♥The Important Stuff♥

Thursday 17 June 2010

Topic #5 - Blogger's choice! Write about anything that's on your mind!

When I first saw this topic I thought "Oh yay, free for all, time to talk bollocks." Then I realised I'd do that anyway so why not use it to get some things off my chest at the same time. So here goes. Enjoy the rare time I rant, and remember

All words past this point are of my opinion only, they are not carefully worded to protect anyone or anything (although I'll try and avoid names). If you are easily pissed off, don't read past this point. If you are easily upset, don't read past this point. If you just wanna make drama out of the words I've written before 9am ... go for it, I'm happy to appease your boredom in some way. ENJOY!

When I started designing in SL I was told to "thicken my skin". I can honestly say I was so unbelievably naive, and assumed they meant people might say my stuff is shite and that I should just give up. I though SL drama was the game of lovers who want to fight and strippers who steal each others pole. I honestly didn't think it had a place in business, which is what the fashion world basically is right?
So, when I started noticing the "he said, she said" posts on blogs, and the plurks with over 1000 ranty comments, I slowly began to realise, to my shock, that there are drama queens around these here parts too. Of course I shrugged it off and joined the masses in the "oh I hate drama, lets just ignore it" scene. Though secretly I loved reading the posts, and loved looking at the offending blogs. I still do today.
For the record I LOVE DRAMA. I love watching a fight play out between two designers. I love watching the individual cliques spend hours building an argument up as to why their friend is the victim and I love seeing it come to an explosive conclusion.
What I can't stand is those who throw a nice public "screw you guys I'm going home" style tantrum. I've seen too many plurkies dump their accounts and too many people leave sl or close their store over a drama. Yeah, drama is shitty and drama can hurt. But if you don't want it to, don't read the blogs, delete the plurkies that piss you off, make your timeline private, ban, mute and move on. Just get back to your SL and whatever it is you do there and forget the drama.
The fact is... people who cause/participate in drama just want attention. They want 15 minutes of fame. If you ignore them, they lose right?

Speaking of fame, another shocking thing I love in SL is SLebrity.
OMG SHOCK HORROR!

Yes, I love SLebrity and one day I want to be one.
I love creating, and I love my store. I love each new release and I want to share it with the people who pass by. Why shouldn't I aim to be well known for what I do? Is it so shameful to want to benefits of being known by a large proportion of the SL community?

The fact is being a SLebrity opens doors. It brings custom, it beings notority and it brings sales. It also brings invites to the coolest parties and invites to hang with the coolest, most interesting and talented people. The people who can pick and choose who they want to spend time with.

I don't get the people who say "Oh SLebrity is a load of old balls, it's SL it's not RL."
BIG DEAL! SLebrity means the same as celebrity. It means people know who you are and they want on that bandwagon. So they buy your stuff. They trip over themselves to meet you and get your attention. They wanna do what you do. Who wouldn't want that?

Another argument against SLebrity is "Only x number of people from y community know you."
Guess what... there are Celebrities in RL that are not universally known. They are known within their community and their skillset. There are poker Celebrities, (Devilfish anyone?), Music celebrities, art celebrities, IT girls/boys... etc etc.

Not everyone knows every celebrity... only x number of people from y community know them. Get what I'm saying?

And for my final little rant before I step of my soapbox.

Theft!

We all know copybotting and copying happen. Unfortunately it's a fact of life in SL.
It's not one we should sit down and ignore, we SHOULD fight it. But the sad fact is, too many people witch hunt.
Too many people make assumptions based on a few "facts" that they have gathered.

Think of the last time you saw a copied item. Did you know every single fact for definate? Or did you follow the rest of the sheep into assuming you knew for a fact that "colonel linden did it on the sim with a copybotter"?
The fact of the matter is, there are a zillion templates in SL. People use them, and a ton of identical items appear. Yes the shading can be identical too, because some of the templates come in layers with shadows.
LMC sell a ton of such, psd templates. They have all the details in, and people pay 2-3k a set to be able to just shove it together and call it a creation. So you see 2 identical gowns... are they copybotted? Who's to thief?
Answer... nobody, they are just both very uncreative people who slapped textures on a mesh.

Sometimes it definately IS a copy. The copy doesn't have to be exact either.

At the very end of last year I created a gown. It hurt like hell to see, 3 weeks later, a dress in almost the exact style released as a dollarbie from a well known designer. My gown, which was selling slowly, stopped selling at all. Why buy a style you like for L$499 when you can get it for $L1 eh?
Fact was, it wasn't theft. The other dress was a scarily similar style, but the other designer put in as much work as I did. So it had to be let go.
I checked it wasn't theft with a few friends, then I left it alone. Chalked it up to flattery, and moved on.

At the end of the day, the witch trials were caused by people creating "proof" and victimising people for whatever reason they liked. Do we all really want to be the next innocent person sat in tears after an accusation?
The law states people are innocent until proven guilty. If you don't have proof, let it go.

So there it is... my bloggers choice.
And I won't hide behind the anonymous wall for saying any of it. I'm Tracy Rubble in world, feel free to IM me. My email is tracyrubble@gmail.com, feel free to email. You can comment etc. I'm open to hearing your thoughts. In fact it'd be nice to see people de-sheeping and saying what they REALLY think for once. So go ahead.... whats your true colour?



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