take the web, a dash of entrepreneurial spirit, and a disinclination for the mass-produced, and you’ve got Etsy. this NYT magazine piece talks about the phenomenom; it’s something i’ve tried to explain to corporate drone HB and he just wrinkles his forehead in puzzlement. for all his vaunted immersion in Web 2.0, i think he doesn’t get it because it’s so, well, girly.
let’s face it, there’s a Laura Ingalls Wilder girl-vibe women of a certain age share, where we sewed clothes for our dolls (then later, ourselves), or knitted, or baked/cooked/canned “from scratch” according to much-loved recipes. and then we went to high school and realized that if we didn’t buckle down and prepare ourselves to succeed in the rat race, we’d never be able to swan around some exciting city in our manolos, looking for career satisfaction and Whatever Came Next After College.
then one of two things happens: motherhood lands on you like a week’s worth of dirty baby laundry and feedings “every two hours” that are half an hour long each. or, you get increasingly proficient at your desk jockey job, moving 1’s and 0’s around, and you hunger for some outlet where your hands are actually moving molecules through space, preferably to craft something that gives you satisfaction. or both; you want to “stay at home” but are loath for two-paycheck dependent reasons (or even laura hirshman reasons) to give up a source of income.
ergo: Etsy. a way to have it all on your own terms. working at home, at hours you dictate, making something from beginning to end, and then connecting with people who value what you’ve made and are willing to buy it from you. ‘value’ being a slippery and indistinct thing that’s hard to assign.
i guess i’m an Etsy-ish indie filmmaker. if one set of events happens, i’m fully prepared to distribute my film Etsy-style, one exhausting personal appearance at a time and through the web. if another set of events happens, someone else who already has those networks will distribute the film and i’ll just show up anywhere i can to help get the word out.
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