Embrace Whimsical Links

This from a recent Twitter exchange, in response to the wonderful “Algorithm is Gonna’ Get You” article, written by Danielle Evans.

“Been thinking of dropping off IG for awhile. I gotta build up my own art sites and creator spaces. Just wish there was a positive online pool of people that congregate outside of algorithms and ads. That fosters connection and drives people to my art and projects. Maybe ello?”

@shootbydaylight

I just feel like leaving everything up to that “community pool” is a rough these days. It’s too centralized. Remember DIGG? StumbleUpon? Is the answer sites like Dribble, or Vimeo, or Flickr?

My dream is we get back to our websites, and letting the whimsy and awe of links do their thing. That happened for me recently with one of my daily loops. I noticed one video got a few more plays than the others, and discovered it was linked from another website – neato!

There was a time when we didn’t drink from the “content firehose” for hours everyday, bombarding our eyeballs with fear and dread mixed in with “oooh, a pretty picture of a sunset!” I think for our own health and sanity we need to back away from cramming everything into one site, one network, one silo.

Daily Loop #32

The first day of February, 2021. Hoping got a little less drama this month than last, but I won’t be holding my breath. It’s not the first time I write a number in the the title of these without it being the actual day of a month. Welcome to day #32 of 2021.

Below are some more of the things I like from Twitter and Instagram, about the only reason I stay on either site at this point. They’re not posted here as embeds, as I don’t trust either social network will be around in five years, and then five years from now you’d see nothing below.

Also doing my best to link to the actual persons website, when available. Websites are pretty great.

LIKES

Molly Mielke via @mollyfmielke
Via @shiifoncake
Tim Easley via @timeasley
Molly Sugar via @Molly.sugar

Don’t Let Your Likes Disappear

Photo: Lyndsey Hansen Sunderland from Twitter

Each day on social media a 400 page magazine shows up on your doorstep, bursting at the seams.

And everyday, the previous day of wonder and delight has begun its walk into obscurity.

David Sark from Twitter

This is why I added the LIKES section to my Daily Loops videos. I know from doing the “blog thing” over several years that there are times when I’ll go back through my archive and find something I forgot about.

In that moment in the past something grabbed me, it was enough for me to hold onto it, to put it on this site, my little corner of the internet. Even if I don’t have hoards of readers, I have me, and I want to re-live and re-experience some of that magic.

Crocodile Jackson from Instagram

So my LIKES section is a collection of things that catch my eye, or my ear. For a bit I was embedding the Tweets or Instagram posts, but I fear that one day they could disappear.

And to think some people aren’t even on Twitter or Instagram, and they can’t see that magic, those bright colors, the rich hues of music and noise.

So now I’m adding those things to my site, adding a link to the source (of course), and looking forward to 2025 when I can come back here and see the magic that got me through the pandemic, this moment in time that people will talk about 100 years from now.

Stop Handing Out Flyers

There was a time when we didn’t spray a firehose of images, videos, and words into our eyeballs for multiple hours, every day. Around the clock.

During that time we still made albums, published magazines, made videos, and everything else.

The thing I hear a lot, if we abandon social media, is how will we be found? How will our music get heard? How will our videos get watched?

Look, they will.

Back in the day you’d hand out flyers for the show you were playing that night. Put the flyers in the local music shop. Hand them to anyone wearing Chuck Taylors or a nose ring.

Social media is where you hand out flyers, but at a certain point you gotta head back to the venue and play a show.

We’ve all bought into the 24/7 social media marketing life style, heading both directions; both as the consumer and the advertiser.

But there comes a time when you gotta put the phone down and work. You’re going to have to miss that meme, or that person who did the thing, or that random video.

Trust that the wonderful people in your life will send you some of the highlights. Also be okay with missing shit.

Like, how many memes have you missed when they first came out? Then you discovered it three months later. Still funny, right? Great. What’d you lose? Nothing.

Get into your studio, your space, put on your headphones and make your art. That’s the thing that people will discover three months from now. That clever Tweet or funny IG story is nice and all, but it’s gone in a day. Poof.

Put your top stuff on a site. Your writing, your photos, your music, your whatever. Give it a home where people can find it. And keeping filling it up. Keep adding. Make it your home.

People will find you when they find you, and it’ll probably be for your art, the magic you bring to the world.

Photo by Mick Haupt from Pexels

Daily Loop #31

A month of loops (you can see them all here). My goal was to make music each day, even if “just” a loop that I liked, and I hit that mark. I’ve enjoyed the process. It got me out of bed in the morning, instead of scrolling through Instagram, so with that alone I’ve spent my time creating, learning, and crafting something, which I’m happy about.

Today’s loop is noisy, and dark, and off rhythm in a way I can’t explain, but it’s done. Not everything will be perfect, and that’s okay.

Just putting this out there – if anyone would like to join in – say with a melody, or a beat, or a video – please get in touch! I have no idea of that whole “musical collaboration over the internet” thing, but I’d love to dive in.

LIKES

“Creators talk about Instagram as a game, a conversation forever circling “gaming the algorithm.” But the game is less like monopoly and more like poker. The house always wins,” Danielle Evans from ‘Algorithm is Gonna’ Get You: How Instagram Failed the Creative Class.”

Source: @_tyedied
Source: @the___carousel
Source: @the___carousel
Source: @the___carousel

Video by Pat Whelen from Pexels

Daily Loop #30

I never know which way a loop is going to go. This one actually started off with some real bass, but I settled on synth bass instead, along with loops of dialogue chopped up into random bits.

There’s actually another version of this loop on my desktop, which vocals. It’s a radical departure from my other material with vocals, so I’m sitting on it. It’s odd to consider where some of these loops could go, without the “daily” limitation, but that’s something I’ll figure out eventually.

LIKES

“Just another reminder that in Welsh if you want to say ‘to calm my mind’ the traditional phrase directly translates to ‘to return to my trees,'” @_meggybread

Video by Kelly Lacy from Pexels

Daily Loop #29

More loops, more beeps, more reverb. Remember, it’s not on / off, black or white. You don’t have to be in a recording studio or on an expensive set shooting a video. Start where you’re at, put it out there.

LIKES

“A lot of the “creator economy” is basically mainstreaming what bloggers have been doing for years now. Own your platform (WordPress + email list), sell products (PDFs, eBooks), build a community (FB groups). It’s like watching history repeat itself, but with different software,” @monicalent

“Stop calling yourself an “aspiring” writer. If you’re putting effort into writing, no matter how financially successful or big an audience, guess what, you’re already a writer. Stop selling your own passion and achievements short,” @mattmillswrites

https://twitter.com/frederiquepng/status/1354844351399157761

Video by Pressmaster from Pexels

Delight Your Current Fans

The fantastic Andy J Pizza gives some solid, practical advice in this podcast, talking all about using social media for your benefit while being mindful of the cost.

One of the biggest take-aways – stop focusing on new followers and instead put effort into engagement. People who follow you are the fans at your show, the friends at your gallery show, the people who bought a print.

Keep putting out killer work so you’re top of mind for the people who already raised their hand and said, “I want more of this.”

Daily Loop #28

It starts with a sample, really. Oh, I’ll just make a drum beat. Then before you know I pull out the microphone and weirdness just happens.

“You are the center piece, you are the way to go!”

Between full-time professional musicians who are in real studios recording albums, and the whole “I just don’t want to make music” (which is where I was a few months ago), there is a wide ranges of places to be. I see these people everyday on social media, playing guitar and singing in front of a propped up smart phone. Finger drums on some cool piece of gear. Ambient live streams with enough equipment to launch rockets.

I discovered the idea of “picking yourself” from Seth Godin, who wrote about it back in 2011 and 2015 (and other times, too, probably).

Once you understand that there are problems just waiting to be solved, once you realize that you have all the tools and all the permission you need, then opportunities to contribute abound. No one is going to pick you. Pick yourself.

Seth Godin in ‘Reject the tyranny of being picked: pick yourself‘

There is room for all of our music, our art, our photography. But we can’t hoard it. We can’t wait until it’s perfect, for someday, because someday we might not be here. The world needs softness, and weird music, and quirky art.

Pick something you made and put it out there. And do it again. Pick yourself, we need you.

Daily Loop #27

Feeling absolutely zero inspiration at the start of this one today, and ran into some software issues, but it got done.

The links below… just, damn. I spend far less on social media than I used to, and these sorts of gems belong somewhere, you know? Like, that artwork is from Ms Wearer. There are so many people who aren’t on Instagram, or the various other channels they’re on. I don’t know. I just want people to see all this wonderful art, and photographs, and solid quotes, but I also want it to be somewhere, too, and not locked away in random silos.

Okay, I need some coffee. Have a good day, friends.

LIKES

“I refuse to create for engagement. I don’t care if my art flops, I’m here to share ME & if someone follows me, I wish it to be from a genuine connection made. I wish for the meaningful to succeed over the consumable,” @Vlizzyjpeg

Reel to reel video from Pexels