Quitting engineering to pursue art full-time

> “If you’re getting hate, that’s a good sign.” ...In the past, he used to engage with them...Now, he doesn’t get too involved.

Did he mean to say "passion" in this case? How is hate a "good" sign of engagement? If someone has an opinion and is willing to share it with me, I'd hope they could do it in a constructive way (but I wouldn't call that "hate", and this is the Internet he's talking about).

Imagine being surrounded by 100 people hurling insults at you, telling you you're no good and your product / service / art sucks. How is that a "good sign"?

Edit: Maybe the assumption is "For every hater, I find 10 people that _do_ like it", so the realization is that "I'm reaching people," and the underlying prayer is that "And hopefully, they're not _all_ haters."

It’s the unrecognized but genius artist fallacy: many great artists were unknown and poor when they did their best work.

Therefore, since I am unknown and poor, I must be a great artist.

I think the argument here is that hate (which is a subset of passion) is not the purely negative thing that we immediately think it is. Especially in art. When people _hate_ art the art has served its purpose. Art's intention (to paint with heinously broad strokes) is to create emotions and drive thoughts. That's a very different intention than a product/service and they shouldn't be compared in that sense.

But also:

> Afterall, it’s good for engagement and the Instagram algorithm.

It's what artists do to lie to themselves so their entire life doesn't seem like a waste of time. I went from music to tech. Art is full of completely delusional hacks.

I mean, that does sound like something someone who switched from music to tech would say, but it’s also a little true.

I assure you that your life in tech, waging for a boss, is a waste of time.

Nah, steady paycheck, health insurance, don't need roommates, can afford the nicer things in life. Gigging and touring is fun in your 20s, but starts to drain you. This is much better.

I made a career out of it and made it to regional status. If you want to pay your bills, you need to hit national level or teach music. It's a fucking grind and you naturally age out.

Arts intention is whatever the artist makes it out to be. If an artist wants their work to be loved, not hated... Well then this doesn't really apply does it

Tech is also full of delusional hacks. You find them everywhere. Delusional hack artists are more fun.

Your edit is the goal, it's why content creators have a new influx in views after getting "canceled". People who forgot the youtuber existed before cancellation come back to see what's going on.

In this case, hate is attention that helps algorithms. It's why shortform media is usually inflammatory, you get more engagement out of it.

Hate and other powerful emotions are a good sign, they can promote you to people who don't hate you.

That’s not it at all. Almost all art is just quietly ignored. If people have strong feelings about your art then that’s a huge win.

I've been watching one of my friends keep on pushing at the grind and it looks super gruelling, he's been drifting from programming to running the mixer board at a lot of local shows and it's impossible to hook up with him to hang out any more. I dunno how he does it.

Even if the artist wrote their own citation of a work saying "I intended it for it to be loved, and that's the only correct interpretation", it's still not correct if one subscribes, as I do, to the literary-focused "the death of the author('s authority)" once they release it. They really don't get a say how it's taken once someone else perceives it.

I think the parent's free use of 'hate' stands in for a conflict in emotion and interpretation this way, and less it being completely despised or loathed.

Does the artist control that outcome, though? The clear communication of their art's intention? Whether their work is loved or hated?

If you're creating art because you enjoy doing it, and if you're performing / putting it on display because you think it has value and others might enjoy it too, then I can't think of any reaction other than love and encouragement (implicitly via purchasing or explicitly via encouragement) that would suffice in keeping one motivated to share it with others.

Now, amidst any hate I might ask myself "Did I do the absolute best according to my ability? Is there anything else I can improve?" From this perspective, hate is amazing as fuel because it's an effective way to eliminate your perceived faults (assuming you take it personally, which I'd wager most artists do).

I think this is just a "content creator" realizing, but not admitting to themselves, that the algorithms that spread their content (that they're banking on to get paid) have "figured out" that humans' strong negative emotional reaction has a higher engagement potential than strong positive reactions, thus those who generate the most hate are those who get seen/paid the most.

If you’re selling a product or service promising objective utility for a user, maybe. Art is just...there, though. Maybe games can promise functionality that a consumer can expect to have working, but most mediums don’t.

Without objective functionality, “Haters” in an art context only have one thing to be vitriolic about - their own subjective aesthetic taste. Thus their words cannot contain anything of value to the artist.

In the movie biography of Tom Wolfe (RIP), his daughter tells of reading some of the vicious things people said about him, and asking him if this didn't bother him.

He said, "No, of course not. You're nobody 'til somebody hates you."

So if you despised them first and said something that touched them that deeply, I could see considering that a success.

I'd rather hang with people that have a rudimentary idea of logic than talk about karma, auras, moon phases, vibrations, and energy. It seems to come from a good place but it's fucking exhausting.

You and I know very different artists. "Logical" people have their woo, too.

Hey good job man.