Before you say, “Books can talk. Just get the audio version,” that’s not what we mean. We’re talking about the meaning of each book to you.  

Artifcts co-founder Ellen Goodwin found herself staring up at all her books on the wall and mulling over an article she'd read about decluttering that perplexed and offended her. Are books really trophies of a sort, signifying pride in having traveled through the paper universes held by our shelves? That was what the blog’s author suggested. Clearly this is not how Artifcts co-founder Heather Nickerson feels, since books were a whole category of objects she wishes her mother could have Artifcted.

Arguably, if this Gallup poll from December 2021 is correct, and people are reading their way through fewer books, maybe we are buying them just for show. But couldn't it also be a sign we're aspiring to read more? Certainly, in the old days, personal libraries were more commonly curated as symbols of wealth and knowledge, worldliness, too. Most people could barely afford one book in the original days of the printing press when each run was small, leather binding and embossed impressions expensive, and hand illustrations an art and a luxury.

Today books are cheap to produce, even making self-publishing an obtainable reality for many. Few books in and of themselves are likely valuable, unless you’re a bibliophile and rare books and unique signed copies are your passion. If you add up every book in your collection then, sure, they were expensive, but reselling through secondhand bookstores will get you only pennies on the dollar. 

Maybe then our bookshelves today send different and more practical messages. What do your books say about you or to you?   

The next time you dust off your shelves or undertake a bit of reorganization—rainbow order, by genre then author, alphabetical by title, or some other schema—or maybe find a way to fit in "just one more," take a fresh look at your collection. Pick one book to Artifct because it holds special significance through the scenes it sets, the messages imparted, the journeys undertaken, or maybe something more personal, like the “who” that gave it to you. Share the Artifct with the world—we've shared a few, tagged #realbooksarebest—or a friend to inspire their next read and learn a bit more about you!

Happy Artifcting!

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© 2023 Artifcts, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Even the most ardent Artifcts supporters struggle sometimes to get started. And then they do start and suddenly they are late for meetings because they are enjoying the experience.

If you find yourself stuck, or maybe you think you don’t even have much to Artifct, see if any of these experiences from around the Arti Community get your wheels turning.

No Idea Where to Start.  

One of Artifcts’ own advisory board members confessed, “I joined Artifcts because what you’ve built is amazing. It will change relationships and relationships to ‘stuff’ forever, but I was slow to start Artifcting. I just kept over thinking it! I wanted to start with the most meaningful items to me, but that was delaying me. So, I turned around at my desk and I Artifcted the first interesting thing I saw. It was a dried flower my daughter had picked for me outside her preschool. She’s thoughtful like that – it’s so her. That’s all it took to get going.”

I Needed to Artifct the Most Valuable, Quickly. 

One woman shared, “At first, I went collection by collection and just added a few words about each item so I knew my most valuable possessions were safe in Artifcts. Now I’m going back through my Artifcts to add the stories. I want to be able to say these things, have them here. I’ve also started adding audio and video to some, too.” The "Alberto Lagos Print" Artifct captures the provenance of an item in a big way. Check it out ->

My Adult Daughter Inspires My Artifcting.

A gentleman wrote that his daughter is his Artifcting inspiration. “She Artifcts a lot at night and when I wake up, I have new Artifcts she’s shared with me waiting. They give me ideas about other things I want to Artifct."

Look for the alarm bell on Artifcts.com and the Artifcts mobile app for your newest alerts!

He continued, "This morning my daughter’s Artifct about a purse she bought in Paris reminded me to Artifct my wallet. I bought it in a market in Brazil years ago during a work trip that my wife accompanied me on. She drove me crazy trying to pick the best one. I think of her every time I grab it. I don’t think I’ll ever finish Artifcting. It’s more like a way of life now.” His story reminded us of our #HabitChange story in ARTIcles ->

It Usually Starts with a Story I Tell.

“Sometimes I catch myself telling a funny or very personal story, and realize in that moment, I really need to Artifct it. I’ll add or take a photo to go with it; other times I record a quick voice memo of myself telling the story. I think my family will really appreciate it one day.”

Arti Tip! Use a tag like #LifeStories, #EarliestMemory, #LessonLearned, and #BestTallTales to help quickly find all the stories of yours you love best. Just click the tag to sort your Artifcts!

Don’t Judge: I Made an Outline.

At an Arti Workshop last month, one woman told us that in preparation for starting to Artifct, she made an outline. We were intrigued. “I wanted to capture objects from my personal and work lives, my childhood and adulthood, each of my hobbies (stained glassed, travel, and reading), and about key relationships. I’m working on each of those one at a time. I got the idea from an Artifcts post that talked about going room by room. I just used different life-based groupings!” 

It Was Bulk Trash Day.

Sometimes the act of giving or throwing stuff away is your ultimate motivator. “I dragged this old trunk to the curb that first I had used for sleepaway camp and then my son, too. And I looked at it and realized I needed to Artifct it! It held so many memories. I couldn’t let it go completely.” 

What will you Artifct first? Next? Share with us at Editor@Artifcts.com; we’d love to feature your own stories!

Happy Artifcting!

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Artifcting Starter Resources 

We have all sorts of helpful resources that we want to be sure you know about to take the pressure off and let the fun begin: 

Inspiration Checklists

Videos on YouTube

Artifcting Quick Tips

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© 2023 Artifcts, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Reading time: 3 minutes 
 
Ready for the list? This is from real world experience, based on 1000s of conversations with people just like you.
 
TOP 5 VINTAGE SHOPS IN THE WORLD

1. 1. 1. Your closet 
      2. Your workshop 
      3. Your craft room 
      4. Your attic 
      5. Your storage unit

Maybe not in that order.  And maybe replace "your" with Mom, Dad, Grandma, Grandpa, or Neighbor Alice.

You surely have read the headlines that convey “No one wants your stuff," and yet we know, nostalgia and vintage are all the rage and antiquing a constant. Just because your family may not want large pieces of furniture or a complete set of non-dishwasher safe china, it does not mean they care any less about you, your stories, and specific mementos from your home. 

Your home is truly the best vintage shop in the world. 

Let your children and grandchildren into your closet.

If not them, your “people,” whoever they are! We guarantee that the items they choose they will also keep and use more than any of the stuff you may assume they should have or will want. This is especially true if they know the stories behind the objects.

--> That was the blanket you bought in Peru on your first solo trip abroad.

--> These are vintage t-shirts your grandpa sent to you from his collection.

--> And  that  is a painting of the first car of the first train your great grandfather ran on his railroad.

Sometimes items lurk in our drawers, bins, and closets simply because they give us reassurance just by being there. But imagine setting them free to be enjoyed. You can even set your own return policy or date if it will make you feel better! And you can always see them anytime here on Artifcts if you capture them first!

"Exactly! I’m bound by a return policy. I asked my parents about a music box that I have always loved and was just collecting dust in an upstairs closet. They agreed I could take it under one condition: At any time they might ask me to bring it back. Deal!" recalled Artifcts co-founder Ellen Goodwin. "I'm still working on getting them to let me borrow a couple of old photos, too."

Sure, it is made of steel, but you carry anything as light as 10 lbs. around the world as a reporter, author, or even war-time journalist, and it's prone to anything from minor scratches to irreparable damage. That's what makes finding typewriters like this one in great condition so challenging 100 years later. 

It might be strange to call a typewriter beautiful, but if a car of steel can be beautiful, why not a typewriter?

Mark Twain called typewriters “curiosity-breeding little jokers”—his correspondents were so curious as to be distracted by the fact he had and used a typewriter (learn more in this story from Heritage Auctions)—but my typewriter is petite, totally functional, and emblematic of artistically inspired ingenuity fit to purpose. And isn't it funny that one of its taglines back in the twenties was "personal writing machine?" And what would they say now about modern mobile phones? Or ChatGPT for that matter? 

I bought and wrapped this gift for myself as a congratulations for the creation of Artifcts. I waited to buy until I hit that moment when I knew we were on the doorstep. The moment arrived... a corona for a crowning moment. 

Now I can enjoy two clicks I love: that sound of clipping into my peddles on a road bike and the tapping of the corona’s keys.

What antiques take up positions of pride in your home? Artifct and share today, National Cherish an Antique Day.

Happy Artifcting! 

__________________

BONUS! For all of you typewriter enthusiasts 

I know you covet the details about the typewriters, like the machine’s serial codes. I can confirm my serial number and carriage number do not match.

I purchased my typewriter from the most amazing, knowledgeable, and gracious shop on Etsy @Findstein who even pointed me to print and online resources so that I could learn about and maintain my Corona, including purchasing a new 1/2˝ universal ink ribbon 300 hundred pages or so from now, which has to be re-spun by hand. Here are the references, if you’re in the market: 

• • • https://site.xavier.edu/polt/typewriters/ 
    • https://site.xavier.edu/polt/typewriters/tw-restoration.html
    • site.xavier.edu/polt/typewriters/Corona3-1920.pdf

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© 2023 Artifcts, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

We want to acknowledge the elephant in the room: ChatGPT. Created by a company called OpenAI, it’s only been publicly available for a few months and is an unavoidable topic. You might think it’s not for you, you’ll ignore the bold headlines, go on with life. Or you might have this nagging feeling that you’re missing out on something. 

Here at Artifcts, we’re excited about the promise the constant evolution of Artificial Intelligence, this time in the form of ChatGPT, holds for us all. SPOILER ALERT: We won’t be introducing it, even in a playful experimental version, at Artifcts yet for you to capture your stories and memories. Here’s why. 

_____________________

Let’s imagine your grandfather was, gasp, imperfectly perfect. He served his country during WWII, was a dedicated civil service employee after the war, and fiercely protective of his family of four. And yet … he told rude jokes, harbored controversial views, and was blustery in his judgements he shared with no filter. 

Now imagine you have a piece of his military uniform you want to Artifct. You tell ChatGPT that you were at your grandfather’s house, cleaning it out as he downsized, and he gave you the hat. 

ChatGPT nearly instantly can give you a story, “With tears in his eyes, my grandpa placed the hat in my hands…” Hold on! TEARS in his eyes? Um, nope, not my grandpa. With a whole story written like this, I know I’m better off starting over. No machine knows his personality. No machine knows the words he said to me. No machine knows how I feel when I’m with him, the smells that remind me of him, the events of that day together that precipitated him giving me the hat. 

This sort of output from ChatGPT is what one person interviewed by 60 Minutes in a segment, “Who is minding the chatbots?” called authoritative bull****: “[ChatGPT] blends the truth and falsities so finely together that unless you are a real expert, you do not know.” It’s a pathway to your own personal alternative histories. Much like reading historical fiction, it takes a cautious reader to parse out the fact and the fiction. Watch the interview on 60 Minutes > 

We need to take ChatGPT’s stated limitations seriously and play with it to experience those limitations for ourselves. 

ChatGPT could also respond to this same scenario with a more straightforward, leaning toward prescriptive output. Here’s an example based on this scenario: 

That’s better in some ways. Still might be offbeat for how I view ‘stuff,’ but at least we’ve ditched the tears. The bottom line is that you simply can't outsource your memories and stories in general, nevermind, to AI.

Where to for ChatGPT and Artifcts? 

One area where ChatGPT could, as is, apply to the Artifcts our Arti Community Members are creating is in the factual elements some people include in their Artifcts. The history of an artist, a designer, a manufacturer. The history of a world or community event. If you want to share who H. Stern was in life within your Artifct, ChatGPT can help.  

Of course, since ChatGPT requires a personal login, and will remember and learn from what you type into it, you can also easily build its knowledge of your life to the point where it will remember where you were on the date you received that present from your mom. Items you own and should probably Artifct. It could remember stories you shared about people in your life. Emails you exchanged, videos you posted, searches you made; so much data for a tool like ChatGPT. So, yes, it might someday know that Grandpa was a grumpy old man late in life and recast stories for you in that light to rapidly create Artifcts with fairly accurate descriptive details, but at what cost? 

The privacy risks are not yet fully understood. And that’s a difficult compromise to make when in an Artifct, you need only add a few words to capture the essence of why you have or keep an object in your life. 

For now, because we value and place great importance on your story, one that often is deeply personal, we cannot rely on a technology that has proven to have its challenges to be your source of truth. We’ll be watching and waiting, maybe even playing still behind the scenes, to understand ChatGPT’s potential for Artifcts along with its potential risks. 

_____________________

What's your experience with ChatGPT? What are you hopes for what it will offer the world? We'd love to hear from you at Editor@Artifcts.com.

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© 2023 Artifcts, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Here you'll find a simple listing of a wide-ranging and growing collection of books, with 'stuff' as the unify theme. They were recommendations from others, background research, continuing education, and sometimes just straight up fun. Now and then we may post a link to an online article, podcast, or similar, but given how impermanent those links can be and the frustration paywalls can present, we'll mostly stick to books.

We use tags to organize them for your quick scanning. Click any image below to review the book over on the author’s site, Amazon, or elsewhere. 

What are you reading? Share with Editor@Artifcts.com and we'll check it out.

(Please note: These books are literally on our nightstands, coffee tables, e-readers, and bookshelves. We are not paid to list publications here.)

THE ARTIFCTS BOOKSHELF

	The Hare with Amber Eyes: A Hidden Inheritance By Edmund de Waal, Jan. 2010 FICTION, COLLECTIBLES
	The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue By V. E. Schwab, Oct. 2021 FICTION, ARTS
	Uncommon Type By Tom Hanks, Sep. 2018 FICTION, COLLECTIONS
	What to Do with Everything You Own to Leave the Legacy You Want By Marni Jameson, Jun. 2021 NONFICTION, INSTRUCTIONAL
	108 Beloved Objects: Letting Go of Stuff, Keeping Our Stories By Jeff Greenwald, Aug. 2021 NONFICTION, THE EVERYDAY
	The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning By Margareta Magnusson, Jan. 2018 NONFICTION, INSTRUCTIONAL, THE EVERYDAY
	The Dig By John Preston, Apr. 2016 FICTION, HISTORY
	goodbye, things: The New Japanese Minimalism By Fumio Sasaki, Apr. 2017 NONFICTION, THE EVERYDAY
	Joyful: The Surprising Power of Ordinary Things to Create Extraordinary Happiness By Ingrid Fetell Lee, Sep. 2018 NONFICTION, THE EVERYDAY, INSTRUCTIONAL
	Keep the Memories, Lose the Stuff: Declutter, Downsize, and Move Forward with Your Life By Matt Paxton, Feb. 2022 NONFICTION, INSTRUCTIONAL
	Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things By Gail Steketee, Jan. 2011 NONFICTION
	The Book of Form and Emptiness By Ruth Ozeki, Jun. 2022 FICTION, MENTAL HEALTH
	What We Keep: 150 People Share the One Object that Brings Them Joy, Magic, and Meaning By Bill Shapiro & Naomi Wax, Sept. 2018 NONFICTION, COLLECTIBLES, TRAVEL
	Taste: My Life Through Food By Stanley Tucci, Oct. 2021 NONFICTION, RECIPES, TRAVEL
	A Gentleman in Moscow: A Novel By Amor Towles, Mar. 2019 FICTION, HISTORY
	Minimalism for Families: Practical Minimalism Strategies to Simplify Your Home and Life By Zoë Kim, Oct. 2017 NONFICTION, INSTRUCTIONAL