현재 살아있는 나쁜 예술가 에게 돈을주는 것에는 차이가 있다고 생각해요. 과거에 나쁜 였을지도 죽은 예술가들의 예술품을 즐기는 것도 괜찮은 것 같아요. 유럽의 위대한 고대 건축물에 감탄할 수있는 것고유럽이 여러 나라에서 얼마나 많은 부를 약탈했는지 완전히 무시하면서. 같은 방식예요. 그러나 Bryan Singer, Roman Polanski 또는 Woody Allen이 감독 한 영화에 대한 비용을 지불하는 것은 또 다른 일이예요. 하지만 “Rosemary’s Baby” 해적판 보는 걸 좋아해요.

The third red flag is something I mentioned in passing. The works simply don’t stand on their own. Taken without the artist in mind, will anyone take notice of it? Does it look amateurish or plain? Not to be insulting here, but elephants can be tortured to paint canvasses. They are very primitive swaths of color, almost like a random accident. But because they are made by tortured elephants, they become something else. Does an artist’s work look average? Is it elevated by the artist’s “story”? Then maybe it’s not about the artwork at all. Now, I love Dada and the idea of found objects and readymades, but their “stories” are concepts which are itself art. I don’t think the everyday life of an artist and their struggles with whatever ails them compares with Dada.

세 번째 신호는 이미 이야기했어요. 그 예술품들은 그 자체로 서 있지 않아요. 예술가 없으면 누가 알아 차 릴까요? 아마추어 같거나 평범 해 보입니까? 여기에서는 모욕적이지 않지만 코끼리는 캔버스를 그리기 위해 고문을 당할 수 있어요. 그들은 거의 우연한 사고처럼 매우 원시적 인 색채요. 그러나 고문당하는 코끼리에 의해 만들어 졌기 때문에 그들은 다른 무언가가되요. 예술가의 예술품이 평균적으로 보입니까? 예술가의 “이야기”로 개선 되었나요? 그렇다면 예술품에 관한 것이 아닐 수도 있어요. Dada와 found objects과 readymades에 대한 아이디어를 좋아하지만 그들의 “이야기”는 그 자체가 예술인 개념에요. 예술가의 일상 생활과 그들이 어떤 병때 투쟁을 Dada와 비교할 수없어요.

So why do I care? Why do I write these things? Because I want you to grow. I want you to look at your work and really evaluate it. If a stranger saw it somewhere, would it be compelling for them or would it be ignored? For what reason should they be staring? Give your audience a reason to stare. Make it about the art and not about yourself. This is why I tend to distrust actors or singers who decide to become artists. Their work can be mediocre but it is immediately elevated by their celebrity, totally separate from any artistic merit of the artwork itself. The only reason people will look at a dumb shoe “made” by Kanye West is that he said he designed it. Forget that they all look dumb compared to other shoes in the market.

그래서 내가 왜 신경을 써야합니까? 왜 이런 것들을 쓰나요? 나는 너를 성장하기를 바라요. 나는 너를 너의 예술품을보고 정말로 평가하기를 바라요. 낯선 사람이 그것을 어딘가에서 본다면, 그것은 그들에게 매력적일까요 아니면 무시 될까요? 그들은 어떤 이유로 쳐다보아야합니까? 청중에게 쳐다보아야할 이유를 제공하세요. 자신에 대한 것이 아니라 예술에 대해 이야기하세요. 예술가되기로 결정한 배우 나 가수를 불신하는 경향이 있어요. 그들의 예술품은 평범 할 수 있지만 예술품 자체의 예술적 장점과는 완전히 별개로 유명인에 의해 즉시 향상되요. 사람들이 Kanye West가 “만든” 멍청한 신발을 보는 유일한 이유는 그가 디자인했다고 말했기 때문에요. 다른 신발에 비해 모두 멍청 해 보인다는 사실을 잊어요.

I think artists need to decide whether they’re selling themselves or their art. Maybe they can be successful at both. It can happen! But often I see people calling themselves artists but are too busy with the art persona and not the art. So yeah, if you’re an artist, start with showing more art and less of your dumb artist face.

에술가들은는 자신의 에술품을 판매하게 아니면 자신의 페르소나를 판매하게 결정해야헤요. 둘 다 성공할 수도 있어요. 그것은 할수 있어요! 그러나 종종 사람들이 스스로를 예술가라고 부르지 만 예술이 아닌 예술가의 인물에 너무 바쁘다는 것을 보에요. 예, 너는 예술가라면 너의 멍청한 예술가 얼굴을 대신에 더 많은 예술을 보여주고 시작하세요.

A Sinking Ship

Instagram has changed for the worse. Let’s talk about the change in algorithm first. Whoever is in charge of Instagram has decided to make it harder for people to get noticed and get followers. I used to think that it was just me, I thought I had reached a plateau, but then I started seeing complaints from others as well. They’re either not gaining followers, or worse, they’re losing them. When I first started posting regularly, it was not unusual to gain around 100 followers in every week or so. These days, my growth is at a snail’s pace. And with Instagram upgrading me to a creator account, I could see that my engagement and growth is incredibly low. But that’s not all I see. I now constantly see Instagram offering to promote my posts for a price.

I’m guessing Instagram is now pressuring people to pay in order to promote their posts and hopefully see their follower numbers grow. Maybe I’m naive, but these makes me very suspicious of every post I see on “top,” especially if I keep seeing the same account over and over again. Instead of a social network service, it’s turned into a paid commercial service. Users are either being asked to become paid advertisers or deal with other users who are now probably paid advertisers themselves. Add to that the regular advertising users see on their feed.

Of course people are trying to fight back against this trend, asking followers to save their posts, comment, or share to other users, instead of just liking them. These actions are supposed to increase their visibility and allow them to grow. But I don’t know if this will work in the long run. The platform seem quite intent in preventing organic growth. Not to toot my own horn, but I like to think of myself as a pretty decent artist. And when I see someone with mediocre skills get several hundred likes from their tens of thousands of followers, it’s like an ant staring at a mountain. This person probably either boosted their account somehow or has been paying for promotions, and Instagram likes it that way.

Instagram has also decided to make shopping a major part of the platform. Looking at it, they’ve given the stores of the accounts I actually follow very small real estate compared to corporate brands and online stores on the platform. Shopping and browsing through the actual accounts I care about also requires more clicks to look through. Sifting through the stores Instagram is promoting, I notice that perhaps Facebook and Instagram doesn’t have enough data about me. It’s like stumbling through some stranger’s Pinterest/Etsy page. If they’re trying to simulate caring and actually knowing their user base, they’re failing me. I don’t think Instagram will be taking over as one of my go-to platforms for shopping anytime soon.

So what does this do to me? Well, aside from not growing, nothing really. I imagine this is more frustrating for people who are intent on growing their accounts for visibility, business, or whatever, but if the end goal is business, Instagram is discouraging the influencer route and forcing people to reconsider paying for promoting their accounts. I think they’re also catering to people who are already selling through Instagram, not to new players. It was good to see my account organically grow within a couple of years. Honestly, I felt I had better feedback and more exposure as an artist compared to having my works in physical galleries in Korea. But seeing this current trend, I’m worried that Instagram will soon become the next Facebook.

It’s a good thing that Instagram is currently just images and short videos. If it becomes more like Facebook and becomes a platform for fake stories that trick my dad, then I will move on to the next thing.

Wasted Year

This coming weekend is the long Korean Thanksgiving holiday. It’s a short work week, but outside of seeing relatives, there’s really not much to look forward to outside of just staying indoors. The Korean government is asking people to stay at home and don’t visit their hometowns during the holiday in order to keep the coronavirus infection rate low. Ever since the resurgence of the virus a few weeks ago caused by a right wing religious group, Korea’s been bouncing back and forth between over 100 to lower than 100 infections per day and people are worried that the long holiday will make the infection rate skyrocket. It’s been even more dangerous lately because most of the cases have been untraceable. So yeah, this means more staying at home, more Netflix, and more getting frustrated/bored. A long weekend sound horrible right now. It is literally making me anxious.

And really, what is there to be thankful for? 2020 has been a depressing slog. I can’t think of any way that I have progressed this year outside of getting a small raise at work. I suppose I should be thankful that I’m still employed, and I am, but that’s been a really low bar in this horrible, horrible year. I mean for crying out loud, Burger King and McDonalds just announced that they won’t be able to have tomatoes in their burgers due to floodings and the tremendously high price of vegetables this year. Tomatoes… we don’t even get tomatoes this year. What a joyless, depressing year!

…

I’ve noticed it recently, and I’ve heard from a couple of my friends about it, but Instagram isn’t really letting people grow in their platform these days. I had a bit of a growth spurt two years ago, but lately I’ve been seeing myself plateau to maybe just a handful of followers a week. I’ll even get bots following me and unfollowing me after a while which really makes my weekly analytics totally unreliable. I think Instagram has been infected by the awful that made Facebook an awful platform. It is now openly discouraging people to grow their followers outside of paying to promote their posts for more visibility. It’s always there, that “promote” button waiting for people to push their content to more people. As for it actually working, a couple of Youtube videos tell me the investment isn’t really worth it. It doesn’t really add up to more views or followers.

I’m not really trying to grow my followers or anything. I have no grand delusions of making a living out of social networks. I just want people to see my work. But with this new Instagram algorithm making the platform a pay-to-play scheme, it makes it that much harder to get my work out there. And what gets to me is that I’m just an unknown artist who could die unknown and it wouldn’t really make that much of a difference to me. It must really suck for full-time artists who live and die from marketing themselves on social platforms. Seriously, everything Facebook touches turns to absolute shit.

Thanks for the comment, buddy!

Despite #Inktober, I’m still working on art everyday. I’m slowly making new pieces whenever I find the time and applying to galleries if I find something that matches my work. My Instagram has been a bit sad since I post the same piece everyday with just a different part of it highlighted, but one thing it showed me is whether some of my regular Instagram visitors or actual people who know me are actually paying attention to my work or just throwing mindless compliments and pushing heart. To understand what I’m saying, here’s what I have on my Instagram.

As one can clearly see from above, a number of colored circles are there to highlight the part of the work which was zoomed in for that day. The colored circles are simply a tool, a sign, a visual to signify to the viewer to look at that spot. It was never meant to be a design element.

And yet one person who I happen to believe I was close to remarked, “Wonderful work Jospeh loving the colour.”

Now, it’s one thing to misspell my name. I can take it. But to say “wonderful colour,” why bother? The person cares enough to leave a comment and make their presence known, and yet doesn’t care enough to actually look at the work they are commenting on. This person is an artist, too! How can I take any artistic comment or criticism from this person seriously again, be it regarding my work or anyone else’? Ugh!

It’s like being in a gallery and hearing someone say the most general thing about your work. You know that they are trying to pay you a compliment. They are being kind. Patronizing, but kind. Neither of you want to be in that moment, and both of you would rather be back at the food table grabbing another glass of free wine.

Anyway, the lesson I guess is don’t take social media too seriously. And if you’re gonna half-ass saying hello to anyone on your social media for any obligation whatsoever, don’t even bother.

Putting a Face on Creepy

I’m not a big fan of conservative politicians in general, but I find what’s happening to Tony Clement a tad unfair. Setting the hypocrisy of being a conservative, married politician fishing for young women online aside, I think people forget that he is a victim in this as well.

To recap Tony Clement, was caught sending lewd messages and inappropriate nudes online after it was learned that in at least two occasions, he has been extorted by people pretending to be willing adult recipients. Later, several surfaced and detailed Tony Clement’s behavior and calling it creepy. Apparently, he’s looking for extra-marital trysts with young women and would often boldly “like” women’s sensual pictures on Instagram, sometimes deep-diving into a user’s history of pics and liking them. This, apparently, is “creepy.”

Well, let me try defending a creep.

First off, I believe he should be disqualified for any leadership position, not for any of his behavior, but simply because he lost the confidence of his peers. Tony Clement is first and foremost a politician, and regardless of how unjust the way he lost his political influence and became toxic, you cannot have a leader which others would not want to be associated with. It is all simply politics. It has nothing to do with ethics, morality, or hypocrisy. No one would want him in the room. That’s not a leader.

Second, I believe that the “sin” of cheating on his spouse is solely between him and his wife. Anthony Weiner’s repeated escapades never really bothered me. I thought he was a good politician despite his crippling addiction to sexting. It wasn’t until he got caught for inappropriate communications with a minor that I got off the bandwagon. No one really knows what was happening in his marriage, no one except him and his wife. For all we know, his wife might have been okay with the whole thing. We can’t call it a sin if it isn’t a sin in their eyes. I can’t really judge what Tony Clement did to his marriage since we really don’t know what the nature of his marriage was at the moment. We can judge it for hypocrisy, yes, but it’s very difficult to call it a betrayal when we’re not privy to his marriage.

Just recently, 700 Club’s Pat Robertson proclaimed that viewing pornography is adultery. That is him judging everyone else’s marriages, marriages that he has no idea what the husbands and wives are okay with. I wouldn’t want to be like Pat Robertson and make assumptions on Tony Clement’s marriage. For all we know, his wife was okay with him messaging women. Maybe she thought it harmless. Men and women do things that others might consider infidelity but their partners are okay with. I’m sure many of the men who go see strippers have wives at home who are okay with that occasional behavior. Turning a blind eye to such activities is sometimes a pillar to many marriages.

And speaking of harmless, deep diving into someone’s Instagram gallery is harmless. It truly is. When a person’s pictures are out on the web, it is there for everyone to see. The harm or the “creepiness” that Tony Clement did was leave evidence. He let the women know that, yes, he did look through their pictures. He “liked” several of them. People are pretending that people, strangers, don’t do this. If your pictures are out there, people will look through them. Men do it. I’m sure women do it too. What Tony Clement did however is that he brought a face to that stranger looking through women’s Instagram history. He made the invisible stalker visible. Now, perhaps it was boldness on his part, or perhaps it was him simply being inept with the platform, but let’s not pretend that what he did was especially creepy. People do what he did all the time, they just don’t boldly “like” the pictures.

As for sending lewd messages and pictures, I don’t see anything wrong if it’s between consenting adults. As far as I could tell, the pictures he sent were towards consenting adults. And I could be wrong, but I haven’t seen any stories of him harassing women online by constantly messaging them. Sure, he would comment on people’s selfies and perhaps annoy, confuse, or make them feel a bit weird, but I don’t think that’s necessarily harassment. It’s weird and unusual, but he wasn’t on a campaign to menace people. It sounds more like he’s inept, if not socially then in terms of technology and security. Some of the women who have surfaced post rather sexy material online and appear to be open to online admirers. I am not placing blame on them for being harassed nor am I conceding that what Tony Clement did to them was harassment. But if total strangers online can make comments about a person’s half-naked pictures, why is it so wrong for a famous person to do so? Does it depend on the type of person who liking the pictures? What if it was some more attractive Hollywood celebrity instead of a conservative Canadian MP? And I don’t really buy into the fact that there is an unfair power dynamic since he is a famous politician. In fact, the recipients of the “likes” and messages had more power over Tony Clement since they were in position of what could possibly be embarrassing and politically damaging for anyone in government.

Again, Tony Clement is a victim of extortion. Let us not forget that. He is still being sex shamed after being a victim of what is comparable to revenge porn. He has made some women feel uncomfortable online, but he has not broken any laws. Everyone needs to calm down on the schadenfreude over his downfall.

Catching Up on All Things Old

So I’m just discovering the beauty of Twitter. Well, I had an old Twitter account which I used to follow people before but I’ve been very active with tweeting. But recently, I find myself tweeting thoughts and replies more often. It’s a great way to just put a thought out there. And it’s a bit of a payoff to see someone share the sentiment. I’m not gonna go crazy about it and start tweeting all of the time, but it’s good to put in my two cents with popular issues now and then, especially since I’m a bit of a news junkie.  (same thing goes for  Instagram)

My wife and I are enjoying Minecraft just now. She’s more into it than me, but I can definitely say that I now understand the appeal. When I first tried it out over a year ago, I didn’t really care much for the interface nor for the unappealing tutorial, but we picked it up at a discount and I’m now seeing why people have gone nuts over it. I’m actively trying not to spend too much time with it since it can suck up hours of your day easily. (Same thing goes for Clash of Clans and Nintendo 3DS)

My Christmas was spent playing mahjong, a game I haven’t played since my teen years. My grandmother taught us how to play mahjong when she stayed at our place back when I was in elementary school. She was bored and needed someone to play it with. Later on, my sisters and I would play it with our nanny, with real money. I taught my wife and her friend how to play. I’m rekindling my old love for the game. It’s good to have an indoor activity where we don’t have to stare at the television, even if it involves a bit of gambling. (Same thing goes for Monopoly)

I started reading more magazines, well, their pdf versions. There’s just something about reading a magazine that has all of the information right there instead of news websites where it’s one click bait article after another (no more loading!). With magazines, it takes a fair bit of dedication to devote space to an article, as opposed to some websites and aggregators that print out badly-edited articles about things that just happened to be popular that day regardless of how inconsequential they are.

I realize this has been a fairly innocuous first entry for 2016, but there’s been a lot of bad news in the headlines as well as with people around. Better to sit back, enjoy the mundane, and count our blessings. God knows, we have the rest of the day to be paranoid about our existence.

Inktober is for Jerks

Being an artist who mainly does ink drawings, it’s a bit odd that I’m missing out on Inktober. I’d like to blame Jake Parker, the man who created Inktober, for not listing Rotring pens as one of the best ink drawing tools. If he can’t recognize the superiority of the German rapidographs over any other technical pens, then the man must be insane and the movement a sham. Sure, Copic Multiliners and Pentel Pocket Brush Pens are good, but that’s if you’re a child. If you’re a grown man, you use Rotring rapidographs.

Actually, the real reason I don’t do Inktober is that I already draw almost every day. That and I don’t really maintain my Facebook or Instagram account that much. Despite the occasional good that we get from social platforms, I really think that Facebook is a cynical sham built on a foundation of narcissism and the desire to peek into your ex’s life. It sounds like a conspiracy theory, but I’d rather not provide a multi-billion dollar company personal content for free (or at least try to limit my use of it).

In any case, any movement that gets people drawing more is good with me (despite the misleading title). At least it’s better than Movember, when people grow hipster mustaches and don’t bother donating to cancer research or getting their prostates examined. Less hipster, more drawing please.