https://mcrenegadescots.weebly.com/blog/archives/03-2015 explains the rationale behind it and why we chose to become an ‘early adopter’ of the dot scot domain.
And now, three years on, we’re jumping ship. Here’s the ‘story’ behind the decision.
We would have expected that after 3 years the domain name cost would have settled to something more reasonable. Instead of that, it’s gone up. This year we were going to be charged £39.99 to renew. To add insult to injury, there’s been a flurry of adverts telling folk that you can get a NEW dotscot domain name for £10 for the first year. Way to go in keeping your existing customers happy? I don’t like ‘pusher’ tactics. I prefer the notion of rewarding loyalty than giving great ‘offers’ to suck in more users.
I understand that if I shopped around it might be possible to shift where we buy the domain from and the price might reduce to £23.99 (plus vat) which puts it back to what it was when we first got it. But this would mean all kinds of hassle changing all kinds of things and hey, is it really worth it. It all smacks far too much of the marketplace. The truth is, a domain extension is just a ‘commodity.’ And much like Scotland post abortive Indy Ref dotscot feels to me like a ‘brand gone bad.’
Over the last couple of years there’s nothing that’s convinced me that we are any closer to independence and that’s largely (in my opinion) because of my fellow countrymen and women. It may not be that we all believe ourselves to be too wee, too poor and too stupid, but rather that we are too cowardly and too greedy to live the ‘dream’ we still sing about at sports matches. ‘To be a nation again?’ Behave. That ship sailed. There’s nothing left but the corporate vultures trying to make a killing out of spread betting on ‘brand’ Scotland. And sadly, I feel that dotscot is part of this.
Domain names, like telephone numbers, and email addresses become personal and it’s a hassle to change them. We all know that. Including those who tempt us in in the first place. It all smacks of drug pushers and addiction to me – ah, now I read something quite different into Trainspotting than I ever did before. There is a Scottish realism to it but it’s not something I’m proud of in any of its manifestations. It’s not my Scotland. I have become painfully aware in the past three and a half years that my Scotland is not the Scotland of the 21st century. I’m out of step because I’ve been left behind singing songs of community in a country that is obsessed with economics and aspiration over equality. A country where words do definitely not match deeds. It’s a corporate jungle out there and Scotland is first and foremost a brand.
A country that does not vote for independence doesn’t deserve independence. And let’s face it, we’ve got what we deserved.
Catalonia took another path. Yes their future doesn’t look bright, but at least they showed some cojones. We remain timorous cowering beasties. And is our future any brighter? I predict that post Brexit things will be even worse than post non Indy Ref.
Forgive my predictions of doom but ‘the game’s a bogie’ is certainly true. All around there is fighting about what the Scots language is/isn’t/should be and it feels like a certain degree of implosion is inevitable. No longer do I hear the Proclaimers ‘Linwood no More.’ I just hear ‘Indy no more.’ The rage is, if not gone, well hidden under the ‘going forwards’ aspiration of those who deny that they are a cultural elite. Scotland reads to me like a pitiful sham. Most people just don’t give a bugger, ‘to be honest.’ Clichés and tweets are the reality and order of the day.
And here at McRenegades? How many have stayed firm to ‘the faith’? Well, it’s up to each to examine his own conscience and I’ve been here no more than many over the past year, but I have to admit that when the chat was had about what to do with this site, (and note that I say site not community) my first response was SHUT IT DOWN IT’S NO’ WORTH IT.
I am coming, sadly, to an understanding of the line ‘I can’t understand why we let someone else rule our land, cap in hand.’ I understand we have done this to ourselves. By action or inaction, by deliberate choice or implicitly, we have allowed ourselves to become too wee, too poor and too stupid, and as long as there’s the next new iphone and social media platform no one gives a damn. Tweet to your hearts’ content folks. Just don’t try to say anything meaningful. Don’t try to effect any meaningful change - and whatever you do, don’t use this incredible tool we have for communication for actual, meaningful change.
McRenegades is not shutting down YET. We are a much reduced clan – it feels like living through the Highland Clearances – but we have taken the decision to leave dotscot.
We weren’t happy having to pay a ‘premium’ in the first place. We’re certainly not happy to pay a premium for ‘brand name.’ So. We’re moving from www.mcrenegades.scot to www.mcrenegadescots.weebly.com How long before anyone even notices?
Of course, the first comments will be the critics pointing out that Weebly is a corporate American entity. Aye, but they host the domain for FREE. We can’t escape being shafted but I’m dog sick of being asked to pay for an illusion. Given that all any of us are in this new techno world is data, why pay for the privilege of having your nose rubbed in the fact that your country is no more than a pathetic excuse for branding. Never mind Kailyard, think about what Scotland actually means, about what is being sold in its name these days. Read it and weep. The time for getting angry is, I suspect, past. There’s no point. No one’s reading, no one’s listening, no one is sharing and no one is committed to meaningful change. ‘Be a nation again that stood against…’ Don’t make me boak. Winning the Calcutta Cup is a pretty poor second to being an Independent Country isn’t it? Or maybe it’s all that anyone really wanted. Bread and circuses, anyone?
There probably won’t be that much activity on McRenegades in the future. But for the short term at least, you can still access the past – if only as a legacy of the time before those of renegade and independent minds were killed off.
When they ask me what part did I play in the McRevolution, I’ll be able to hold my head up high. Not that it will matter. No one will ask. Scotland is Outlander now, remember. Just a movie set. We’ve got a ‘whole lot of scenery’ and are still more than pulling our weight for the economy of ‘Great’ Britain as we lurch towards our post Brexit apocalypse. Life will go on. People will keep shopping and taking holidays and posting tweets and taking drugs and trolling each other. Bullying and sexual harassment will mutate and survive. It was ever thus. There is no brief shining ‘McCamelot’ moment. Scotland didn’t die on 19th September 2014. That was just the date of the funeral. We simply hadn’t noticed we were dead men/women walking up till then. We had hope. And people need hope. Allegedly. Certainly there’s a global industry geared up to selling us it. Well, you know what, I’m not buying any more.
Of course, the hope peddlers want us to believe that we, as ‘human resources’ need to prove ourselves resilient. As good consumers we need to realise that owning a premium brand domain name IS a more important part of our identity than being a decent community minded human being. I don’t have hope. I certainly won’t buy it. I still avow it’s our world too, but our world has become a parallel one, in a galaxy far, far away from the ‘reality’ of UK 2018. Oh, William Wallace… they HAVE taken our freedom and left us with our lives.
To my mind at half time the score is:
McRenegades 0 – Parcel o’ Rogues 3.
What will the second half bring? You may hope for a miraculous victory but I am no longer convinced Scotland has the ‘team’ or McRenegades the ‘players’ to scramble back to a draw.
We are all of us not so much voices crying in the wilderness as data making someone else rich. If you are not paying for a product you are the product. Creativity has been commodified and there’s precious few McRenegades left to take a stand against it. We had our chance. We blew it.
But while there are a few wee voices left, they will, on occasion, come here and ‘speak truth to power’ (and other clichés) But we’re not paying for the privilege (financially) any longer. The emotional cost is high enough, don’t rub our noses in it by making us buy our own cultural heritage AGAIN. The long tail of the Act of Union is still wagging, folks.
Kirsty Eccles.
(aye, and those of you who’ve been waiting for my latest story ‘Catharsis’ might just about understand why it’s still not forthcoming. Car crash carnage seems more snappily appropriate a ‘best selling’ title.)