New Rule

So, yes, I’ve been absent and lax about communication. I haven’t fallen off the face of the earth. With all this instant access to other humans via social media and the internet comes expectations that you should be able to find out the latest about any one person at your fingertips. Ah, the old days when we didn’t have that digital tether and we could just disappear and you would have no way of knowing where people fucked off to until they made contact again. When busy signals meant people were busy. When no answer on the telephone meant no one was home. (Or were they?)

My husband and I were reminiscing about being kids at school which was over a mile from home and walking home from elementary school in third, fourth, fifth, sixth grade. No panic, no fuss, no worry. My biggest worry back then was timing my walk so that my nemeses, the bullies in my class who lived in the buildings next door, left the school before me and I’d never cross paths with them on the way home.

Now, that’s not remotely possible for children and everyone’s all up in your business. Even strangers from other parts of the planet.

Speaking of which, I will have a new rule moving forward regarding my mailing list which still functions. The back story leading up to this new rule involves the bizarre times we live in right now. Recently, I created a Bluesky account to explore if there was another way to get news without the garbage that is Twitter. Initially it seemed like a promising platform and I even added my website as a way to maybe find another way to get my work out there. Imagine my surprise when within a week, I had added twenty-five new email addresses to my mailing list! Then the next day I added over a dozen more! Hey, maybe this will work!? But as I looked over the email addresses on my email list client I noticed they were all missing first and last names and zip codes which I ask for in my sign up sheet. Hrm. Some of the addresses also looked weird, generic business addresses, not personal addresses and out of the country. I don’t mind non-US interest but I don’t ship out of the country for financial and liability reasons so why the sudden influx? I was concerned that I was being spammed with added addresses that were potentially not real or if real, were being added without the owners knowledge for some scam reason somewhere, I’m sure. I had one newsletter about new work set to go out. Should I include those addresses or not? I went ahead and dropped the email and sure enough ran into a rash of unsubscribes from that new group. So I separated, took them off and archived them all. Additionally, I started getting regular visits to my website from IP addresses with generic “United States” locations along with daily visits from IPs in Beijing, China and Pakistan and Iran and Serbia? Say what? Interest in my pottery? I found that hard to believe. Most were shop visits, some went through the whole site. Almost none went through the blog. The IP addresses, particularly from Beijing, China were deemed to be legit IPs although those IPs were often affiliated with Amazon, Inc. Something was off. I had also had an influx of spam emails and a few texts. I, too, had been finding myself getting emails from lists I never signed up for.

Here’s the thing, my site, my work, rarely gets traffic. The traffic it does get is organic and that’s the way I like it. I’m not a “viral” girl. I’m a “connection” girl with real people. Doesn’t have to be soul-searching connection, just “real people” connection. I’ve made a decision. I removed my website and links from Bluesy. I disabled the sign-up form. I don’t like automated bot garbage. We’ve been swimming in that cesspool for over a decade now and I’m weary. With AI being pushed, particularly when it comes to writing (and yes, tiny, micro, no one will notice if we steal this data, fuck the copyright and privacy blogs like mine get scraped for AI training), it gets harder and harder to tell on digital media if who you’re corresponding with is a legitimate human being. I expect that to get worse. websites and forms have those “CAPTCHA” things to “prove” you’re a real human but I’ve just read a new tech article that a group has now figured out how to game that and fool those tools, too.

Which bring me to my new rule. From now on, if someone wants to subscribe to my mailing list, you’ll have to send me a postcard or a letter and write me to ask to be added. Cusick/Tea Horse Studio, 873 Sand Hill Rd., Irvine, KY 40336. Include your email, your first and last name and your zip code. Include your whole address if you wish. Put a stamp on that shit. Show you’re real and you mean it and I will treat that ask with respect. I mean, up until the Bluesky account creation, I got maybe one add every 10-12 months if I was lucky. I’m fine with that level of participation. I’ll also have a sign up form at shows I participate in locally. It may sound dumb, inconvenient and stubborn but holy hell, to the global crypto-scammers, I’m a single artist and potter here in Eastern Kentucky. Leave me the fuck alone and let me get on with my life.

Happy New Year everybody.