Misunderestimating

I had a wonderful lunch with sherrold the other day, which cheered me immensely. One of the things we talked about was the vid I made for her and posted last week, and how soul-crushing it is when you put a fannish work out into the world and hardly anyone seems interested -- it's never about, maybe everyone's gone, maybe they missed it, maybe they'll go back to it later and hit counters or view statistics don't tell you about bookmarks, etc., but always about, "I must suck" or "I did an artist/subject/song no one likes" or "you're not cool enough" or something else like that. She mentioned Laurie Anderson being a hard sell, but I wondered if people these days even mostly know who she is (and I think unovis is right, that Hardison would totally love her, what with her talking violin invention, and her lighted beatbox suit, and all that stuff). And then I wonder about characters of color, or some such, but I think mostly we just try to avoid saying we suck when we do that.

Anyways. It's like, we talk all the time about how you can't/shouldn't do things for feedback because that way lies madness, yet when we see something we put out there floundering, yet others' things thrive, we're left with the judgment that we do indeed suck, that something we did or some choice we made means it sucks, and so and so is better for whatever reason. I know people who have a lot of confidence in themselves and would never think that way, but I believe the vast majority of people I know do believe that, at heart, they are no good, and that people passing their stuff by is a statement about their worth. It's human nature, really -- and of course there's that Dunning-Krueger effect, where incompetent people see themselves as smarter and more competent than anyone else, completely oblivious to their own stupidity, and competent, smart people see themselves as less competent and downplay their abilities. Do you suffer from the Dunning-Krueger effect?

I'm never sure where I am. I'm fairly certain I'm a lot more on the incompetent scale -- when I look at things I do against other things out there in fandom, it certainly seems like it, and if I look at the struggle I've had to get consistent work since I went freelance, it definitely seems that way. Not to mention the failed relationships with people over the years. But then I look at some of the feedback I've had and the friends I've made in fandom solely because of the work I put out, it changes that picture, and if I look back before I went freelance for work, at the high-profile jobs I've had, I have to realize there was some success there, even if they didn't always work out. And the relationships are more complicated, but I have seen some give there, too.

Anyways. Lots of navel-gazing this past week, I guess, because of some silly little vid. I want to write, too, but I almost feel like there's no point, because I can never be successful the way I was when I was younger. It's easy to talk myself out of it. I've been missing my sister so much lately. Needing her to bitch me out of my funks, needing her cheerleading. For all her bitchery, sis_r was also my biggest fan, as twins tend to be. I find myself crying at the worst times these days, usually out in public.

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Not being much of a code-literate person, I had a hard time understanding all this pingback stuff and reposting stuff, but I think I understand what's happening now, and how to modify it. All this means more people for DW, though, I'd imagine. I can't really move over there completely. I should probably stop giving LJ my money, but I hate losing my icons! And most of my posting is still there, because the vast majority of my communities have no DW presence, nor are they likely to. I have never figured out how to post pics to DW, otherwise I'd just stay there -- I can never figure out the coding and the sizing and all that shit, it's just easier to post to LJ's gallery and then post from that interface for a luddite like me.

I mean, I get why LJ thinks this cross posting thing is so neat. And pretty much everything has an option to tweet it or FB it or what have you. So they're just jumping on a bandwagon. But I think they don't understand their user base at all, and how separate so many people want to keep their real-life FB or Twitter presences from their journaling presences. It's cluelessness on a grand scale, and when you make it possible for people to override privacy settings, that's just... hostile to your users. I have a lot of faith in my flist, but I enable anonymous posting most of the time for my friends who don't use LJ, and I really don't want someone to accidentally or purposely repost something. I rarely lock anything, but when I do, it's for a reason.

So all that said, I have many invite codes for Dreamwidth, if you want one! Please leave me a comment and I'll send it to you.