Worm Regards #3: Instagram n Stuff
It’s Friday wormos and I am literally buzzing with productivity. This week, I (Ashley) remembered to-do lists and have been writing things down, and then doing them, almost every single day. If you don’t recognize me that’s probably why. Anyway on today’s to-do list I wrote down “write newsletter” so here I am, getting absolutely high off the thrill of checking a box.
Final Thoughts: Literally What Even is Fashion
Call me crazy, but I actually don’t dislike a lot of Danielle Bernstein’s outfits. I mean of course it’s not crazy a lot of her outfits are supremely fine and well tailored, fine things almost always look nice. Yesterday I did a poll to examine whether or not Danielle Bernstein was creating cool outfits or just owned a lot of clothes and people responded to almost every single outfit identifying the IT girl of the moment she had obviously copied. I know that’s how normal people style works, we’re all pulling inspo from pinterest and Tik Tok and Instagram and re-creating the outfits we like, but I’m the influenced not the influencer.
What I think bothers me is that there’s something so impersonal about her style. Allison Bornstein is a stylist who introduced me (via tik tok) to the idea of defining your style in three words and trying to build your closet around those words, but after being aware of Danielle for years now I don’t know what her three words would be. Someone asked us how we’d separate owning lots of clothes from having style and I think it’s the inspirational quality of their outfits and their content. Do you feel driven to copy the outfit exactly or do you feel driven to capture a vibe and create something similar with your own wardrobe? Is the creator just shilling clothes or teaching you about discovering your own style? I actually do think there’s a big place for fashion influencers to continue influencing and sure sometimes you see something you like on them and want to shop but are they more than just things?
Who is Trying to Bring Back Regular Instagram
I’ve stayed as far away from the Instagram convo as possible but it’s hard to stay too far when you’re… constantly on Instagram. There’s been so much discourse over the last few years about the curation of an Instagram feed, the push to “make instagram casual again” and now the push to “make instagram instagram again.” The thing is, every social media platform is at its most fun when no one understands where the money is quite yet. For a few years Instagram was just a place to throw single photos of your day for friends to see. At one point Tik Tok was a place to rant, dance, and think about beans. Now, Instagram is undergoing embarrassing changes to become Tik Tok and people are grumpy as fuck about it but I don’t think the loudest complainers actually care about the same things we do. For the celebrities and brands up in arms it’s strictly about a bottom line, not rediscovering a fun and engaging platform.
Once these platforms and their users discover the monetization potential, the casualness disappears. The platform goes from amateur to professional and as we know, jobs aren’t fun. When people like the Kardashians push back on Instagram’s updates, it’s not because they’re hoping to re-gain a platform to connect with their friends, they just don’t like how their position is evolving within the company and they want to go back to a time when they were the top salesman.
I’m not sure where I’m going with this and honestly this whole rant might have been hella obvious, but I think it’s mostly helped me realize that there are no rules for social media. Working in brand social media for so long got me so caught up in what Instagram should look like and everyday people curating the shit out of their posts can really seep into your brain. They can update the algorithms and whatnot but the social pressures of what to post, how many likes it should be getting, how an image should be composed, etc. were created by people using Instagram professionally and there’s no reason to follow those rules. You don’t have to campaign to “make instagram ___ again” you can just do it and amateuring Instagram is without a doubt the more fun way to go.
Take My Worm For It
750 words dot com: Speaking of productivity, one thing that’s always cleared out my noggin like drain-o is free writing. Sitting down to a blank page with no objective feels like it does absolutely jack shit in the moment but when I’m really consistent I notice ideas coming in clearer and my mood getting a little brighter. I found this website called 750words a few years ago and it’s just a place to spit words onto a page for the slightly under-motivated (me) because it sort of gameifies the experience. There’s no real winner and it’s completely private but being able to see exactly how many days a month I sat down to write really motivates me to get the juices flowing and I very much recommend it to anyone with writers block and anyone looking to sort some thoughts.
Yuck Planet: Every time this artists posts new work I think, no that’s the best art I’ve ever seen in my life. You guys know I have a think for cartoon skeletons and this just speaks to my soul.
Trader Joe’s Mango: I forgot about these things but they are the superior dried mango. I’ve tried many a dried mango in my day and these bitches are it.
One Last Thing
Who do you think can hop higher dog Claire or person Claire.
