“Haters gonna hate is not a sound social media strategy.”
Excerpt from Welcome to Optimism blog.
5 tips for aspirational digital copywriters
15 MarFrom 15 September, 2010.
This link has made the rounds but thought it was a good start. Frankly, this advice should apply to ANY copywriter. Don’t just think that because you wanna do TVCs and have email that you can get around web ideas. The internet isn’t stopping any time soon. Hell, you’re using it right now.
http://mashable.com/2010/09/11/job-search-digital-copywriters/
How to run a professional blog
5 DecAnother one from Aussie Arts, written June 10, 2008.
Let’s face it – if you’re a designer, crafter or an artist with a blog you’re inevitably going to be wanting to pimp your skills. However, when you start going from personal blog to a professional folio blog, you need to carefully look at the way you present yourself and the way you interact with your readers and the rest of the world wide web.
Luckily, there’s a number of talented bloggers out there who have some tips to help you. As I come along more articles, I’ll add them to this post so it becomes EXTRA-helpful.
Nubby Twiglet has a number of posts on Business & Marketing, coming from her experience as a freelance designer.
- The benefits of folio blogs vs websites
- 13 steps to a successful blog-based business
- Choosing a business name
- The art of networking
Pip from Meet Me at Mikes has recently done a run of entries on how to maintain a craft blog, but they can be applied to pretty much any blog possible.
- How to start a craft blog
- How to market a craft blog
- How to make your blog look cuter
- How to have nice blog manners
Every Tuesday, Leni & Rose does a post on blogging tips & tricks. They also include step-by-step guides on how to customise your Blogger account, if that’s your processor of choice.
Other articles:
Zine Scene
5 DecTransferring some of my posts from my soon-to-be-defunct arts blog, Aussie Arts. This was written in June 4, 2008 so is probably completely innacurate by now, But good for a start if anyone is googling.
Since Aussie Arts was recieving alot of search hits for zines, I thought I’d celebrate the MCA Zine Fair with an entry about the Zine Scene in Australia. If you are unaware of what exactly a zine entails, I suggest you get the full lowdown at Book of Zines.
The Australian zine scene (sorry, I can’t stop saying it) is a funny thing. It’s like Sydney weather – dry one day, flooding rain the next. The entire structure of the scene is run on people’s spare time and money, meaning that previous information about zine stockists, distros and groups quickly becomes outdated. I’m hoping to maintain this entry as a current and relevant list of zine contacts, which I’ll update as information comes to hand. If you are aware of anything that’s incorrect or missing, please send it through to karen.at.karenisafox.com and I’ll make the necessary changes.
GROUPS
Recently Miss Helen (I think) set up a new google email group, Australian Zines and Small Press. It is great, join now.
DISTROS
Beating Hearts Press
PO Box 37
Rochedale South QLD 4123
Flying Machine
Emma
PO Box 4, Enmore NSW 2042
(She is slowly getting back into distro, currently working on only distributing her new zines)
Gato Loco
P.O. Box 190
Seddon West VIC 3011
Spiral Objective
PO Box 126, Oaklands Park SA 5046
Zine Classifieds
(it’s online! it’s awesome!)
ZINE STORES
Arc Art Store @ COFA
COFA Campus (OXford St Corner), Paddington NSW
Paint it Black Records
86 Enmore Road, Newtown NSW 2042
Polyester Books
330 Brunswick Street, Fitzroy, Victoria, AUSTRALIA 3065
PO Box 73, Fitzroy, Victoria, AUSTRALIA 3065
RubanRat
King St, Newtown NSW 2042
SquareOne
525 Harris St, Ultimo NSW
Sticky
Shop 10 Campbell Arcade
(underneath Flinders St Station via Degraves St underpass)
Melbourne VIC 3000
POSSIBLE STOCKISTS
This is a listing of stockists that once used to stock zines, but now I’m not sure. If you’re looking to stock at these stores, please note that alot of these stores only accept topical zines, eg: music, anarchist, comics etc.
NSW
Gallery Serpentine
Shop 2/116 Enmore Rd, Newtown NSW 2042
MacLean’s Booksellers
69 Beaumont St, Hamilton NSW 2303
PO Box 130, Hamilton NSW 2303
Red Eye
66 King St, Sydney NSW 2000
QLD
Ace Comics
Level 2, 121 Queen St, Brisbane QLD 4000
Comic Warriors
Shop 18, Annerley Arcade, 478 Ipswich Rd, Annerley QLD
Rocking Horse Records
245 Albert St, Brisbane QLD 4000
Trash Video
1/73 Vulture St, West End QLD 4101
TAS
Play by Wire
Shop 23, Yorktown Square, Launceston TAS
VIC
Barricade Books
1st floor of Irene Community Arts Warehouse, 5 Pitt Street, Brunswick VIC 3056
Collectors’ Corner
240 Swanston St, Melbourne VIC 3000
Eltham Bookshop
970 Main Road, Eltham VIC 3095
Friends of the Earth
312 Smith St , Collingwood VIC 3066
Greville Records
152 Greville St, Prahran VIC 3181
Greville St Bookstore
145 Greville St , Prahran VIC 3181
Missing Link Records
Basement 405 Bourke St, Melbourne VIC 3000
Paperback Books
60 Bourke St, Melbourne VIC 3000
Peril Underground
Basement 17-19 Elizabeth St, Melbourne VIC 3000
Synaesthesia
Level 1, 28 Block Place, Melbourne VIC 3000
GPO Box 1117, Melbourne 3001
WA
78 Records
914 Hay St, Perth WA 6000
Dada Records
36 Pier St, Perth WA 6000
Quality Comics
872 Hay St, Perth, WA 6000
PO Box 7742 Cloisters Square WA 6850
LIBRARIES
Zine Libraries are places you go to read and photocopy archived zines.
Copy and Destroy Zine Library
Visible Ink, Fortitude Valley QLD
Murdoch University science fiction zine collection
South St, Murdoch WA 6150
National Library of Australia
Canberra ACT 2600
Octapod
3/231 King St, Newcastle NSW 2300
State Library of Victoria
328 Swanston St, Melbourne VIC 3000
FESTIVALS & MARKETS
Festivals can be a one off thing, or an annual thing. Markets on the other hand are pretty regular, and are good if you’re stocking other crap.
ACT
Canberra Writers Festival Zine Fair
Run by the ACT Writers’ Centre, the Zine Fair will be held on Saturday 21 June, in the foyer of Gorman House.
NSW
Consolador de dos Caras DIY Markets
Every Wednesday, 8pm
la Campana, 53-55 liverpool St, Sydney NSW 2000
Kino Zine Fair
A new initiative of Kinokuniya, the giant bookstore in Galleries Victoria. It’s held this year on 28 June 2008 in store.
Level 2, TGV, 500 George St, Sydney NSW 2000
Newcastle Zine and Independent Press Fair
The National Young Writers’ Festival is held as part of the This Is Not Art (TINA) Festival, during the September/October long weekend of every year. A key highlight of the Festival(s) is the Zine fair, which attracts zinesters from all over the country. This year the fair will be on Sunday, 5th October 2008.
Penrith Regional Gallery Inaugural Spring Zine Fair
Last year this was held on the 1st September, as part of a Zine Factory program the gallery was running.
smARTarts Art & Cultural Festival
The smARTarts Festival is a National Youth Week initiative run in and by Pine St Creative Arts Centre. One of the features of the festival is a zine fair. This year the festival was held on 12 April.
Pine St Creative Arts Centre, 62 Pine St, Chippendale NSW 2008
Verge Arts Festival Zine Fair
Verge Arts Festival is run annually by Sydney Uni, and the Zine Fair is booked to run on the 11th September, 2008.
Sydney University, Camperdown NSW
Wollongong City Gallery Zine Fair
First was during National Youth Week earlier this year (13 April, 2008).
SA
Pt Augusta Zine Fair
Every year Pt Augusta has a writer’s festival, and in July ’08 they had a Zine Fair.
The Barracks, Beachamps Lane, Pt Augusta SA
VIC
Independent Press and Zine Fair
The flagship for the Emerging Writers Festival in Melbourne, this year the Zine Fair was held on the 11 May at the Atrium in Federation Square.
Melbourne, VIC 3000
Mercado Art Market
Bi-monthly art market selling all bits of DIY, run by the good people at Forepaw.
275 High St, Northcote VIC
Sticky’s Festival of the Photocopier
This annual festival run by Australia’s best zine shop was held earlier this year on February 6th, in the Degraves Subway under Flinders St station.
Yeah Write! Zine Fair
Held by the City of Boroondara, Yeah Write! Zine Fair occurred last year on the 24 November at the Hawthorn Town Hall.
358 Burwood Road, Hawthorn VIC
Big ups to the Australian Zines and Small Press group and Keg De Souza’s MCA Zine Fair program for the wealth of info, some which has featured here.
Baby take a ride in my coupe
2 FebAt the moment I’m kind of obsessed about Salt n’ Pepa’s “Shoop”. Reminds me of being six when it was perfectly fine for women to be this domineering and sex-demanding, before everything got confusing and PC. That said, I never actually realised how all their lyrics was just screaming SEX SEX SEX, or in this case, SHOOP SHOOP BA-DOOP.
I’ll always love you love Newtown
12 JanThere are many songs about Sydney but not so many filmclips. However, I’ve recently come across a few and the old ones are the best. Check out Newtown before it was trendy and only had empty/wierd shops, in John Kennedy’s Love Gone Wrong clip. It looks a bit like the current Marrickville, which is a bit scary. AND HOW OLD IS THAT FUCKING COLES.
Then there’s this awesome one of The Fauves on Bondi Beach, before it was filled with whiny brown scabby backpackers.
Sometimes, street projections can be relevant
11 JanIt seems to be a thing in ambient ideas at the moment where people project images on a wall and go awesome. Because clearly ads are cooler when they’re bigger, right?
Maybe not.
Half the time the projections are usually something basic that has no relevance to the consumer, or worse, a brand logo. Agencies get caught up in the fact that it’s a new technology and get so hyped up and confused that they end up producing something that five years down the track appears amateur and obvious that there’s no actual idea or strategy behind it.
Thank god for Shimon Attie. A projectionist artist, he’s been photographing his projections for a few decades now and has had his work displayed in galleries throughout the US and Europe. Attie will typically source historical photographs depicting “marginalised and forgotten communities” and project them onto modern landscapes features or located near where the photograph was originally taken.
Wooster Collective has blurbed about two of his amazing projects: The Writing on the Wall (1991-1993) based in Berlin’s former Jewish Quarter, and The History of Another (2001-2002) of Roman Jews on the city’s ruins and excavation sites.
Not only does the lighting parody that which the government uses to illuminate and glorify the ruins, it also re-places these marginalised figures back into their environment (imagine a sense of displacement times two), and introduces the thought that history does not necessarily have to be a thing of the past – that the ghosts can return and forever live looped in their environment.
Coraline
11 JanI emailed the following to my work end of last year but no one replied so I’m sticking it here instead. Thanks to Maggie for the heads up!
Coraline is the new stop-motion film made by Henry Selick (Nightmare Before Christmas, James and the Giant Peach). It’s a twisted story told with teeny tiny handmade props, so the site is as fantastical, exciting and detailed as the movie itself.
Users can navigate their way through a three-dimensional flash world, interacting with hidden elements in each scene. Behind-the-scenes movies and short clips are hidden around the site, plus content that “pushes the idea further”. Eg: a stopmotion film of the art director’s moustache dancing; an interactive tea reading which also gives you a handy navigation tool to explore the site easier; a button eye generator (key part of the film), where you can upload your own photo and give yourself your own button eyes.
Selick fans could also get a sneak peek of the site earlier this year, provided that they could track down the passwords (moustachio, puppetlove, armpithair etc).
Overall, a slick and enjoyable site with a beautiful story embedded throughout. Users can literally waste hours on it, not only giving great response stats but helping the audience develop a relationship with the film and its elements long before its released.
Stupid audience = stupid ads
10 JanThis article appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald about a week ago, lsting the 10 most complained about ads in Australia for 2008.
- Kotex U female sanitary products - 185 complaints
- Domino’s Pizza – 145 complaints
A man dressed as a character called Many Toppings sings to the tune of Supercalafragilisticexpealadocious. - Advanced Medical Institute – 110 complaints
Want longer lasting sex billboard.
- Inghams – 100 complaints
- Quit Victoria – 65 complaints
- Coca-Cola Mother – 50 complaints
- Tell The Truth Coalition – 45 complaints
Pamphlet depicting pictures of aborted foetuses. - Virgin Mobile Go Topless – 45 complaints
A young woman covers her bare breasts as she talks on the phone. - Advanced Medical Institute - 45 complaints
Bonk longer billboard. - Motorola Razr mobile phone – 40 complaints
The justification for the complaints from the Advertising Standards Bureau’s Fiona Jolly was that “the community has a high level of concern about ads which could inadvertently cause distress to their children and to themselves.”
She also stated, “We have a . . . complaints system that gives consumers a voice and allows us to keep advertising in Australia at a high standard.”
WHAT THE HELL. SERIOUSLY.
Kids don’t know what beavers are (and half of them have them anyway, not to mention that all of them CAME OUT OF ONE), know you can’t kill people with phones and don’t find creepy fat men dressed as Mary Poppins scary as long as they’re still in the TV and not outside their school as a bad thing. And btw, your 5 year old hears worse words at school than “freaking”.
Canning ads that use a beaver puppet instead of blue liquid or women riding horses, or having the client step up and accept that their original product is shit and they’re replacing it ISN’T keeping advertising in Australia at a high standard. It’s making it dull, boring and so cotton-wooled that you can expect more of the same droning message for every 20 minutes you sit down to watch Law and Order. We might as well just screen Proactiv ads and be done with it.
