Fashion Consolidated

Dear FashCon, I need a word with you.

In the last week, I’ve been pummelled to death with IMs, notecards and FashCon work. FashCon has always been a labour of love to me, and I still love it deeply, but the amount of time I’m now having to spend keeping it going isn’t sustainable.

I need your help. Your attention to these few things will make a big difference for me:

(1) THE FAQ. Please read the FashCon FAQ when you have questions. It’s now required reading for all members. I get many IMs every day that are already answered in the FAQ, and unfortunately I just don’t have time to repeat these answers. It’s not my natural way, and I’m going to find it tricky not to reply, but there are 1700 of you now and 2-3 hours a day spent in IMs just isn’t possible anymore if I’m to keep this going.

(2) OFFICE HOURS. As before, only IM me concerning FashCon between 7am-3pm SLT. I need some time off too. My IMs also regularly get capped by LL. If I don’t reply, that may be why. I’ll do my best during the hours above if you’re patient and they’re not answered already elsewhere.

(3) GROUP IMs. Policy hasn’t changed, there are only two valid types of group IM: (a) a comment on a notice and discussion thereof, (b) sending a courteous reply containing the URL http://fashcon.com/oops in response to spam or an IM contrary to policy. Reasons for this in the FAQ. Trust me when I tell you that you don’t want your favourite (and busy) designers to leave through IM exhaustion – several have. Spamming and IMs contrary to policy will be dealt with by removal. See below for a new alternative for those who like group chat.

(4) CAFE. I’ve just set up a new group called Fashion Consolidated Cafe (FAQ etc. to be updated). This group is for anyone who likes a good natter and finds the rules above too restrictive. No fashion release notices will be sent to the Cafe group: it’s a group for IMs only. You may chat about anything there, as long as you aren’t rude or abusive, safe in the knowledge that others who signed up to it are FashCon members who also want to chat over a latte. You largely self-police it. Any prolonged discussion in main FashCon group IM that stretches beyond immediate questions or comments about a notice just sent are required to “take it to the cafe”.

(5) BE NICE. Abusing or flaming someone else, including those who send inappropriate group IMs, is now a capital offence and you’ll be removed. Please don’t send the oops URL as an automatic reaction – stop to see if the question/comment someone just sent actually refers to a notice. If so, all’s well. But please don’t let conversation meander – remember potentially 1700 others are having to read it too. A few seconds of your consideration before you send can save me a lot of time later.

(6) NOTICE CONTENT. As per my last notice and the entry on the website, all notices from designers must focus on new releases of fashion or av-related items and include pictures. General “come to my store” notices are not appropriate FashCon content and buyers will note them as such. Most have followed this since I asked – some have not. Persistent senders of notices that don’t conform to the content expected will have sending rights revoked.

(7) GROUP NOTICES. If you have notices turned off, please ensure you scan the archive regularly for notices from me: they will contain important FashCon admin, changes in policy etc. and it’s your responsibility to keep up if you ever send a notice or use group IMs

(8) FEEDBACK. I’ve spent many many hours explaining the why’s of FashCon rules with members and designers in IMs. Feedback is really appreciated, but I’m now completely exhausted. I’ll continue to review group policy and make changes based on obvious sea-changes in opinion, and, most importantly, when LL actually give us the tools I’ve asked for for all of us to use groups more manageably – to help with this, please see, comment on and vote for http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/MISC-64 to MISC-72.

(9) KIOSKS. FashCon would appreciate you putting up an information kiosk on your premises if you haven’t yet. See the options in an earlier entry on this page and add a comment there to request one.

Thanks for reading. FashCon supports the income of many designers, but isn’t a money-earning business itself and thus can’t currently support waged staff to help out and police it, so it’s just me. While volunteers might seem viable, in practice it’s been tried and isn’t workable. Therefore you have to guard FashCon’s future and the continuing existence of designers you like on it by digesting the rules, sticking to them, and explaining to others in private carefully and politely if they’re not aware of some.

Finally, those designers who expected to be given vendor status last weekend: sorry I missed the boat, but I’ll do it soon when I get a breather, and you’ll receive an IM, welcome, information, kiosk etc.

Thanks, lie down time, Honey x

Japanese translation thanks to Nock Forager