id like to hear what you have to say on keychains
Also answering @katlovesshrimps who enquired! The post in question
Keychains are some of the items that gets made, promoted and sold online by independent artists. I am around this sort of artist constantly online through my love of fanart and being a moderately successful online 2D artist myself. Keychains, stickers and prints make some of the most common stuff that gets sold by us: it's a great way to showcase 2D art, and being small items that are relatively easy to manifacture they're appealing to customers who'll not have to spend the hundreds of bucks that a fully commissioned piece is rightfully worth. A lot of fanartists who have online success make some income in the convention space, which also incentivized this kind of product because some cons restrict what you're allowed to sell to only items worth under a given threshhold apiece.
Internet allowing good international deals, this art community keeps discovering new and better manufacturers for this stuff. Most artists seek for stuff that's cheap to order so they can make a good profit off it as well as fun options (for keychains, you can have various plastics used for the charm, and fun shapes and colors in the chain itself, for example). This is where my first problem lies: the crushing majority of these people do not make the things themselves. Hand making a keychain charm would take so much time you cannot fit it under a 5€ pricetag at a con. If you want to make a profit, or to access some material types like plastics and metals, you need to contact a manufacturing firm. And with the international availability of online, you can easily find firms that are cheap.
Here we get in the meat of the problem.
The artists using this sort of production typically profit off exchange rates, commissioning the manufacturing in countries that have cheaper labour.
The stuff that is made is small trinkets. Keychains are not essential items to live. Acrylic stands, shiny stickers and whatnot aren't either.
Despite it all, the artist who'll typically only contribute the design if not part of the design, will frame the item as of their making, as an indie production.
I'm a big old hippie. I'm already opposed to the mass production of useless trinkets made of non recyclable materials that use a lot of energy to produce. I also find it morally questionable to use your position of power as someone from a richer country to make stuff cheap overseas. A few years back a documentary on water pollution completely radicalized me regarding shipping: it's a huge impact on the health of the planet and so much of it is useless. I barely order stuff online anymore, preferring to either buy local or not buy at all. I thrift, borrow from peers or repair my own stuff as much as I can. I believe if more people did this, the world would be better. Not many people do this.
The fact that a piece of this worldwide commerce is presented as an indie buisiness for small artists when it's only possible thanks to global chains and wealth imbalance is bollocks to me. Unfortunately, because it IS true that most artists living from con to con are not rich, and that they and their followers are big in the spaces I frequent online, nobody pipes up about it much.
Seeing ccasino, a big blog and an artist who's work I admire, dig at this whole thing openly is a rare and precious moment to me. Stop filling landfills with marketable keychains indeed. Paint your own keychain from a piece of wood if you're a real one or something. Nerds will tell you "there's no ethical consumption under capitalism", they're full of shit. You can make an effort. It's just that the effort consists of letting go of fun trinkets, and that is too much for a surprising amount of people
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