Business
If You Are An Artist And In Business And Pay Taxes Online WARNING!
I know there are many artists, writers, and small businesses that pay their quarterly taxes online. Please feel free to share this post. PLEASE NOTE: if you make your federal tax payments online there is a spoof e mail that is going about. Please forward those e mails to phishing@irs.gov
My e mail that I received looked something like this
From: EFTPS Tax Payment
Subject: LAST NOTICE: Your Federal Tax Payment ID: ( A RANDOM NUMBER WAS HERE I DELETED IT) has been rejected.
EFTPS:
The Electronic Federal Tax Payment System
PLEASE NOTE: Your tax payment is due regardless of EFTPS online
availability. In case of an emergency, you can always make your tax
payment by calling the EFTPS.
I Just received this back from IRS after sending them my e mail
This is an automatic reply from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Online Fraud Detection and Prevention (OFDP) team.
We have received your report of possible phishing or fraud. Although we review and investi…gate each email we receive,
due to the number of incident complaints, we cannot guarantee a personal response to your message.
Please note that the IRS does not contact individuals by email.
Therefore, if you received an email claiming to be from the IRS it is a phishing attempt and should be reported to us.
Additional information on IRS phishing can be viewed here:
http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=155682,00.html
Additional information on avoiding phishing scams can be viewed here:
http://www.antiphishing.org/consumer_recs.html
The IRS values your report, and encourages individuals to report future IRS phishing/fraud to phishing@irs.gov
so that we can handle these incidents and limit the number of possible victims.
To limit email volume, you will only receive one auto-response per day for any of your submissions.
Thank you for your report.
Regards,
Internal Revenue Service (IRS)
Online Fraud Detection and Prevention (OFDP)
phishing@irs.gov
Preparing The Next Presentation For SCBWI
I will, once again be the speaker at the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators meeting (SCBWI) November meeting Scheduled for November 1, 2010 at 7:00p.m. It is free and all are welcome to come Tracy Gee Community Center
3599 Westcenter Dr, Houston, TX 77042-5213
The topic is still marketing in the arts.
Last month we discussed-
* Setting Goals
* Target Marketing
* Creating a Platform
* Branding
It was a lot to take in, as there is a tremendous amount of information. I like what a former attendee said about my workshops.
“I left the room with the certainty that if fame and fortune were going to
be mine, it would only occur if I took the bull by the horns, and you
showed me not only where the bull was but how to get the horns, as well.
Besides your ebullient enthusiasm, which is highly contagious,
you also shared with us lucky attendees really practical steps to
getting where we want to go. I left the lecture with a suitcase of ideas.”
Mary Erbert
Artist-Houston
This next month we will be talking about
* Marketing Time Management- How much time should I spend marketing myself in my art?
* Setting Goals- Planning for Your Pony
* Using Social Marketing
* Creating a Blog
* Creating a website
For those of you who missed last month I am hoping to do this as an online webinar and will let you know when this happens. I do have this video that I created on the first few minutes of the meeting.
I also shared one of my gems. A special part of the workshop. Here is last months Gem HARO.
Bridgette Mongeon is a sculptor, writer and educator as well as a public speaker. Her blog can be found at https://creativesculpture.com.
She is also the owner and creator of the God’s Word Collectible Sculpture series
Follow the artists on twitter twitter.com/Sculptorwriter twitter.com/creategodsword
Facebook http://www.facebook.com/bridgette.mongeon
Listen to The Creative Christian Podcast or the Inspirtaion/Generation Podcast Click on Podcast Host Bios for a listing of all podcasts
Listen to the Art and Technology Podcast
SCBWI Presentation Will Turn Into An Online Webinar! Marketing in The Arts- Stay tune!
Part one of the Marketing in the Arts workshop for the Society of Children Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) Houston Group went well. It is a lot of information to take in for a short period of time. It is usually meant as a workshop to break off and do the homework and then come back to the group and work on the next step. I feel I might have overwhelmed some people, but all looked like they were excited to get to work on their marketing campaigns for their art. We continue next month and all are welcome to attend.
For those who might have missed the event. I’m working on a remedy to that. Funny how things happen. As I was working on the presentation I came down with what appears to be vertigo. And so I felt compelled to think in another direction. I decided to offer this workshop as an online webinar. If you are interested please let me know and I’ll contact you when it is available.
Sculptor, Writer and Speaker
Bridgette Mongeon is a sculptor, writer and educator as well as a public speaker. Her blog can be found at https://creativesculpture.com.
She is also the owner and creator of the God’s Word Collectible Sculpture series
Follow the artists on twitter twitter.com/Sculptorwriter twitter.com/creategodsword
Facebook http://www.facebook.com/bridgette.mongeon
Listen to The Creative Christian Podcast or the Inspiration/Generation Podcast Click on Podcast Host Bios for a listing of all podcasts
Listen to the Art and Technology Podcast
Free Lecture On Marketing In The Arts
guidance in finding your way
through the marketing and
public relations maze?
Be sure to catch my lecture at SCBWI
On Monday October 4th 2010 and again on Monday November 01 2010 I will be speaking to the Society of Children Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) Houston Group about Marketing in the arts
This is fee lectures and though it is catered to writers, the tools that will be shown here will apply to all people who are working in the arts, and small businesses. This is only a part of a weekend long hands-on workshop that I have created and present to groups. Though the time at the SCBWI meetings is short I will try to put as much information into the time allotted as possible.
Some things that we will discuss are:
* Marketing and public relations basics
* Internet marketing
* Websites
* Social Marketing
Meetings begin at 7:00p.m.
Tracy Gee Community Center
3599 Westcenter Dr.
Houston, Texas 77042-5213
Here is a google map for your convenience.
If your arts organization, small business, or networking group would like me to come and speak. Please contact me through the contact form at https://creativesculpture.com
______________________________________________________________________________
Sculptor, Writer and Speaker
Bridgette Mongeon is a sculptor, writer and educator as well as a public speaker. Her blog can be found at https://creativesculpture.com.
She is also the owner and creator of the God’s Word Collectible Sculpture series
Follow the artists on twitter twitter.com/Sculptorwriter twitter.com/creategodsword
Facebook http://www.facebook.com/bridgette.mongeon
Listen to The Creative Christian Podcast or the Inspirtaion/Generation Podcast Click on Podcast Host Bios for a listing of all podcasts
Listen to the Art and Technology Podcast
Are You A Starving Artist? Art in The Times of Change.
And the times they are a changing. Life and an artist’s life are full of change. Change may be one of those elements that are necessary for success as an artist, however, creative people like to dance to their own drummer and therefore, often resist the change. Here are three stories to relate to this change.
Story 1- Mad Hungry Artists
I had a recent conversation with a very good artist friend who was distraught because he was getting messages from the list serve in his e-mail box regularly with threads from fellow artists, seasoned, professional artists in their field. (This field requires very specific training.) The artists were distraught with the field and were ready to throw up their hands and give in, even take on other jobs that were not related to art. Many of these artists have had no work for months.
My friend said the posts bothered him so much he thought about quitting the list serve. It is important to point out that this friend has more work than he can handle. So what is the difference between all of these people and this friend? I’d have to say they have “resistance to change.”
My friend embraced new technology within his career. Some of those artists want to create traditional pen and ink illustrations or watercolors. It is honorable but that industry is demanding more technology out of those artists. My friend embraced that and made it work for himself.
Story 2 – The Law
While examining the new Copyright issues that are involved with the creation of 3d artwork I was speaking to a lawyer. He said that indeed, this new technology could play havoc on the legal issues surrounding digital art. He mentioned that it is the same as it was for musicians who had mp3’s come out and their music was being distributed without compensation. He mentioned that the musicians that did well with this imposition were those who didn’t fight against the inevitable change but instead embraced it and tried to figure out how to use it to their advantage.
Story 3 – The IRS
The IRS website made this simple statement that has stuck out for me. It was based on the questions to ask yourself if you need to decipher if what you do is a business or a hobby. The question that stuck out for me was based on this thought. Have you continued to improve or change your methods of creating or doing business in order to increase the profits that you receive? I wonder, how many artists are willing to do this? There is a great deal of emotion involved in our day-to-day business. We have attachments to what and how we create. Are we so bound by those that we “resist change?”
Story 4- My Story
This last story is my own story. I am a traditional portrait sculptor creating bronze sculpture of loved ones for memorials, homes, prayer gardens and the like. But recently I have been exploring new technologies and tools surrounding my craft. Instead of just sculpting with my hands in the studio I’m exploring such things as 3d sculpting, 3d scanning, and additive and subtractive manufacturing and other areas, that not only add to my tool set, but also expand my market for work. Now, I not only can create in bronze, but I can create in stone, wood and other ways, that I normally would not think of or have access to.
The conclusion is to look for ways to change your process, your market, and your toolset. Don’t resist it and insist on creating what and the way that you want. There may be some that will do this in their studio and hit it big with a unique experience displayed in a visual form, but those are far and few between. You can actually resist, but you should not expect to make a living that way. The IRS requires we change, the lawyer suggested we embrace it. Let’s try to be creative in finding ways to embrace change and make it work for ourselves, and the work we love to create!
Bridgette Mongeon is a writer and a sculptor embracing change.
You may reproduce this article on your website or blog with the by-line and links attached.
Major Panic-But It Is Over Now
Major panic this morning. I noticed that none of the links that I had been sending out on my blog were correct. In fact, they were all broken! I freaked. My blog is a major way of my promoting my work. My husband saw the terror in my eyes as I realized this affected
1. All outgoing blog posts anywhere linking to my site from present or past
2. All of my twitters posts
3. My work that I had sent to my instructor for graduate school.
My husband, who is not into social marketing, rolled his eyes and said, “Oh, it is the end of the world.”
For someone who works hard at social marketing it means a lot, plus it is wasted effort if the links no longer work, and I hate that. If I send someone a link on a blog post I would expect that it would work!
Now, if you remember, I had to change my blog from blogger to WordPress about a month ago. ( Notice this link that I just posted will work now that this problem is fixed.)
FYI the reason I had to move was The blog I had through blogger was an ftp blog, which basically means it was not a creativeendeavors.blogspot.com blog
but instead my links were linked from my website https://creativesculpture.com/blog. I moved because blogger would no longer support these ftp blogs. This change infuriated many, me included. However, I have really liked the transition and the Word Press blog.
When the problem of broken links to my blog appeared, it was hard to notice. After all, how many times do I go back to the internet and try and see how my links are doing?
When it hit me today I looked around and sure enough broken, broken, BROKEN!
I contacted web designer Shawn Hesketh, who by the way has wonderful tutorials on how to put up a WordPress site at http://wp101.com/
The problem was all about my permalink structure that can be set up in the settings in the admin panel on the WordPress blog. Shawn said I could read about it in
Part 2: Creating a New Post – covers how to create a custom permalink for an individual post.
Part 17: Configuration Settings – covers how to set up the Custom Permalink Structure.
But basically if I had the same settings as my old blog which was creativesculpture.com/blog/Yearofarticle/dateofarticle/nameofarticle.html I would be fine. I set this up as custom permalink structure with this code. /%year%/%monthnum%/%postname%.html
He also said he might create an individual topic on this tricky subject. for http://wp101.com/
Oh , and Shawn said his WordPress 101 site is a membership site, but if you use this coupon code CREATIVESCULPTURE during signup he will discount the cost of a lifetime membership by 50%.
Thanks Shawn.
Antiquities, Masterpiece, Rights of Ownership and 3D Scanning
I have been spending some time looking at historical artifacts and the copyright and ownership issues surrounding them. The reason why this topic has created some interest to me is that I’m curious about the advancement and tremendous increase in 3D scanning of artifacts.
It seems there are benefits in the 3d scanning of these precious items. There may be information captured by the scanner that will help scientist know more about the item. It offers an opportunity to document and make accessible the information. For example, the tomb of Tutankhamun is being scanned in hopes of preserving it so that the experience and information can be made available to those interested without actually having to make it accessible for individuals to experience it. This is important because the experiencing of some artifacts causes more damage to them. And it can be an asset in the restoration of an artifact.
Recording the tomb of Tutankhamun from factum-arte on Vimeo.
I have been cautioned not to just embrace all of this new technology without trying to thoroughly examine it. So, I must ask myself, what are the cons of having the artifacts scanned in 3D? Before I answer that, I thought it would be appropriate to look at some of the issues and questions revolving around the artifacts themselves.
For example:
- Is it ownership that is important or access?
- If I own land and I dig something up on my land. To whom does it belong? It will depend on the country you are in and the laws within that country. The antiquity may not belong to you. If it did not, would I report it or would I be more inclined to cherish my treasure without saying a word ?
- Many laws are developed in hopes of preventing looting of antiquities. Do they actually accomplish this? How do these laws effect poorer countries?
- How do I feel about cultural property?
- If something is taken or looted what happens to “the loss of context?” Having a coin but knowing where it was found or what the people who had this coin did, ate, where they slept, is important. It is not just the object that is researched, but where it was found.
How important is it for individuals to be exposed to the cultures and antiquities of those around the world? Should countries horde their antiquities? If antiquities can be distributed through trade, what happens with countries that have nothing to trade? How do they expose their people to the cultures around the world?
According to an article that I read, if I happened upon a stolen or found object and it ended up on the desk of an archeologist and it had something of importance on it, that information cannot be published. How difficult it must be for the archeologist who happens upon this. The reason— it has no legitimate provenance and the Archeological Institute of America forbids it. Why? If the archeologists should transcribe it and publish it, then they would be determining its authentication and making it more valuable.
Identity, self esteem, illicit digging, artifacts, private/market all of these words initiate a tremendous amount of passionate opinion in the information that I was reading about this subject.
Should there be a cultural common? Shared information and artifacts between countries, museums and collectors. The Brooklyn museum is making some of their artifacts, for which they hold the copyright, available on a Creative Commons License. Those who want to use them for non commercial use can do so. But, how is this policed?
I would suppose that the same questions and concerns that are found with traditional masterpieces and antiquities will apply to 3D scanned artifacts. Who owns them? Should they be reproduced? And my biggest thought is, that it is much easier to steal a data file than it is a physical dated fossil.
I also wonder about the artists who might use these artifacts as part of their own work. In the case of artists Barry X Ball, whose work I absolutely love, I have questioned this. Ball has taken digital scans of two Braoque pieces, “Masterpieces in the permanent collection of Ca’Rezzonico, Venice— La Purità (Dama Velata), by Antonio Corradini, and La Invidia by Orazio Marinali, as well as Hermaphrodite Endormi from the Louvre, Paris.” and he has digitally scanned them. Then he recreates them using digital milling in another substance. Does he sell these? Can he sell these? Is this art? Can he copyright this as his own?
So I ask the question, What are the pro’s and con’s and more importantly, what are the questions I should be asking when looking at this new technology of 3D scanning as it pertains to masterpieces and artifacts?
( I do hope to cover more podcasts on this subject. Looking for lawyers working with antiquities)
If you are reading this blog post from facebook and do not see the videos and or photographs visit https://creativesculpture.com/blog
I’m Making A City!
At least that is what it feels like. My coauthor Mike de la flor, who also just happens to be my husband as well, and I have been working diligently to prepare another new website. But it is not just a place to go and look, it is a community site, where people can have their own blogs, comment on forums etc. It is a HUGE undertaking.
The entire project was prompted by our publisher Focal Press. Instead of having a CD in the back of the book they are moving to providing files to the book buyers online. So months ago we knew what we needed to do. INTRODUCING ….. Digital Sculpting.net
It has taken a tremendous amount of energy this weekend to get this up, but we are there. Still some tweaking and we will be adding a ton of content. So if you get a chance come on over, drop in, become a user, set up a blog and say hi! It will be great to have a legitimate post. I’m fighting spam bots!
Today Has Been a Website Struggle
Yes, the new blog and website are coming along. Sorry for the delays in real posts, but it is necessary to get everything working correctly on the new server. And as I posted earlier, “things will break.” They did. Things got lost, but I retrieved them. Soon I’ll be back to some real content.
Success?
It looks like I was able to move my ftp blog that was on blogger and destined to shut down come the first of May to Word Press. IT was much easier than I would have thought, but I made more work for myself in that I moved my entire site from USA Hosting to Host Gator.
Why? I don’t know actually. USA hosting was quite a good hosting company, but we did buy a reseller account and hope to host all of our sites under this account. This action was prompted by the fact that we have yet another website digitalsculpting.net that will be going live very shortly. And hubby suggested if I was moving I should move the site first and then go ahead and set up Word Press.
There is still some formatting to do, but I am thrilled that it is here and up.
HOW DID I DO IT?
Here is a hint. Word press import tool will not work with an ftp site. So I first changed my Blogger Ftp site to a regular blogger page and everything has uploaded perfectly. OF course the formatting of the page looks like a wordpress blog, but we will add the https://creativesculpture.com web header shortly. Now on to redirecting the DNS to point to the new server.