💛#PortfolioDay News - Issue #20
An important update! So long, Twitter.
Happy New Year everyone! The next #PortfolioDay is coming up real soon! How soon? Find out after this important message!
Bye Bye, Birdie.
#PortfolioDay’s base of operations is moving to Bluesky!
To keep it brief: Twitter just isn’t what it used to be. I’ve written in the past about the struggles of keeping up with the platform. It changes at the whim of a single person, usually to the detriment of artists and anyone who relies on the platform to connect to their community. A recent terms of service change—which explicitly gives the platform the right to feed user uploaded data to Grok—is the final nail in the coffin for me as the person who runs #PortfolioDay and as a creator myself. Plus, president Musk has said himself that hashtags are “ugly” and that the “system doesn’t need them anymore.” So fine. Let’s give him what he wants!
I’ll also be abstaining from actively running #PortfolioDay on Meta products like Instagram, Threads and Facebook at this time for similar reasons. Last year, Meta denied users the option to opt out of training their AI and recently decided to pollute their app with fake AI users. The unethical scraping aside, if you thought your reach was bad or getting worse on IG, a wave of new, fake users will likely worsen the odds of getting seen on that platform.
So what does this mean for you? If you still want to use Twitter/X/Instagram/Facebook, by all means do so! The whole point of #PortfolioDay is to help people find each other and get work; whatever strategy you want to employ for yourself is valid. The Twitter @PortfolioDay account will no longer be updated but will remain for now as an archive. Same goes for the @portfolioday_ Instagram account. I will leave room to reevaluate these decisions in the future should the platforms have a change of heart… and a change in leadership.
To be clear, nowhere online is safe from unethical scraping (which is why you should always always Nightshade and Glaze your images). It just feels extra bad supporting a platform that goes out of its way to spit in their user’s faces.
For updates about future #PortfolioDays, subscribe to this newsletter, follow the PortfolioDay account on Bluesky, and please tell a friend! A platform is only as good as its users, so come join us and let’s look forward to a feed full of art with fewer bots. 💛
Preparing for #PortfolioDay!
Thanks for sticking with me. The next #PortfolioDay is Tuesday, January 14th, 2025! If you’re a creative looking for work, here’s how you can participate:
Step 1. Compose your best work into a single image.
Step 2. Make sure your work is web-sized and watermarked!
Step 3. Run your piece through Nightshade.
Step 4. Run your piece through Glaze.
Then for the written portion of your post include the following info:
A short intro.
The kind of work you’re looking for.
Relevant experience.
A link to your portfolio.
A way to contact you.
The #PortfolioDay hashtag.
May 2025 be good to you all dear readers! Best of luck!💛