What is the most annoying thing a model can do?

[VeronicaChaos]

You used both "art" and "industrial trends" in the same post, so I guess it comes down to do you consider yourself an artist who does what they want and makes money from their art or a businessperson who follows trends to make money?

Every time I see a model call herself an artist and what they do on MFC as art I wonder if they are fooling themselves too or just their audience. Half the time I am certain they are trying really hard to convince themselves that what they are doing is not, in fact, stripping on the internet, but something more elevated than that, something dignified and glorious. (I already think camming is dignified and glorious, but they don't)

A show can be artistic, sure, like a flower bouquet or a cocktail can be "artistic" but there is a difference between a great vodka martini and the Sixtine Chapel.

Camming is a business. There is not a single career model on MFC who is not there because of the money. Take the money away and they won't be "entertaining" their audience with their art very long. At the end of the day models are there for the money, and members are there for sexual satisfaction. It is a commercial transaction. Utilitarian activities cannot be art, because by definition art is an end and a purpose in itself.

So in that light, a model as a businessperson can try to be innovative and offer an original show and it is sometimes appreciated. But "copying" stuff from other models is a given. It is the nature of competitive enterprise. It happens in every market, from toothpaste to cell phone companies, whenever one company innovates to their advantage, every other brand catches up. Everyone is watching the competition closely and implementing what they see works well in others because everyone wants a piece of the pie and nobody wants to be the one to lag behind. Being current is important in a business that is new and constantly changing.

This doesn't mean that a model should have no criteria when it comes to copying stuff. Not every single strategy works out for every single model, nor is it wise to be like someone said on this thread a "fad chameleon". Model has to find what to copy, and how, to her advantage. This is called style.

Ha. As someone who considers their mfc performances art, and friends with about a dozen artists in different fields as their profession... You are wrong. Art is by definition...ahhh see here is the problem. One cannot define art. It simply is. That's the beauty of art. And art has always built upon itself. Copying happens not because people are mindless drones, but sumply because artists have always copied each other since the beginning of time. That's exactly how we have artistic movements and periods. And by the way, you better believe those renaissance artists were doing boring family portraits to pay the bills.

 

[LadyLuna]

I think most people have already said what I would want to about art and business. (It's compromise between your vision and your client's vision.)

Is camming an artform? Yes. Are all camgirls artists? No.

Are there some camgirls who would still perform without the money being there? Yes. There was a girl who used to post here, I'm pretty sure she put in the public section that she used to cam for free through some website until one of her regular viewers told her about either MFC or Streamate, can't really remember which. There are plenty of people who just want others to see them.

Are there some camgirls who are doing things they don't like just to pay the bills? Yes. That doesn't mean they are worse. They might be really good actors. Shit, there have been days when I sure as hell didn't feel like getting on camera, and I hated every show, but got plenty of compliments because I was successful at acting like my usual self. Do I feel a little bad after that? Like maybe I duped them? Yes, but ultimately, it's the nature of this business. It's why I want to put this to a hobby status. So I can get online whenever I want, but never have to actually get online.

And Jimx, I've had a few people who wanted to take me private to make me cry. I declined whenever it was mentioned before the private, and banned if they just started in without warning during the private. If it exists, someone somewhere will fap to it. If it has ever been thought of, whether it existed or not, someone somewhere will fap to it. And someone somewhere will be willing to be paid to get as close as possible to making that fapping experience happen.

 

[mynameisbob84]

On whether or not camming could ever be labelled as art, it really depends how you define art (like Veronica said), and whether you think that an artistic enterprise that exists solely for commercial purposes should be disqualified from being considered art or not. A lot of what gets bandied about as "modern art" these days confuses and annoys me. "My Bed". I don't think that qualifies as art. If transposing something mundane and banal into the setting of an art exhibition and affording it some wider abstract context is considered art, then what's to stop me from rocking up to the Tate Modern and taking a dump in a fish tank and claiming it's abstract expressionism? And yet there are (many) people who know a lot more about art than I do (which is next to nothing to be fair) who would claim that Tracey Emin is a genius. A lot of the stuff that I would consider art is the stuff that was created for no nobler cause than to make money and get laid...



So if somebody wants to claim that camming can be art, I couldn't really argue with them. Do I think that the majority of cam girls are artists? Not even close. But I do think that a lot of what some girls are doing (VeronicaChaos' shows with Slappy for example) could definitely be considered performance art :twocents-02cents:

 

[JimsX]

And Jimx, I've had a few people who wanted to take me private to make me cry. I declined whenever it was mentioned before the private, and banned if they just started in without warning during the private. If it exists, someone somewhere will fap to it. If it has ever been thought of, whether it existed or not, someone somewhere will fap to it. And someone somewhere will be willing to be paid to get as close as possible to making that fapping experience happen.

I hope I never meet anyone like that. That is deeply disturbing.

 

[Miss_Lollipop]

And Jimx, I've had a few people who wanted to take me private to make me cry. I declined whenever it was mentioned before the private, and banned if they just started in without warning during the private. If it exists, someone somewhere will fap to it. If it has ever been thought of, whether it existed or not, someone somewhere will fap to it. And someone somewhere will be willing to be paid to get as close as possible to making that fapping experience happen.

I hope I never meet anyone like that. That is deeply disturbing.

Its actually a fetish. I have a video of me crying over a sad book that sells very well in the crying fetish catagory on clips4sale.

I think i get it. Its about getting off on vulnerability.

 

[Alexandra Cole]

A show can be artistic, sure, like a flower bouquet or a cocktail can be "artistic" but there is a difference between a great vodka martini and the Sixtine Chapel.

Sistine. And if we follow the criteria that you've set out, it wouldn't qualify as art.

(Art and money have always touched.)

Utilitarian activities cannot be art, because by definition art is an end and a purpose in itself.

What you mean is: by one definition. Specifically, an aesthete's definition: art for art's sake, popularized by Theophile Gautier in the 19th century. Crops up in aesthetic literature. Manifests primarily in the Pre-Raphs, Decadents, and Symbolists. Meant to resist the widely accepted understanding of art (at that time) as something that elevates or instructs. Roughly contemporary to the Arts and Crafts movement which believed very much the opposite, that art is meant to be very, very functional.

To Warhol, art is business. To Degas, art is vice. To Oscar Wilde, "art is the most intense mode of individualism the world has ever known."

Point being: there are more than a few definitions, and there's a reason for that.

You can say that you don't believe camming is art, or that it isn't what you would call art - sort of the way people say Abstract Expressionism isn't art - but jesus, dude... you've got to stop presenting your very personal, very specific opinions as statements of fact.

This is called style.

Gauguin would call that art.

 

[TicTacToe]

Addressing several different people

1) What I state is always my opinion, this goes without saying, because it is me who is typing them. I do not feel the need to constantly excuse myself for my beliefs. I do not often construct my sentences with "I believe" and "in my opinion" because of it. Even when it is unpopular, I have a strength of conviction that reality is one and not many. That we can get to know reality through our own reason, and that this expectation that there is "your truth", "my truth", "his truth" is moral relativism.

2) I have seen VeronicaChaos' shows. Are they are awesome: yes. Is she really creative: yes. Is it innovative and original and unique: yes. I certainly consider her shows artistic, but still... that doesn't mean what she does is art. I have seen a few people use these big words when referring to models (such as Olivia4Naked) and even models themselves attributing their shows qualities they do not possess (like Panzii) and even when I do think they are both fantastic models and very original, it is pretentious and deluded to call it art.

3) Sure, there are a million different definitions of what art is. Sure, we can discuss this at length. Sure, camming is art for some people, in the same way pottery is art for others, and a urinal rotated 90 degrees is also art when sitting at a museum. I am convinced some people would also argue that by the same logic anything is high literature, and VCR manuals belong in a library next to Shakespeare and T.S Eliot, and Rabelais.

4) But here is the thing: when you start calling everything "art" nothing is. Words have a meaning that gets lost when their definition is abused. I recently read an article in a teenage girl magazine about losing your virginity. The author argued that losing your virginity is not necessarily penis-in-vagina penetration. That losing your virginity can be anything from a single peck on the lips to anal intercourse, to a blow job because different people react differently to sexual acts. Sure, people are entitled to their own feelings and reactions to things. But it used to be that we had a term for 1st penis-in-vagina intercourse: "losing your virginity" and another term for whatever it is you feel does the trick: "losing your innocence" and now they are both intermingled and they have lost its purpose.

5) Reading back I realize I wasn't clear on my initial post. Whether or not I consider camming as art, doesn't have to do with the fact that it is a commercial transaction, but with the fact that it is an utilitarian activity. Art has value which is what made it possible for artists to take commissions such as portraits or allegoric paintings and trade them for money which is perfectly fine. What I don't consider art is things like pottery which is meant to be used for something else, not an end in itself. This is the same reason graphic design is not art. The same reason architecture is not art: they are utilitarian activities that can be artistic but they are not art.

In short: in my opinion most modern artist do not fit into what I consider to be art. The definition of art changes, but I do not think we should so easily dismiss centuries of knowledge and craft. In my opinion there should be a canon, and a space, and a context for art. I do not consider camming an art even when some shows might be artistic.

 

[SaffronBurke]

All this discussion of art makes me giggle cause I have a buddy named Art and he's definitely the Quagmire of the group, "giggidy" and Hawaiian shirts included.


I'll go away now.

 

[yossarian]

The author argued that losing your virginity is not necessarily penis-in-vagina penetration. That losing your virginity can be anything from a single peck on the lips to anal intercourse, to a blow job because different people react differently to sexual acts. Sure, people are entitled to their own feelings and reactions to things. But it used to be that we had a term for 1st penis-in-vagina intercourse: "losing your virginity" and another term for whatever it is you feel does the trick: "losing your innocence" and now they are both intermingled and they have lost its purpose.

Congratulations, gay people! You're all still virgins!

 

[Delta]

5) Reading back I realize I wasn't clear on my initial post. Whether or not I consider camming as art, doesn't have to do with the fact that it is a commercial transaction, but with the fact that it is an utilitarian activity. Art has value which is what made it possible for artists to take commissions such as portraits or allegoric paintings and trade them for money which is perfectly fine. What I don't consider art is things like pottery which is meant to be used for something else, not an end in itself. This is the same reason graphic design is not art. The same reason architecture is not art: they are utilitarian activities that can be artistic but they are not art.

Art is a product of creativity, and every human has a tendency for creativity. Just because camming (or graphic design, or architecture) is a service designed to serve public need, does not mean it is void of meaningful expression.

Your opinion and whatever, but you're missing out dude.

 

[LacieLaPlante]

5) Reading back I realize I wasn't clear on my initial post. Whether or not I consider camming as art, doesn't have to do with the fact that it is a commercial transaction, but with the fact that it is an utilitarian activity. Art has value which is what made it possible for artists to take commissions such as portraits or allegoric paintings and trade them for money which is perfectly fine. What I don't consider art is things like pottery which is meant to be used for something else, not an end in itself. This is the same reason graphic design is not art. The same reason architecture is not art: they are utilitarian activities that can be artistic but they are not art.

Art is a product of creativity, and every human has a tendency for creativity. Just because camming (or graphic design, or architecture) is a service designed to serve public need, does not mean it is void of meaningful expression.

Your opinion and whatever, but you're missing out dude.

I don't know why people have to place stipulations on "what art is" .. Art is intention, art is found, art is made and art is destroyed. It's anything the artist wants it to be. It's sad that someone could create something they feel is artful and there are people who didn't have anything to do with it's creation trying to say it's not art, because of whatever reasons they think.

 

[yossarian]

5) Reading back I realize I wasn't clear on my initial post. Whether or not I consider camming as art, doesn't have to do with the fact that it is a commercial transaction, but with the fact that it is an utilitarian activity. Art has value which is what made it possible for artists to take commissions such as portraits or allegoric paintings and trade them for money which is perfectly fine. What I don't consider art is things like pottery which is meant to be used for something else, not an end in itself. This is the same reason graphic design is not art. The same reason architecture is not art: they are utilitarian activities that can be artistic but they are not art.

Art is a product of creativity, and every human has a tendency for creativity. Just because camming (or graphic design, or architecture) is a service designed to serve public need, does not mean it is void of meaningful expression.

Your opinion and whatever, but you're missing out dude.

I don't know why people have to place stipulations on "what art is" .. Art is intention, art is found, art is made and art is destroyed. It's anything the artist wants it to be. It's sad that someone could create something they feel is artful and there are people who didn't have anything to do with it's creation trying to say it's not art, because of whatever reasons they think.

Yeah, I usually don't waste my time with people who feel the need to put art into little boxes and exclude anything they don't believe deserves to fit. They have such narrow perspectives and will miss out on a lot of great stuff because it doesn't conform with their preconceived notions. As Louis Armstrong once said when asked how he would explain what jazz is to somebody who didn't know: "There are some people that if they don't know, you can't tell them."

 

[TicTacToe]

The author argued that losing your virginity is not necessarily penis-in-vagina penetration. That losing your virginity can be anything from a single peck on the lips to anal intercourse, to a blow job because different people react differently to sexual acts. Sure, people are entitled to their own feelings and reactions to things. But it used to be that we had a term for 1st penis-in-vagina intercourse: "losing your virginity" and another term for whatever it is you feel does the trick: "losing your innocence" and now they are both intermingled and they have lost its purpose.

Congratulations, gay people! You're all still virgins!

Well, gay women can be virgins, but gay men can't. Men cannot be virgins. Men can be inexperienced, they can be chaste, but they cannot be virgins. The origin of the word "virgin" and the way it has been used for centuries it is to denote an unmarried female who has never had sexual intercourse and therefore her hymen is intact. The purpose was to guarantee her husband that his offspring would be, in fact, his. So it was a very practical thing related to marriage and inheritance as institutions.

Now, you can agree or disagree with this concept on a moral level. You can think that it is revolting, or unfair, or demeaning. But this is what the word "virgin" denotes. The attempt to recycle the term and apply it to a wide variety of sexual practices was done with the intention of diluting the meaning of the word with an ideological purpose, and that is fine, but it also degrades our language in the process.

 

[Alexandra Cole]

In short: in my opinion most modern artist do not fit into what I consider to be art. The definition of art changes, but I do not think we should so easily dismiss centuries of knowledge and craft. In my opinion there should be a canon, and a space, and a context for art. I do not consider camming an art even when some shows might be artistic.

There you go. Much better. Now I get what you're saying. I don't agree with it, but I get it.


To address your points:

1) There is a canon. (To anyone reading this who isn't sure what a canon is, it's the criteria and body of work generally accepted as "art." Scare-quotes necessary.) It's debated constantly, as it should be, and it's an entire area of scholarship. The continuous critique, though, is less about definition than it is about inclusion and exclusion.

2) There's definitely a context, but I'm guessing you either don't see it or you're using the term to refer to something else.

3) There are few reasons why there's no fixed definition of art in the sense that you're using it.

The biggest and bluntest reason: Art is the product of a culture. Cultures vary and cultures change. If you're talking about art and how it's defined, the answer is going to depend on the culture that produced it. There is no single definition.

Another reason: as you roll towards the 18th century, individualism, as a phenomenon, picks up speed. In the Renaissance, there were some fantastically innovative artists, but it was still a world of patrons and workshops. Over time, you start seeing artists break away from those workshops and institutions, and with this change came a lot of redefinition. So, there was a time when art was largely defined by something like an academy or a money source (church, monarchy), but as artists pulled away from those influences and destroyed previous definitions of art in the process (as tends to be the case with innovation), art stopped being a relatively fixed thing that conformed to a set of strictly defined criteria and judgments. They killed that legacy shortly after the Revolution.

This is why you see artists defining art. The old institutions were destroyed, and with them the tidy definitions. So then you have artists saying that art is about expressing the unseen, or about disturbing the viewer's expectations, or about beauty - just beauty - or finding beauty in the mundane, or reflecting reality, or enhancing reality, or revealing the subconscious, or just fucking shit up, and all of that is correct because at this point, it becomes a philosophical question.


But we do have a working definition. Art is a form of cultural production often, but not always, characterized by creative expression.

The definition's broad because it has to cover medieval religious icons, Chinese opera, cave paintings, Warhol's Blow Job, Roman sarcophagi, Conceptual art, and Duchamp's Fountain. All of that is art.

That urinal is art not because it's a urinal but because it's a form of culturally significant expression. In this case, Duchamp was expressing his middle finger. And it's included in the canon of Art We Care About because of what he did, when he did it, and what happened as a result. You can prefer the Old Masters, and you can think Duchamp is a dick, and plenty of people have agreed with you that urinals aren't art. But that was kind of his point, which is why it is. It matters the way it does because of the cultural, historical, and physical context, which is why an argument could also be made that someone like Olivia is an artist.


Listen - whatever. Your discomfort with complexity weirds me out, but I dig your desire to make sense of the world around you and I appreciate that you've started to make the distinction between opinion and fact. Keep that going.

 

[Alexandra Cole]

Well, gay women can be virgins, but gay men can't. Men cannot be virgins. Men can be inexperienced, they can be chaste, but they cannot be virgins.

I think this is why you're confused by art.

 

[TicTacToe]

Well, gay women can be virgins, but gay men can't. Men cannot be virgins. Men can be inexperienced, they can be chaste, but they cannot be virgins.

I think this is why you're confused by art.

Is that your opinion or a fact?

 

[JimsX]

If anyone is confused about what art is watch Veronica Chaos singing "Cheek to Cheek" with Slappy. Not THAT is art!

*This post is only 45% sucking up.

 

[yossarian]

Well, gay women can be virgins, but gay men can't. Men cannot be virgins. Men can be inexperienced, they can be chaste, but they cannot be virgins.

I think this is why you're confused by art.

Can we be best friends?

 

[JimsX]

If anyone is confused about what art is watch Veronica Chaos singing "Cheek to Cheek" with Slappy. Not THAT is art!

*This post is only 45% sucking up.

Crap! Of course I meant "NOW that is art"

 

[Alexandra Cole]

Well, gay women can be virgins, but gay men can't. Men cannot be virgins. Men can be inexperienced, they can be chaste, but they cannot be virgins.

I think this is why you're confused by art.

Is that your opinion or a fact?

That answer is going to cost you 100 tokens.

 

[LilyMarie]

I just got almost 2 million results from a Google search on "what is art?".
People have been trying to define it hundreds of years ago, and they're not finished, they're still in the process of defining it today. (I learned this stuff in high school, by the way.)

Just like literature, for example. In my introductory course on Literary and Cultural studies, we talked for 1.5 hours about what we perceive to be literature, and what isn't. Is a stop sign literature (because it's something that can be read)? Is an e-mail literature? Is an audiobook literature? Is Harry Potter literature or are only authors like Shakespeare literature? We didn't get to a clear definition by the end of the lesson, and you're not going to get a clear definition of art, ever. It's too broad. You can't define it the way you can define what a pony or a highway or an oven is.

That's why the 'losing your virginity' is clumsy, yes there used to be a clear definition in the past, i.e. that a woman lost her virginity when she had PIV sex for the first time. But with art, there never was a clear definition in the first place, nor is there one today. Trying to establish one is getting you nowhere. People smarter than you or I, in different eras, have been confused about what can be called art and what can't be called art.

 

[Nordling]

I just got almost 2 million results from a Google search on "what is art?".
People have been trying to define it hundreds of years ago, and they're not finished, they're still in the process of defining it today. (I learned this stuff in high school, by the way.)

Just like literature, for example. In my introductory course on Literary and Cultural studies, we talked for 1.5 hours about what we perceive to be literature, and what isn't. Is a stop sign literature (because it's something that can be read)? Is an e-mail literature? Is an audiobook literature? Is Harry Potter literature or are only authors like Shakespeare literature? We didn't get to a clear definition by the end of the lesson, and you're not going to get a clear definition of art, ever. It's too broad. You can't define it the way you can define what a pony or a highway or an oven is.

That's why the 'losing your virginity' is clumsy, yes there used to be a clear definition in the past, i.e. that a woman lost her virginity when she had PIV sex for the first time. But with art, there never was a clear definition in the first place, nor is there one today. Trying to establish one is getting you nowhere. People smarter than you or I, in different eras, have been confused about what can be called art and what can't be called art.

Agree. Because of the reasons you've listed a clear-cut definition of art or literature is impossible, because what is and what isn't are subjective. One man's great literature is another woman's pulp fiction. If a work of art or a series of words move YOU, then it's art or literature to you and others who have the same experience.

 

[Eva_ChangeN]

I was raised by parents that were hippies, and so was taught that "Art can be anything that makes you think, feel or react. You don't have to enjoy it, look at it sideways, or agree with the person who created it."

I still believe that. I think thats pretty close to what Nordling said.


AAAAnyways....I'm gonna say what annoys me that models do is begging, sitting silently with no movement, and sucking/snorting snot (GAG!). Smacking their clit is an odd thing for me as well.... meh

 

[AedanRayne]

5) Reading back I realize I wasn't clear on my initial post. Whether or not I consider camming as art, doesn't have to do with the fact that it is a commercial transaction, but with the fact that it is an utilitarian activity. Art has value which is what made it possible for artists to take commissions such as portraits or allegoric paintings and trade them for money which is perfectly fine. What I don't consider art is things like pottery which is meant to be used for something else, not an end in itself. This is the same reason graphic design is not art. The same reason architecture is not art: they are utilitarian activities that can be artistic but they are not art.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceramic_art
"In art history, ceramics and ceramic art mean art objects such as figures, tiles, and tableware made from clay and other raw materials by the process of pottery."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphic_design
"Graphic design is the art of communication, stylizing, and problem-solving through the use of type, space and image."

Yes, your opinion trumps thousands of other opinions and the definitions above. It's your right to disagree but it doesn't mean you're right. Art, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. You seem to have a strong opinion on the matter but I hope you'll at least respect the fact that others do view it as art. It's disrespectful to tell people they're deluding themselves in their chosen field (not only cam girls but graphic designers, ceramic artists).

Art is something that elicits emotion and who is the say that a graphic design, piece of pottery or cam girl cannot elicit emotion within a viewer? What about the cam girl that is also a dancer who makes thousands of people watch her in awe - is she not an artist? The model who spent months planning one particular show that made hundreds, if not thousands, of people laugh - she is not an artist? Comedians are considered artists but it's not a stage or a road that makes them such, is it?

We're dealing with a new platform to distribute the artistic process to the audience, webcams. I'm not sure if it is the webcams that leads you to believe that Cam Girls cannot be artists or if it's the fact that many of the models are naked but neither makes it less of an artistic expression. I'm not say every performance is a work of art but to make such a broad statement, that Cam Girls are deluding themselves by viewing themselves as artists, is pretentious at best.

 

[VallieBeuys]

There is a long history of action as art. Performance art. I lived and breathed that shit through 7 years of art school.

I don't see any difference between what a number of models do on cam sites (Aella and Veronica Chaos come to mind immediately) and performance art. Because it IS performance art. With orgasms. Just look up Annie Sprinkle. Or Vallie Export (where I got my first name).

Do I consider my cam performances art? Not really. But that doesn't mean I don't have plans and ideas for future shows that (to me at least) would be performance art. I come at everything I do with an artist's eye because that's what I am. You don't have to LIKE it, but no one can tell me that art doesn't exist in sexy spaces on the Internet just because money and wanking are involved. Besides, the actual art world is basically just a big self congratulatory circle jerk over a heaping pile of money anyway.

 

[Starling]

Although I'm glad my post sparked and interesting and thoughtful discussion on the place of art in camming or whether or not camming can be art in itself, that really wasn't the intention of my post! I framed it in terms of artistic integrity because yossarian was annoyed with girls bandwagoning, and claimed that doing things for monetary reasons made them disappointingly mercenary (which, as we've discussed, is kind of silly to specify, being that this is a commercial site- if girls wanted to just do cool things on camera for free, they'd start a YouTube channel).

My point with the art comment was that I didn't understand what ethical code girls are betraying (the implication with the term "mercenary") by trying something that has already become popular and is clearly successful. Yes, it's one thing to offer to do something you hate just for the sake of making tokens- that displays a sad lack of creativity, in my opinion. But to evaluate the intentions of a whole slew of camgirls just because they aren't the first to do what they're doing as though they've "sold out" is annoying in its own right.

What I was trying to say is that EVEN if one DID evaluate camming and camgirls by artistic standards and held them to the same integrity as a musician (because it felt like that's what yossarian was doing), it would be ridiculous to assume that producing "art" and doing so by employing aspects of current trends in order to make money are mutually exclusive pursuits.

Bob Dylan could have done a disco album in the 70s, or a rap album in the 90s, or he could start slapping models' asses and twerking with Miley tomorrow--and he might have made a shitload of money doing it--but he had the integrity not to. He does what he wants and trusts that his audience would follow. I've seen some really original models like Aella and Veronica Chaos, but they are few and far between. Most girls are trying to make a living, so I understand what you're saying about trying new ways to make money. I guess when I said bandwagoning I meant "doing things because everybody else is doing them." That's sort of the opposite of what I want a camgirl to do--I want her to be herself. If I want to watch Kickaz in the library, I'll watch Kickaz in the library.

I'm gonna try really hard to not be offended by the "Aella and VC are original but they're rare examples" line for various reasons, but I am going to point out that if you want girls to be genuinely themselves, you need to stop assuming that anything they do that's already been done by many is a deviation from that genuineness or from originality itself. It's not like the Bob Dylan thing at all- it would be like accusing all modern musicians of not being genuine or not being worth listening to because they use piano and guitars and not some new and unique instruments, or the C G Am F chord progression as opposed to something more novel. These are tools of the trade. They are industry staples. They are mechanisms that have proven highly effective and compelling in crafting unique and interesting pieces, so they've become standard.

Hell, when it comes down to it, even Aella (whom I love and admire, for the record) is doing a lot of things that are already very popular- spanks, shots, Hitachi control shows- she adds her own personality to it and does have a TON of creative and unique aspects to her performance like the gnomes and the chipmunk head, but its not like she's any less "guilty" of this "doing things because everyone else does them and they clearly work" thing.

Sorry, perhaps I'm really invested in this discussion because I feel like I'm exactly the kind of camgirl to whom you're referring, but I don't feel like I deserve the criticism. I do many things that could be considered bandwagon-y. I don't do penetrative cumshows, anal, squirting, or any of that jazz, so my room could be considered pretty vanilla, but I offer spanks and pussy spanks. I do library shows. I do hot wax and hitachi control shows. I have a whiteboard and my bed has pretty string lights above it. But my library shows don't involve me getting down and dirty in the stacks as much as they involve doing ridiculous dances and army crawling down the aisles, which I'm pretty sure is the most unique thing a camgirl has done for tokens in a library, and yet by the sheer fact that it's a library show I'm being lumped into the bandwagon category. One of the ways to win spanks in my room is by correctly guessing whether Schrodinger's Cat will be alive or dead in my neat little Schrodinger's Cat box, yet when I do the spanks I'll apparently be seen as only doing them for the money. It's just really frustrating to be held to some impossible and arbitrary standard of originality and legitimacy when I think I'm one of the most unique girls out there. I'm sure there are others who feel the same way.

There's always a saturation point with bandwagons and trends, and then aspects of those trends will be assimilated into standard operating procedure. At one point in the very beginning, I'm sure a girl figured out she didn't have to do privates all the time- she could offer to do countdowns in public chat and make more tokens there. After a while, other girls picked up on it and started incorporating it into their routine. Some people probably griped about how annoying it was to see countdowns everywhere. Now, nobody questions it because it's standard. I think it's really cool, actually, to see how social media adapts and is repurposed like an organic, ever-growing entity.


TL;DR- Blah blah blah art, blah blah blah Bob Dylan, blah blah Lilah whining some more.

 

[RainyDayGuy]

As a former art student, all this talk of "what is art?" is giving me a brain boner and making me slightly nauseous at the same time.

 

[goldenaye666]

Debating art with TicTacToe is about as pointless as actually playing Tic Tac Toe.

 

[HarmlessSquirrel]

All this art talk reminds me of something from the game Civilization V, which I am addicted to. There's a way for your civilization to create great books (they use the names and quotes from actual famous writings). When you create a book, a short quote from the book is read aloud, and there's one that goes ...but then the Devil came down and said, "it's pretty, but is it art?"

I am not an artist, so my working definition of art is essentially this: If it seems like art to me, it's art. In my opinion, art is in the eye of the beholder. It doesn't seem like a single precise definition is required.



On topic: I am annoyed when models are meanie-heads.

 

[yossarian]

Although I'm glad my post sparked and interesting and thoughtful discussion on the place of art in camming or whether or not camming can be art in itself, that really wasn't the intention of my post! I framed it in terms of artistic integrity because yossarian was annoyed with girls bandwagoning, and claimed that doing things for monetary reasons made them disappointingly mercenary (which, as we've discussed, is kind of silly to specify, being that this is a commercial site- if girls wanted to just do cool things on camera for free, they'd start a YouTube channel).

My point with the art comment was that I didn't understand what ethical code girls are betraying (the implication with the term "mercenary") by trying something that has already become popular and is clearly successful. Yes, it's one thing to offer to do something you hate just for the sake of making tokens- that displays a sad lack of creativity, in my opinion. But to evaluate the intentions of a whole slew of camgirls just because they aren't the first to do what they're doing as though they've "sold out" is annoying in its own right.

What I was trying to say is that EVEN if one DID evaluate camming and camgirls by artistic standards and held them to the same integrity as a musician (because it felt like that's what yossarian was doing), it would be ridiculous to assume that producing "art" and doing so by employing aspects of current trends in order to make money are mutually exclusive pursuits.

Bob Dylan could have done a disco album in the 70s, or a rap album in the 90s, or he could start slapping models' asses and twerking with Miley tomorrow--and he might have made a shitload of money doing it--but he had the integrity not to. He does what he wants and trusts that his audience would follow. I've seen some really original models like Aella and Veronica Chaos, but they are few and far between. Most girls are trying to make a living, so I understand what you're saying about trying new ways to make money. I guess when I said bandwagoning I meant "doing things because everybody else is doing them." That's sort of the opposite of what I want a camgirl to do--I want her to be herself. If I want to watch Kickaz in the library, I'll watch Kickaz in the library.

I'm gonna try really hard to not be offended by the "Aella and VC are original but they're rare examples" line for various reasons, but I am going to point out that if you want girls to be genuinely themselves, you need to stop assuming that anything they do that's already been done by many is a deviation from that genuineness or from originality itself. It's not like the Bob Dylan thing at all- it would be like accusing all modern musicians of not being genuine or not being worth listening to because they use piano and guitars and not some new and unique instruments, or the C G Am F chord progression as opposed to something more novel. These are tools of the trade. They are industry staples. They are mechanisms that have proven highly effective and compelling in crafting unique and interesting pieces, so they've become standard.

Hell, when it comes down to it, even Aella (whom I love and admire, for the record) is doing a lot of things that are already very popular- spanks, shots, Hitachi control shows- she adds her own personality to it and does have a TON of creative and unique aspects to her performance like the gnomes and the chipmunk head, but its not like she's any less "guilty" of this "doing things because everyone else does them and they clearly work" thing.

Sorry, perhaps I'm really invested in this discussion because I feel like I'm exactly the kind of camgirl to whom you're referring, but I don't feel like I deserve the criticism. I do many things that could be considered bandwagon-y. I don't do penetrative cumshows, anal, squirting, or any of that jazz, so my room could be considered pretty vanilla, but I offer spanks and pussy spanks. I do library shows. I do hot wax and hitachi control shows. I have a whiteboard and my bed has pretty string lights above it. But my library shows don't involve me getting down and dirty in the stacks as much as they involve doing ridiculous dances and army crawling down the aisles, which I'm pretty sure is the most unique thing a camgirl has done for tokens in a library, and yet by the sheer fact that it's a library show I'm being lumped into the bandwagon category. One of the ways to win spanks in my room is by correctly guessing whether Schrodinger's Cat will be alive or dead in my neat little Schrodinger's Cat box, yet when I do the spanks I'll apparently be seen as only doing them for the money. It's just really frustrating to be held to some impossible and arbitrary standard of originality and legitimacy when I think I'm one of the most unique girls out there. I'm sure there are others who feel the same way.

There's always a saturation point with bandwagons and trends, and then aspects of those trends will be assimilated into standard operating procedure. At one point in the very beginning, I'm sure a girl figured out she didn't have to do privates all the time- she could offer to do countdowns in public chat and make more tokens there. After a while, other girls picked up on it and started incorporating it into their routine. Some people probably griped about how annoying it was to see countdowns everywhere. Now, nobody questions it because it's standard. I think it's really cool, actually, to see how social media adapts and is repurposed like an organic, ever-growing entity.


TL;DR- Blah blah blah art, blah blah blah Bob Dylan, blah blah Lilah whining some more.

I really didn't think my comments would be offensive, and I wasn't trying to dismiss what anybody does...I guess I just wasn't clear enough in what I was saying. I singled out Aella and Veronica as doing things that I had never seen other models do, but I suppose I contradicted myself when I called them rare examples and then said camgirls should be themselves. It sounds like you're doing exactly what I talked about in a later post--taking the "tools" of being a camgirl and adapting them to your personality. And I think it's all kind of a performance art. I think maybe the jumping on the bandwagon thing came out wrong, and I should probably know better than to speak off the cuff like that. I was responding to Harmless' very specific criticism of models who essentially change what has worked for them because they think what everybody else is doing will be popular, but they end up putting off their regulars in doing so. Maybe a better example (if I'm going to ride this musician thing to the death) is Liz Phair. She was edgy and exciting, and then she tried something different--she ventured into slickly produced pop and basically killed her career with one album. She alienated the very people who bought her records by doing something so antithetical to her established persona that her fans left in droves. I think a camgirl who jumps on the latest trend DOES risk doing that. I can't think of much that would alienate me from the camgirls I frequent, but I know it's not the same for everyone--I've seen longtime, high-tipping members leave forever because a non-nude model started getting naked, or because a girl started doing cumshows, or taking privates, or selling B/G videos. Now, I'm not suggesting that these models did these things to "jump on the bandwagon," so to speak, but I suppose I'm saying it's worth thinking of the impact it might have when you radically change your image, for whatever reason. And if the only reason is money, then maybe it's not worth it. You know?