imageshack disaster II

I like to look at it this way: I am not a wealthy artist, I'm more like a street artist. I prefer not to write on other people's buildings, but I write on websites wherever I can find them, and I take my pictures, store them as I can, and use them with my writing. Over time, I've become better at posterizing, or sharpening, or altering photos, but mostly I do it for effect and don't really consider myself a professional.

Ah but one of the problems associated with my style, pop art as a hobby, is that a site like imageshack can offer you indefinite free storage of photos, and then simply retract the offer. Who can blame them? I wouldn't offer anyone free storage of photos indefinitely, and have trouble even with the junk my kids store on my computer. But I also have to admit, I enjoyed having all those photos out where I could see them anytime I wanted.

I have a curious relationship with flickr: some of my best photos are there, but they stopped after a hundred or so, and I didn't want to compound the dependence with false or manufactured e-mails (I actually have a few anyway) - so my flickr site, I've left as it is. But I had three imageshack sites, and spent the holidays taking back the photos. Putting them in a dropbox. As a yuppie, and a professional at that, I do have a dropbox. Actually it's my wife's. But it doesn't seem to mind all these photos.

I'm beginning to adopt Andy Warhol's philosophy, or at least two of them. First, I am what I appear to be, I'm not hiding anything or giving you a subtle, hidden message. Second, everything I've got, it's out where you can see it. It's right in front of you. I plan to be out there, everywhere, recognizable. That's my modus operandi.

But, it's come down to a number of blogger ports; I don't do static webpages very easily anymore. The SIU personal webpage server blithely made it so you had to use dreamweaver to use it, as all webpages had to be encrypted, so I'm no longer able to change or update my pages there. Same with TTU, although I have a slightly better chance of taking lessons, learning dreamweaver, and getting back on my feet here. That's a long-range plan, though. for the moment, I have a number of blogger sites, and people seem to visit them regularly, but online click-through web traffic doesn't seem to be a lucrative trade. I keep up my pr campaign; I do the best I can. But what I need are bold images, and billboards on the major streets of major cities. That campaign, I guess, will be next.