lol. But seriously, Magic is going to die as an art if we don't change things. This attitude that "I am the best!" and crappy performances just aren't going to hold up.
This is symptomatic of internet artists in general.
Go to YouTube and search for the various "shows" done by college girls. I guarantee you'll get through maybe three of them before either slipping into a coma out of boredom or waking up naked in the woods covered in filth.
Now go to MySpace and look up random bands. Assuming your ears don't start bleeding, try to slog through about three or four of them.
Finally, go to deviantArt and punch in search words such as "anime," "manga" or "fanart." Make sure your phone is already set to dial the suicide prevention hotline.
Now in all three cases, try leaving some constructive feedback. Give it five minutes and wait for the screaming, personal attacks, and death threats to start.
Paradoxically, websites like that thrive on the mediocrity of wannabes and a duplicitous culture of nice is created. So-called fans shower these people with fawning praise and adoration. Eventually, the wannabes start to buy into it and develop massive egos. But since that ego is built on fawning flattery instead of accomplishment, the monolithic self-image is made entirely of glass. They lash out at the first criticism in defense and it's soon made worse when the fans join the fray.
The fans are inherently parasites however. They slowly leach an artist of all drive to improve, all potential, and motivate them to stagnate and waste time that could have been spent furthering their art.
I actually have been lurking for a while at a forum called Concept Art, a board for professional graphic artists to critique each other's work. These people are mind-blowingly incredible, but they take criticism graciously and strive to improve. A while back, some deviantArt brat came there thinking she was going to make waves with her pornographic fetish manga. Most of them tried to be polite and constructively critique her, and she completely lost her **** and blew up at them. A couple of her fans registered accounts there for the sole purpose of defending her by attacking everyone else.
This is the danger of bringing art online and why so many magicians are cranky, arrogant, miserable bastards. To be a performing artist, you need an ego to begin with. You have to enjoy the applause. It's not a bad thing in itself, but it can quickly create a monster. Especially when you have all these young guys posting their videos on YouTube and receiving praise from people who type with spelling and grammar on a 1st grade level at best. Again, it's the parasite thing.
The internet in general is a terrible place to get real, powerful constructive criticism. Without a community dedicated to criticism, you get only a bunch of drooling throwbacks with so little experience in art that they lack the mechanisms to discern great works from amateurish learning experiences.
A now-inactive blog that is a personal favorite of mine is Your Webcomic is Bad and You Should Feel Bad. The author was a savage critic of the highest magnitude. He went after the writing and art of these comics, and also called bull**** on their creators' bad attitudes. But you could tell he knew what he was talking about. Most of the comic artists responded with bitterness, personal attacks, or callous dismissal. But one young guy actually read the blog, saw the critique of his comic, and commented there to say that he could tell the author was right in his criticisms. After a brief conversation, he discontinued the comic and focused on improving his artwork. That was 2007. I took a peak at the guy's portfolio on his website and while he still has a long way to go, his work has improved by lightyears. That's why criticism is important.
Jokes.
) .