The learning curve of a non tech native later in life uni human, has been steep in my experience. Last week, I observed though creating a video of me attempting to tie Shibari knots and posting said content to Youtube that I can do neither. Upon further investigation, I found that Youtube had SO much Shibari content so like my mishaps with Midjourney, I am learning there must be a dictionary of banned words across different platforms. This week took my tentative first step and created my first piece of content on instagram – how to do a Column Tie which is a foundational tie in Shibari.
Perspective
Entering a well trodden arena even though it’s a niche (which can be wildly expansive) feels like walking into a bar to have a drink alone. I’m not even sure the word imposter syndrome covers it. It feels like the whole internet is broaching kink subcultures and normalising this phenomena in temporary online spaces. Perspectives in this niche include teaching, expressing gender & indentity, shifting body stereotypes and confronting platform guidelines. How the female nipple is still banned is baffling to me after exploring this niche.
Problematising
Creating content presents in own challenges, albeit very mundane ones. Good lighting (did I just buy a ring light), camera angles, pace, editing, music and the decision on where to start have all been considerations this week. Hence my decision to leap in with a very vanilla first step which offers authenticity as I am new to this skill and am flipping my interaction with this niece.
One of the challenges of studying experience is that experience is often difficult to articulate, and so attempts to understand and interpret its meaning and significance rely on the ethnographer’s immersion in sites of other people’s experiences. It also depends on identifying concepts associated with sensory or emotional experiences that facilitate the discussion of experience with research participants and academics.
Approaching
As my own data collection tool, I have been observing that the major players in this niche on Instagram are firstly, prolific posters and that they have an agenda that is signified by their profile pictures. Clockwise from top left, this account seeks engagement in their tutorial links, the second is a specialist, artistically expressing complex ties. The third is directing traffic to their Only Fans and the fourth is a generalist, hitting on multiple facets on the niche.
Conceptualising
Lets take a look at these accounts origin stories.
Ref: Pink et.al Researching Experience 2016, in digital ethnography: principles and practice, Sage.
Jane BAMBI Drew 
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