Embracing the Ugly Side of Business: Video
Back at Hello Etsy in Portland over a year ago, I was pretty stoked to see that all the workshops were being recorded. Editing those videos and correcting for challenging sound conditions led to most of the videos not being released, but I was asked a question last week that led me to poke one of the conference organizers to see if there was a video of my session kicking around. And there was (thanks, Isaac)! So if you have a spare 45 minutes and want to feel like I’m sitting right next to you, talking a lot in your ear, take a look. In fact, there’s not much to actually see, so...
Read MoreIt’s Pay-a-Blogger Day!
The brilliant and kind people at Flattr have deemed today to be a good day to take a few minutes to tangibly support the creators of the blogs we enjoy so much all year ’round. Here’s the gist of Pay a Blogger Day: Of course, Flattring content is a good and easy way to pay a blogger today. But the event is also a great opportunity to finally buy something our favourite bloggers are selling outright – the clever t-shirt, the inspiring ebook, the awesome pattern, the jewelry, toy or photograph. Your eyeballs being on my website means a lot to me. I value your opinions and...
Read MoreThe Fair, the Unfair and the Ugly: Working for Free and Working for Pay
A frequent discussion topic in the creative business world has cycled back around, and I want to chime in with a couple examples from my own experience. The topic is doing work for free (with the assumption it’ll pay eventually) versus only doing work for pay. This round of discussion was sparked by Jenny over at Craft Test Dummies who, appropriately, cried foul when a company called Creative Paperclay put out a call for crafters to join their fairly demanding design team and offered compensation only in the product they require the designers to use. Sister Diane sums up Jenny’s...
Read MoreVideoblog 5 – Flattr: We Should ALL Use It!
(From the homepage, click through to the post to see the video.) [tubepress video="9KVEbG8Htvg"] In my imagination, this videoblog would involve animated illustrations of how Flattr works. Or at least line drawings that move. Or at least line drawings. Alas, the universe was having none of it on my recording day, so you get me and words. No worry, I’ve included Flattr’s own video at the end of the post so you can see their version of how it works, with cake. Show notes: Naturally: Flattr’s website. I failed to mention this in the video: Flattr is only as powerful as...
Read MoreRemembering When I Felt Differently
Something occurred to me out of the blue today: during my last few months as editor of Interweave Crochet, as the company was beginning to focus more on the possibilities presented by online tools and social media, I wanted nothing to do with any of it in my work as editor. Crazy, hey? As you might have noticed, the whole print publishing industry is struggling to make sense of online media in much the same way the yarn industry is struggling. In my final months at IC, there was a lot more talk around the office about online stuff: blogs, forums, Twitter. And even though I had my own blog and...
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I write here about creativity, business, crafts, publishing and books.
