Handmade 2.0

[eleny]

A New York Times article yesterday was about the movement for hand crafted things.

Handmade 2.0
By ROB WALKER
Published: December 16, 2007

"The declaration from something called the Handmade Consortium materialized on a Web site called buyhandmade.org in late October. “I pledge to buy handmade this holiday season, and request that others do the same for me,” it said, and you could type in your name to “sign” on; within a few weeks, more than 6,500 people had done so. “Buying handmade is better for people,” a statement on the site read in part, and “better for the environment,” because mass production is a “major cause” of global warming, among other things. There were links to an anti-sweatshop site and a Wal-Mart watchdog site.

The pledge echoed the idealistic language of a tree-hugger activist group, but actually the consortium’s most prominent member was the online shopping bazaar Etsy, a very much for-profit entity that bills itself as “your place to buy & sell all things handmade.” Etsy does not fulfill orders from an inventory; it’s a place where sellers set up virtual storefronts, giving the site a cut of sales. While eBay rose to prominence nearly a decade ago as an endless garage sale for the auctioning of collectibles and bric-a-brac, Etsy is more of an online craft fair, or art show, where the idea is that individuals can sell things that they have made. How many such people can there be? At last count, more than 70,000 — about 90 percent of whom were women — were using Etsy to peddle their jewelry, art, toys, clothes, dishware, stationery, zines and a variety of objects from the mundane to the highly idiosyncratic. Each seller has a profile page telling shoppers a bit about themselves, and maybe offering a link to a blog or a MySpace page or a mailing list; most have devised some clever store or brand name for whatever they’re selling."

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/16/magazine/16Crafts-t.html?pagewanted=1&ei=5088&en=53ee17396750479a&ex=1355461200&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

[AllegroRondo]

1. Etsy got a huge surge from that article

all the sellers there are very happy!

[la la]

2. yeah, I read that--

wish I'd get a surge! ;>)

http://cigarboxbeads.etsy.com

http://suchandsort.etsy.com

every little bit of advertising helps???

:evilgrin:

[AllegroRondo]

3. I didnt get much of one either,

but at least Im selling through other outlets. :)

http://allegroarts.etsy.com