{"id":7149,"date":"2026-06-09T04:24:29","date_gmt":"2026-06-09T11:24:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/i-wish-people-would-stop-being-so-fake\/"},"modified":"2026-06-09T04:24:29","modified_gmt":"2026-06-09T11:24:29","slug":"i-wish-people-would-stop-being-so-fake","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/i-wish-people-would-stop-being-so-fake\/","title":{"rendered":"I wish people would stop being so fake"},"content":{"rendered":"

Poseurs are getting out of control. Like, it is becoming a very annoying situation.<\/p>\n

A woman that only just recently "started reading books" looks around, sees that book people spend a lot of money, and decided to start a book related business. She likely heard about booktok and thought that was her bag.<\/p>\n

So she started a monthly subscription service.<\/p>\n

She looked around, grabbed some popular ideas, and started producing bookmarks. Because she’s not a reader, so she doesn’t understand how readers work.<\/p>\n

Seriously: Readers will buy a handful of good looking bookmarks with the intention of using them, but somehow they’ll end up using a folded post-it note as a bookmark. And they’ll use that same post-it note for the next 6 books, then not be able to find any of those fancy bookmarks they spent actual money on.<\/p>\n

So, from my point of view, I think a monthly subscription box that delivers curated bookmarks to your home is a pretty dead end business long-term.<\/p>\n

The fact that she was able to find a bit of a niche and that she was making enough money that she was able to turn it into her job, that was very lucky. She should have been grateful. She should have kept making her little bookmarks and taking pictures of them and posting positive content. She could have probably kept on keeping on for at least another year or two before she ran out of customers.<\/p>\n

But instead she CHOSE to announce that she had trademarked a fairly popular hashtag and that everyone that had ever used it on any kind of merchandise had to stop immediately.<\/p>\n

She basically destroyed her own little business. And I don’t feel bad about it, because that was a seriously dick move. And I have no sympathy for dicktims.<\/p>\n

Same with the Australian couple and their now failing athletic wear company.<\/p>\n

It’s not our fault they didn’t do any real marketing research before starting their business. If they had, they would have realized that athletic wear is a very saturated market. Their expensive yet cheaply manufactured gym clothes are not necessary to the public. So their bit of bad PR backlash destroyed their company. And crying about it on main is not going to turn things around for them.<\/p>\n

I’m just tired of people that aren’t part of a community, seeing a community, and then trying to use that community for their own profit.<\/p>\n

"I only started reading books last week, so now you should buy my products because I’m part of the book community."–My dude. And then they hold up some random ass book and we’re all supposed to be like, "Wow, one of us! One of us!" and hug them into our hearts.<\/p>\n

There are so many different book genres!<\/p>\n

You can’t just be like "I like book. We friends now."<\/p>\n

Is it a horror book? A romance book? A fantasy book? A science fiction book? A murder mystery book? A philosophy book? A comic book? Naw. It’s just some random ass book she "just started reading," so now she gets to be President of Books.<\/p>\n

Fuck off with that.<\/p>\n

It’s the same deal with the non-authors\/non-readers suddenly realizing that they can produce 300 books a day with the use of AI. They’re just so into the cash grab that they never pause to consider whether what they’re doing is ruining society.<\/p>\n

Assholes gonna asshole.<\/p>\n

~Harper Kingsley<\/p>\n

https:\/\/paypal.me\/harperkingsley<\/a>.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/patreon.com\/harperkingsley<\/a>.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/ko-fi.com\/harperwck<\/a>.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/c\/HarperKingsley<\/a>.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/amazon.com\/shop\/harperkingsley0<\/a>.
\nhttps:\/\/www.harperkingsley.net\/blog<\/a>.
\nhttps:\/\/kimichee.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/harperkingsley.bsky.social<\/a>.
\nhttps:\/\/www.smashwords.com\/profile\/view\/HarperKingsley<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Poseurs are getting out of control. Like, it is becoming a very annoying situation. A woman that only just recently "started reading books" looks around, sees that book people spend a lot of money, and decided to start a book related business. She likely heard about booktok and thought that was her bag. So she…<\/p>\n Read More<\/span> I wish people would stop being so fake<\/span><\/a>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"Layout":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["entry","author-harperkingsley0-0","post-7149","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2pPoL-1Rj","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":4279,"url":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/postal-driver-has-failed-me-again\/","url_meta":{"origin":7149,"position":0},"title":"Our postal driver has failed me again; Drawing","author":"Harper Kingsley","date":"March 17, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"I'm so mad. Our postal driver refuses to deliver packages to us -- leaving a note saying we have to go to the post office to get what we ordered. Which is annoying enough, but what really pisses me off is that we always have to wait until the next\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Artwork"","block_context":{"text":"Artwork","link":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/category\/artwork\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"ink drawing ft flower blossoms, beads","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.harperkingsley.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/dragonhearts.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.harperkingsley.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/dragonhearts.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.harperkingsley.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/dragonhearts.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.harperkingsley.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/dragonhearts.jpg?resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2579,"url":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/does-this-seem-like-a-fair-deal-to-artists\/","url_meta":{"origin":7149,"position":1},"title":"Does this seem like a fair deal to artists?","author":"Harper Kingsley","date":"July 24, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"I've been trying to turn this writing thing into some kind of income, but it's slow going and there's a few things I want that I simply cannot afford out of pocket. And that's not just food *ba-dump-bump* I've been lucky to find an awesome publisher (Less Than Three Press)\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Mailed"","block_context":{"text":"Mailed","link":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/category\/kindled\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6724,"url":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/notes-4\/","url_meta":{"origin":7149,"position":2},"title":"notes","author":"Harper Kingsley","date":"March 21, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"Wow. People have bought my books from Smashwords. Thank you. \ud83d\ude4f\ud83c\udffc You don't understand the spell I'm under to these Chinese novels. (It's some kind of obsessive disorder \ud83e\udd37\ud83c\udffb\u200d\u2640\ufe0f. Once I start something, I've got to finish, even if it completely derails everything else.) The thing about the Chinese novels\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 1 comment","block_context":{"text":"With 1 comment","link":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/notes-4\/#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":167,"url":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/echo-tpb\/","url_meta":{"origin":7149,"position":3},"title":"Echo TPB","author":"Harper Kingsley","date":"December 1, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Wow, \"Echo\" has been a really big hit. I am honestly surprised. It is set to be included in \"The Brownstone Diaries,\" which will also contain \"Bastian,\" \"Topping,\" and the tentatively titled \"Ai-Go\" which will be released probably around mid-2012. Each story will be released separately as ebooks, since they\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Self-Publishing"","block_context":{"text":"Self-Publishing","link":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/category\/self-publishing\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4829,"url":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/2020-03-27-thoughts-on-things-allies-enemies\/","url_meta":{"origin":7149,"position":4},"title":"2020-03-27: Thoughts on Things; Allies & Enemies","author":"Harper Kingsley","date":"March 27, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"So, because of \"Allies & Enemies\" on Smashwords, they sent a bunch of my old stuff for a Premium Catalogue check, which was like a reminder that \"Oh, these things exist.\" I think I'm going to rewrite my Of Blood-universe stuff. I know I was super obsessed with the vampires\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Mailed"","block_context":{"text":"Mailed","link":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/category\/kindled\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6753,"url":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/things-i-question-about-this-life-pt-1\/","url_meta":{"origin":7149,"position":5},"title":"Things I question about this life (pt 1)","author":"Harper Kingsley","date":"July 3, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"Things I question about this life Do I need to replace metal stylus tips? I have a Kindle Scribe, as I have previous bragged about. It is one of my favorite devices--though I do use my phone more. But that's a necessary part of modern life. It's my mobile Internet\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7149","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7149"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7149\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harperkingsley.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}