Official Luthiers Forum!

I have been getting a steady stream of links from the boys... most to guitar repair and modification groups on Facebook. Super-depressing. The common thread is just how many really bad answers are offered for consideration, and how the few good, complete, knowledgeable answers are discounted or hated on by those offering bad advice. While no new posts between Friday and this AM here at OLF lead me to believe that we may be on our last legs, at least we can take some comfort in the fact that we never generated hundreds of garbage posts suggesting that the OP further damage his or her guitar to 'repair' it.

One that sticks in my mind was a guitar that has what is a non-uncommon 'rising /poorly fitted' press-in tuner bushing issue (Epi Masterbilt with retrofitted Waverly tuners). The most common advice was to use a hex wrench to tighten the bushing. The second most common piece of advice was to get rid of those crappy Wavs that must have bent string posts, etc. Seriously. Despite a great bit of evidentiary photography by the OP clearly showing the unambiguous nature of the tuners and the rising splined bushings. When a response was offered that covered both issue and fix, one of the Greek chorus members proclaimed that everyone was entitled to their opinion, however misguided... clearly implying that bad advice and good advice should be considered of equal value.

The take-way? Verification that Mr. Judge's 'Idiocracy' was the most prescient piece of filmmaking of the early part of this century.

Thinly veiled threat follows: start posting, gentle people, or I may be tempted to start cross-linking really bad Facebook group posts for your consideration... and there are a LOT of them.

Amen. But do you really think uninformed opinions on guitar repair techniques, posted on Facebook, constitute the most compelling evidence that we are starting to resemble that dystopia? I see more solid proof in other places.

It would violate OLF protocol for me to elaborate.

I’ll try to post more often. Unfortunately, I am going through a two year laborious process of moving to Louisville (only about halfway done), and I won’t have a working shop again until sometime in 2027. So, any posts will have to talk about the past and future, not the present.

In fairness, I did qualify my statement as being limited to filmmaking rather than the broader ongoing geo-political and societal scrum.

As excuses go, an extended relocation saga might well warrant a hall pass. Good luck with the move!

The Idiocracy is certainly out there. People can be unbelievably gullible.

As far as posting goes, I haven’t been doing anything very interesting. Today’s task is to finish the rebuild of the electronics of a 60’s lawsuit Univox.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

I think increasing posting here is only part of the battle. I see a good deal of what you describe on facebook. Posting here won't fix the problem that facebook is an easy source for people to go to without realizing the advice is bad. They don't know places exist where the advice and techniques are supported by real world experience and challenged by others actually doing the work.

Facebook (and similar groups) are filled with people just repeating bad advice they have read and a snowball effect happens. The prevailing opinion is the prevailing opinion because everyone reads it, then repeats it. It is nearly impossible to tell who actually has real world experience, and even some of the people who have done these things, don't have enough work out there for long enough to know that it eventually failed. . .

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

The internet has enabled the spread of stupidity, when before all they had available was word of mouth. So much for the "Information Age".

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

Woodie,
First, I want to thank you for your long history of intelligent, reasoned and often deeply thought-provoking contributions to OLF.

My perspective comes as an amateur, non-player who stumbled into building by accident and found it to be one of the most satisfying, challenging, and mentally stimulating, as well as the most difficult to do well pursuits of my 74 years.

Although I no longer actively build due to my wife’s severe wood allergies, I log in daily in hope of finding remnants of the knowledge, problem solving, humor and camaraderie that made OLF and MIMF such unique homes to what was the golden age of lutherie.
Guilty, I seldom post, my professional life ingrained a belief in “first, do no harm”

The magnet drawing me here has always been the body of knowledgeable, experienced luthiers that, perhaps in gratitude for what they learned from others, felt the obligation to pay it forward using the forum(s) as their vehicle, and sharing what they’ve learned, as their mentors shared with them.
Their body of knowledge is what drew those of us less experienced to the forums, and grew the give and take that made them the communities we knew.

We, as their “apprentices”, are still here. Still hoping for a return of the forum as it used to be. The need for sound advice is still here.

What’s missing is the participation of the more experienced and professional builders paying it forward.

Whether due to time constraints, personal dust ups within the forums, or a general conceit of being above the bother of sharing what they’ve gained (largely from others), their absence is the deafening silence heard here and at MIMF. I suggest the vacuum their abdication has created is the root etiology of this forum’s current state, as well as the rise of, as you so aptly put it, the idiocracy

It seems impossible to overestimate the damage to be done, in any field, by those confident in their misinformation, and given a clear field in which to sow it. Unless those with actual knowledge step up, this is our reality.

Again, I sincerely appreciate your efforts to shine light for the rest of us, and somewhat desperately hope you continue to do so.
Perhaps, on your next visit to “the Boys” you might find a way to induce them to pause and consider donating an hour or two a week (perhaps from their Facebook budget?) to join you in your efforts to resuscitate the forum? Surely, they did not amass their knowledge from thin air, and possibly see paying it forward as justifiable.

Perhaps they can be convinced that charity begins at home…?

It's pretty depressing to see what the overall direction of the internet has become. Used to be a search engine took you to sites built by actual people with knowledge and love of subject matter. That is almost extinct these days. I think the last bastions of good information are subject specific forums.

90% of the rest is generated by monetized clickbait sites where dollars are the primary goal, or personality driven "likes". Now, whole sites appear to be AI generated by robots using other AI sites for "information". Vetting of facts no longer matters. AI generated answers to questions seems to be running about 50% BS or at least bad info. I only go to WIKI by accident anymore where even "science" is so heavily politicized it is too disgusting to sort thru.

It is just getting harder and harder to find real information of value.

As an example our coffee pot died so did a bunch of searches for the best replacement. Tons of "best 10" or "best 6" all with links to Amzon and every buy sending change to the posters. Most recommended the same low quality pots. Looked up Coffee Forums and found people who love a good cup and many hung their mugs on a few makers that produced a cup worth drinking. That's where the good info came from. Maybe there will be a resurgence in subject specific forums, I hope so!

When I fire up the computer in the morning after clicking the email tab, the next is always the OLF. Long live the OLF, not perfect, but I hold out hope for a rise in activity -- including from me. While building instruments is one of my most fun hobbies, it's a part time gig so comes in spurts. I do have an interesting acoustic on the bench I'll post about when we get some bad weather and outdoor activities move inside.

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Brian R, Wood Mechanic
N8ZED

Good one Chris! Summed up my half pager in a sentence!

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Brian R, Wood Mechanic
N8ZED

Sometimes, you see a post that says everything you feel (and put so nicely), so much so, that you wish you wrote it yourself. . .

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

Personally I don’t feel the need to feed the forum like it’s a tamagotchi. I just need it to be here for when I got a question that needs answering.

Don, I feel for ya. Moving SUCKS. 2 1/2 years later everything is still on top of everything and not a single bench built. The guitars coming out are on point though…

Not many folks can convey a message like Woodie

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Say what you do, Do what you say.

I don’t remember anyone saying it would be “good” information.

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Say what you do, Do what you say.

Did they imply it, or simply let us think it? (and didn't correct us)

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

I mean, it isn't really the internet's fault. It is just more efficient at proliferating our human flawed thoughts. Before the internet, bad info was accepted part of life. It often followed the phrase "they say. . .". Sadly, now we have the ability to double check "they say" but we rarely put the effort into honestly doing that. Instead we just have digital "they." AI search returns are hilarious and sad. They often just instantly compile the most frequently repeated misinformation loop on the net. This further reinforces the loop.

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

I suspect this is likely a good thing...

The Facebook lutherie sites are a riot. Good post Woodie!

I check the OLF almost every day. Try to comment if I have something constructive to add but I am in my 80s now and slowing down a bit. I am not really too interested in getting involved with other forums. Hope this one stays alive a while longer.

We need a thread on doing lutherie with bad eyes, hearing aids, and recent memory loss. (Where the hell is that nut file I just used or what’s that strange guitar case in the rack-hmmm it has a tag- - oh yeah I was supposed to do a setup on that one)

You keep things interesting here Woodie.

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It's not what you don't know that hurts you, it's what you do know that's wrong.

30 years ago, I wrote and recorded a whole song just so I could sing the line “Information isn’t knowledge.”

Woodie’s post was provocative enough to draw people out and show that they’re still here. So, we ain’t dead, yet.

Actually ,
I find facebook great entertainment....

What I really enjoy most is the 2 or 3 young (pretty) "women" who wax poetic about building guitars and seem to post other peoples instruments (with no credit given) ..Then,in the comments aside from the many people fawning over their "skill" questions are asked-thousnds of questions...but never, ever is there an answer-nary a one...Why? because I am convinced they are bots there for the click bait advertising...From time to time I will chime in and say something like" you realize that this "person" does not exist"

But for me facebook is my bread and butter...a necessary evil I pretty much sell all my guitars to by frequenting the various chat rooms-I tailor my posts to whatever guitar I an selling at the time, I have a system.

I am occasionally on the receiving end of the stupid advice/comments when I post some of my experimental guitars...Comment like "that will never work" in regards to my double guitar
and "why do you think they don't use spruce for backs and sides" for my all spruce guitar" both of which sounded great..

I like the leveraging of the aggregated net-negative/individualized net-positive. Lemon... lemonade.

Sorry, my brain just locked up trying to figure that one out....
But, I think I get the gist of it.

In re-reading my sentence, it sounds perilously like a particularly cumbersome back-cover review blurb from one of those annoying self-help books... my apologies! And your reply, Mr. Goodman... what a lovely, clever way to tell someone they are not making all that much sense. I shall have to insist that you allow me to borrow that for reuse... perhaps on Facebook?

Facebook didn’t actually murder good advice, it just made it harder to find. The good advice is still out there, the problem is that you have to have at least some basic level of knowledge and understanding already to sort wheat from chaff.

Facebook reminds me of my grade school play ground.
Some folks were full of it others you could trust.
Ya just got to figure out who to listen too.

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Say what you do, Do what you say.

I agree and think that is the biggest problem. The cast of characters is just too vast; it is too tedious to pick through and try to make that call on any one person. It is much easier to tell whom to listen to if you already have a good understanding of what advice is good.

On the playground you got face to face feedback on who in your grade of 60 kids was a jerk and who was reliable. Now imagine if your playground had 10,000 random kids and you only passed notes to each other by the slide.

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.