Why we should all Flattr...

There will now follow a short commercial break…

pathetically small

You may have noticed (or not) a couple of additions to the sidebar on this blog. No, not the shameless plugging of my books or The Bibble but the Flattr button and the Pay a Blogger Day logo.

Should bloggers be paid for their writing?  It’s an argument that goes round and round and usually involves heated debates about advertising on blogs, on sponsored posts and pay per link rates.  For the record I haven’t done any of that stuff myself (well, not so far) but I don’t have any beef with those who do. Life’s tough.

I’m writing my blog a lot at the moment because, let’s be honest, I ain’t got a whole lotta paid work going on. Also I love the freedom of being able to say exactly what I want, what I feel; to shout out about the people and things I love and admire. Independence, I guess. Should I be paid for that?  To be honest, it’s never even crossed my mind.

I am a waiter  -give generously!

Then Frankie said I should sign up for Flattr – a kind of online tip-jar. It's not just for bloggers but for anyone who creates and shares content online  - it can be words or pictures or photographs or music or vids, or podcasts or  apps or whatever. If you like it, you can Flattr it by clicking on a button. Basically you pay a small amount each month and Flattr.com divvies it up amongst the people you’ve Flattred.  Social micropayments, they call it.  Big change though small payments.  But anyhow, Frankie has blogged about it with far greater passion and eloquence than I could ever muster so I’m just going to suggest you haul your arses over to the blog and read... 

Why We Should All Flattr…  J  

I confess, after reading that, I went from being mildly sceptical to nodding vigorously. Because really, we say we want to foster the arts, to support artists but do we?  Really? Nah, the more I look around, the more I think we rip them off.  So this is a simple, cheap, non-exploitative way to show your appreciation for something you’ve enjoyed on the web. 

"Flattr me," says the Oracle

Flattr have a new initiative called Pay A BloggerDay. It’s asking that on November 29 you give back a little to the blogs you love.  I like that idea.  I read so much fascinating, thought-provoking, darn right brilliant stuff online, it’d be nice to give a little back in return.  So they’re asking you hit the donate button (do people really have donate buttons on their blogs? I must be reading the wrong ones!) or buy the T-shirt or print or whatever (sorry, no Desperate Exmoor Woman merchandise available at this point though I reckon a Beagle Oracle range might have some mileage). Or, of course, you can Flattr.

Anyhow. Change the world, one micro-payment at a time? I think it’s a neat idea. Will people do it?  I dunno.  I hope so. Anyhow, because Frankie nagged me mercilessly, I have put up buttons on the blog and on the individual posts so – if you feel so inclined –you can Flattr me too.  J

Of course, typically, the one on the sidebar isn’t functioning right now…their best people are working on it, I understand.  But the others are.. ;)

 

Four questions?

Ah, apologies, my sweet companions of the road. I have left you high and dry. All these bank holidays have befuddled and confaddled me. I am juggling a lot right now and Time is playing tricksy.


But fear not, the Pact remains and the Journey is starting. Who is coming along? Well, every kind of person, I suspect. I love those who trust, so much – the ones who just launched in and waved their hands eagerly in the air - without having a clue where we're going or what we're doing: Louise Nash, Vivienne Tuffnell, Sessha Batto, Mud in the City spring to mind. But then again, I love those who question and those who doubt too. Will every person be sweetness and light? I hope not. There is room for the tricksters and the plain awkward squad as well as the sweet honeys (cos you can’t make pearls without grit).

Must every person be an artist and a bleeding heart? Hell, no. We need someone to make the sandwiches; someone to pitch the tents; someone to tell us when we’re going just too far, going way too bonkers, and that playing hopscotch in the storm in metal gumboots isn’t the brightest idea. Fire alone burns too bright, too fast; Earth alone gets mired in the mud; Water alone seeps and evaporates; Air alone gets spread too thin. We need one another. We need the contrasts.

My lovely niece Sophie (wise Water) came to stay for the weekend and we talked books and music, life and love, spirit and soul. But above all we talked about people and assumptions and generalisations and about jumping to conclusions. We’re so quick to judge, to condemn. Someone on Twitter said he could never countenance talking to a royalist or anyone who wasn’t a socialist. Another said she was going to unfollow anyone who had tweeted about the royal wedding. It’s interesting what pushes our buttons; what makes us decide a person is okay or not.

I’m seeing it again today on Twitter as the world erupts with fevered excitement over the death of Osama bin Laden. It’s that tribal ‘you’re with us or against us’ thing and I confess it puzzles me. I hate terrorism, I really do but I can’t punch the air at a man’s death; no, not even his death. Hate the acts, not the person, surely?

Anyhow. I told Sophie how one of the most wonderful experiences I have ever had was going on silent retreat for a week. I hadn’t a clue what people did ‘for a living’ or any of the mundane facts about their lives. I just got a sense of them from – what? – intuition? A feeling? Heart?  Soul?  I snatched clues too from their images – some of us painted (obsessively in my case) in the studio. At the end of the week I felt extremely close to a few people. When we talked, I found my favourite people were, variously, a psychiatrist, a surgeon, a nun, unemployed. All titles that come laden with preconceptions.  Halleluyah - we’d by-passed all that crap.  We knew one another as people, as fellow 'pilgrims'.

‘We ask the wrong questions,’ I said to Sophie.
‘I hate that we’re defined by what we do,’ she replied.
‘It’s always the same four questions, isn’t it?’ I said. ‘What do you do? Where do you live/come from? Are you single/partnered? Have you got children?’ I suppose we’re trying to pin people down – to fit them in boxes?
‘What are the questions we should ask,’ I pondered. ‘If we really want to know what makes a person tick at a deeper level?’
‘Questions that open up stories, I think,’ said Sophie. ‘Questions that stir emotions.’

We debated this for so long we lost track of time and Sophie nearly missed her train. We didn’t really come up with any concrete answers either. But we sort of roughed out these for starters...

• Which is your favourite sense? If you could only experience the world through one sense which would it be?
• Which piece of art (music, book, poem, film, TV show, performance etc) most rocked your world?
• Your house is on fire – all people, animals and vital documents are safe – what one thing do you rescue?
• If you were a god/dess, which one would you be?

Did we pick good questions? What would you pick? What are your answers to these four?