I am completely bored this Fashion Week. And no it has nothing to do with the clothing. I am bored because I am sick of this blogging phenomenon. Everyone is blogging! New York Mag, New York Times, bonkers publicist Kelly Cutrone, sweet women from the Midwest thronging the backstage beauty areas thanks to Total Beauty, and god knows who else. And everyone is jockeying for position. Everyone wants their readers (whoever they are) to know they are the most special blogger. It has stopped being about honest reporting and started being about status again. We upset the equilibrium once but now bloggers are just integrated back into that status system. To which I say boo! Its boring. Its not about fresh takes anymore.
The terrible thing about being easily bored is that just as the medium is taking off I lose complete interest in it. I like getting things off the ground but I feel like now that it has reached its apex its starting to lose its early cohesion. Don’t get me wrong. I still love bloggers and I am pretty stoked for new developments at Coutorture that are still top secret. Sugar Inc and Coutorture have much excitement up our sleeves. Its just I have been doing this fashion blogging thing for two years. Its been two years since I was in WWD for being the first person to liveblog fashion week. I’ve been there. Done that. What is next? What can we do to shake up the system again and take advantage of our new positions in the hierarchy?
Going through my morning newsreader looking at everyone comparing their access (ohh I was at Prada, ohh I was at the DVF dinner, ohh I was backstage at Marc by Marc) it just makes me realize how much I don’t give a shit anymore about the access game. Last night after dinner I wandered to the Prada shindig clear invite in hand (I needed white paper behind it to read the details) the minimal crowd dissuaded me completely from attending. My friends wandered off to Matthew Williamson’s party while I hopped in a cab to go home. I just don’t like scenes or parties and I can’t ever seem to muster up the fortitude to suck it up and go. It feels like nothing is new anymore. The new media is just as old and staid as the old anymore. And I don’t know what the heck happened.
I am ready to be the “enfant terriblé” again. I am ready to piss people off. I am ready to scare people again. I am ready to cover the shit that matters, not just the shit that makes editors and bloggers feel good about themselves. This whole opening up fashion bullshit thing is so over. We did it. Now its time to move on. We need to figure out the next step. Now its just a cacophony of voices feeling special about themselves. Yes, OK you are cool? We get it. Yes you are well connected. Now can you stop preening so the rest of us can get some work done.
I want to make people think, not make people jealous. All this longing and aspiring makes me queasy. Frankly I can’t wait for Fashion Week to be over so I can get back to work. We (the Coutorture team) want to lead people on to the next big thing not perpetuate the status quo. We broke ground once and we will do it again. And while I am incredibly proud of the work everyone has done I know we can continue to do better.
Without my muse god knows what I would be doing right now. Probably dying of boredom. Come Monday things will be different. We blazed a trail once, we can do it again. Its been fun guys!
[...] Almost Girl wrote an interesting post today on B To D With FHere’s a quick excerpt I am completely bored this Fashion Week. And no it has nothing to do with the clothing. I am bored because I am sick of this blogging phenomenon. Everyone is blogging! New York Mag, New York Times, bonkers publicist Kelly Cutrone, sweet women from the Midwest thronging the backstage beauty areas thanks to Total Beauty, and god knows who else. And everyone is jockeying for position. Everyone wants their readers (whoever they are) to know they are the most special blogger. The terrible thing abo [...]
[...] Almost Girl wrote an interesting post today on B To D With FHere’s a quick excerpt I am completely bored this Fashion Week. And no it has nothing to do with the clothing. I am bored because I am sick of this blogging phenomenon. Everyone is blogging! New York Mag, New York Times, bonkers publicist Kelly Cutrone, sweet women from the Midwest thronging the backstage beauty areas thanks to Total Beauty, and god knows who else. And everyone is jockeying for position. Everyone wants their readers (whoever they are) to know they are the most special blogger. The terrible thing abo [...]
Bravo Julie!
I think that’s the general malaise I’m feeling too… At least it’s nice to know when one thing’s done and you can move on to the next.
Oh, Julie, you do make me think. I have learned so much from your blog and Coutorture and the blogging community. You and the staff have done an incredible job this week.
You want to make people think…I just want to help women and girls feel confident in their own skin. I just want to make someone smile or chuckle after they have read my blog. We all have different roles in life, even in the blogging community.
I personally use the writing of the daily posts as mental floss. Instead of crossword puzzles, I write, I research, I exercise my brain.
I know you won’t give up on us. You are our fearless and fabulous leader.
Cheers,
Beckie
P.S. I probably entertain The Hubster and my 82-year-old dad the most.
You are such a bitch. Don’t you run a website that brings bloggers together? How can you be so demeaning towards other bloggers?
Shame on you.
Why not fly home early and work on your blog’s layout then?
This default layout sucks. Since you were the “first” fashion blogger i know of, you would think some css, html, and php would’ve crawled into your head by now.
I’m sure in a big old city like New York, they have the ability to change your flights, or you could drive home.
As I recall Fashiontribes.com was the first..and Lesley rocks!
Jeff-You bring up a point about who is the the first blogger not the first liveblogger. Technically it was actually Kathryn of Budget Fashionista if we are being super precise. The WWD piece I am referring to was interested not in bloggers per say but reporting in real time hence first live blogger as their landmark. Lesley to my knowledge has never brought a laptop to the tents and live blogged the event. So while she may have been one of the first bloggers (and I owe my first experiences to her) she is neither the first blogger nor the first live blogger.
Gee, and you wonder why people think the tone of your blog and your online personality is abrasive and condescending.
Boooooooooo…..Sally is right that was the most condescending comment I have ever heard. Rumor has it you were being nasty at the tents too so I guess you should just go home.
Jennifer-I haven’t really been at the tents much. So I would have to have been nasty somewhere else. In fact I haven’t really encountered anyone at all.
Suzy-I may be a bitch but I don’t think there is anything demeaning about saying we need to evolve, change and better ourselves.
Also watch out with the IP address. I can tell you wrote me from inside Hearst. Best to leave anonymous comments from home and not the corporate IP.
I don’t wonder why people think I am abrasive. I know I say things that make people question the prevailing winds. However I am not condescending. I am merely asking hard questions about where our future lies. Evolution must occur. If it is condescending to ask that people continue to improve then so be it. I however believe that we can always be doing better.
julie what questions are you asking, precisely? i would seriously like to know because i haven’t read any well framed questions about this “future” of fashion you are imagining from you. it is wrong to alienate your readers so much by insulting them. it is also wrong to stir up controversy for the sake of notoriety. why can’t people in fashion just be nice? sigh…
Julie, the majority of other bloggers — and haters — are dumb girls from small towns who went to schools like Michigan State and were in third-tier sororities where Rachel Pally dresses was a big deal because Jessica Simpson wore them. There are truly very few people like you. It’s no wonder they dislike you.
why fight? everyone is a blogger, can we finally focus on merit instead of media? why fight when we all just enjoy sharing a fascination with fashion?
I don’t get this post at all. this is so far from representing my experience of blogging I don’t know how to respond. there is so much to be enthusiastic about and curious about, I have never been bored.
Danielle-If we focused on merit instead of media a few people would begin to realize that maybe they don’t deserve the lionshare. And that makes people uncomfortable. Everyone wants to feel special.
You have been extremely lucky to have a positive communal experience with blogging from the start. Toronto bloggers seem to be a bit more sincere and open. I do not find this to always be the case in New York City. Not that this is true of most bloggers at all. The community I engage with is filled with some of the brightest, most enthusiastic, talented and downright interesting people I have ever met. They warm my heart and constantly inspire me.
But fashion blogging in general? I am really down on it right now because frankly I barely recognize it from two years ago. It has gotten fawning again. Its almost as if the second we all got access the critical perspective we once took went out the window. It has become a competition for access and ass kissing which totally defeats the purpose of blogging in the first place.
And maybe its because the publicity regime is so tied to the “smile while you lie” mode of operation that we are simply scared we will lose the access if we are forthright again. And then what happens to all the nice party invites!
Either way I think we need to begin focusing on creating value in our own right. We need to move beyond commentary perhaps. I want to find new creative outlets that add to the experience of being online. Not all of us have the luxury of a budget or full time attention so one solution I see is creating a tool set to make blogging better. Make it more than a blog if you will. That way no one can complain that with the big names getting into blogging that we are being pushed out thus necessitating us being even more simpering and silly to keep our access. Everyone can be back on equal footing again which I suppose is my way of saying now that the hierarchy has been reestablished let’s get rid of it!
I think what Coutorture did this fashion week with our unique photography is a start in the right direction. And a project that is in the works at Sugarland that I am working on is a HUGE step in the right direction. I want to enable people to do better work. Not enable people to go on feeling smug. The smugness makes me yawn and say NEXT. Hence my boredom. We have grown complacent as we have gained success and that is soundly a horrible thing.
Julie:
I have been following your blog for some time now and while I was impressed by your approach at the beginning, I fail to see how your new blogs (almost dressed, almost packed etc) are changing the face of the fashion blogging world. Too many blogs focus on fashion purely from the standpoint of consumption. While you tout your desire to change the way we perceive fashion, you continue to perpetuate the status quo. Furthermore, your self-congratulatory tone is completely unappealing. There is a fine line between pride and hubris….
I look forward to seeing what you will cook up in the future.
[...] the end of fashion week in New York last month, Julie at Almost Girl offered a provoking post about her boredom with fashion blogging. Everyone wants their readers (whoever they are) to know they are the most special blogger. It has [...]
[...] (one, two) thought-provoking posts about the state of fashion blogging (and how she’s bored of it) [...]
Eloquently put. I can see where you are coming from. You certainly made me think!
[...] Its exciting to be shaking up the traditional time tables for publishing original fashion editorial. I just wish I knew what was a reasonable rhythm. But I am sure the first bloggers felt the way I feel now. On the bright side? I am no longer remotely bored with fashion. [...]
you’re amazing, julie. you are so hypocritical, it’s ridiculous! all of a sudden you don’t care about the “access game”? when that’s what your blog was basically built on? yes, your tagline references plato, but i still remember your utterly stupid posts about your new gucci boots, which shows you were being invited to and not… that is, when i actually bothered to check your blog. besides which, in this very post you manage to make a reference to (a not entirely true, as admitted to by you!!) bit about how you were supposedly the first fashion liveblogger! if you don’t care about that stuff, why do you even reference it?!?
in the meantime, there is and has been a whole ‘nother fashion blogging scene going on out there that has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with the “access game” as you call it, is all about people’s personal definitions of fashion, style etc. (susie at style bubble, of course – but there are tons of others – fops and dandies, diary of a third world fashionista, and on and on). these bloggers are actually interested in fashion and style in real life, and not just trying to make a quick buck (c.f. your “almost (blank)ed” series of blogs).
you are bored by a scene that you brought about yourself! of course the blogs you see and read are all about the access game – that’s what you complained/whined about/focused on from the very beginning. i only came to this post because a blog i like (danielle at final fashion) referred to it and i thought to myself, maybe julie finally has something interesting to say? but no, it’s the same self-aggrandizement that reveals in the end, a deep insecurity.
way back in the beginning of your blog, in response to one of your posts that supposedly asked deep questions about fashion, i wrote some thoughtful posts in response. to some extent i disagreed with you, though completely respectfully. and i was truly excited about the possibility of a truly intellectual fashion discussion. unfortunately, you to a certain extent, but definitely your sidekick/henchman (philip? the guy you started coutorture with) took it way personally and in response wrote rude posts that made personal insinuations about my level of intelligence, etc. i haven’t really come back since, and i know many others who were similarly turned off by your blog. we have found an entirely separate fashion “blogosphere” where original thought is appreciated, disagreement is valued and celebrated, and the fashion marketing and p.r. machine doesn’t matter at all. if you just opened your eyes a bit you’d see that it’s been there all along. but it doesn’t make any money, and perhaps that’s the reason you’re not really a part of it.
[...] time has worn on, some have become concerned that bloggers are craving media access just to have it. Aside from [...]