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The No Rule Policy Vs Rules

I read the conditions being sold as opinions on media related sites.
I love to keep it positive. I like building instruments and sharing with friends. I hope we are not a clique or even snobs. Let us define what it means to be a cigar box guitar. They are boxes that once housed cigars that have been converted into stringed instruments. We all know that. However, with the cigar box guitar comes its many cousins. It is hard to define because there are so many varieties of homemade instruments that can be created limited only by imagination.
Here’s comes the conflict that seems to drive a wedge between a community that supports diversity on all levels of experience.
Do we have the freedom to build with any material from anywhere, be it China or US?
Does it matter the shape or density, originality?
Is it completed from scratch or salvaged from cheap knock offs?

Do we police the post on a CBG build site by ostracizing those who fall short of build criteria?
I’ve heard the sermon on the mound about purity and rite of passage from those who have paid their dues or came before us.
I really hope nobody buys into that!
For if you do, we will alienate ourselves from a unique opportunity to connect with people whose interest for the most part is to share all related subjects that have sprung from the Cigar Box Guitar.

Remember this blog is a response to other media sites that use their association with friends on here as leverage to support their ideology. I personally am open to discussion on definitions as long as I’m not attacking another member while expressing with them my views.

I not only respect but appreciate all the hard work and giving from all that have come before and are still providing us with service. There are many types of leaders, those who dictate, use fear and those who encourage though positive influences.
I see the latter here on the Nation and admire his restraint and experience at knowing when to step in and calm things down to keep the peace

I’m a firm believer in the no rule build policy but strongly encourage the traditional CBG build and respectfully share it’s roots. I build everything from canjos, 1-2-3-4-5-6 string CBG’s, Whamolas, bases, Ukuleles CBU’s, salad bowl banjo’s and vintage ironing board lap steels! “If it’s dead and laying around, I will build it and string it”. Stay positive!
smilingdog

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Comment by The Phrygian Kid on January 6, 2015 at 12:57pm: As I understand it one of your USA guitar super-marts (guitar centre??) was selling a Chinese box guitar a few years back, it's already here mate.

Comment by John Roberts on January 6, 2015 at 12:36pm: The Chinese make decent guitars.......for the most part. I have a Johnson wooden body biscuit bridge resonator guitar. It looks and sounds really fine. Not as good as a National of course, but for the money $300.00 it can't be beat. The Chinese mass produce instruments for the masses (you and me) and not for the 1% who have unlimited resources.

40 years ago I was a very young man and went to Luthier School where I learned to build classical guitars. After graduation I realized that to build an instrument and sell it would require me working for about 5 dollars an hour (at todays rates). I just couldn't compete with Yamaha, who made a very decent classical guitar for about !00.00. So I gave it up and went in another direction, and life has worked out well for me.

I can't imagine that most cigar box guitar makers bring in a lot of cash. Most probably do it for enjoyment of it.

As an aside, I don't think the Chinese will start manufacturing CBGs. The demand is not that great, and the market is not big enough (at this point) to get their interest.

Comment by The Phrygian Kid on January 6, 2015 at 12:21pm: my 2c...

If you look at a $90 Chinese Strat and compare it carefully to a $4500 USA custom shop one you might find they're pretty much the same thing.

If you then click on the photos link on this site and start clicking through them you might see a great deal more disparity than that (what an extra four and a half grand gets you in the strat market..). If I for example build myself a cigar box guitar I might spend a month or so on it. I might lam up a neck, wind some coils, carve a scrolled head, fabricate any number of parts etc. And I'm hardly an extreme, guys like Nate King, Randy Bretz, Juju etc etc might make a great deal more effort than I. Yet we have plenty of other guys who are really happy with something they knock together in an hour from a broomstick a box and a couple hose clamps.

So how do you reconcile those differences? How do you prevent elitist cliques from forming, prevent the community from splintering?

Clearly we all love guitars, we all wanna make em, but some apply a much higher standard on themselves than others. How can you apply a higher standard to your own works and still be genuinely supportive to your younger (figuratively if not literally) brothers who proudly turn in works of (what you might consider to be) a lesser standard without coming across as patronising?

By embracing the 'no rules' slogan. Which of course is entirely untrue, of course there are rules, but they are YOUR OWN, not community standards. You may choose to push yourself until you are building professional standard builds, bending sides, carving tops, the works. Or not. Either way you're a brother, and imho thats what it means :)

Comment by turtlehead on January 5, 2015 at 7:24pm: The way I see it there are three things needed for a CBG.

1. Nut

2. Bridge

3. Wishful Thinking

Comment by Scott aka Farmer Ted on January 5, 2015 at 10:38am: Well done Ron. I apologize, and am willing to brush this off as a moment of interesting enlightenment. Best wishes to everyone.

Comment by John Roberts on January 5, 2015 at 10:34am: Ron:

A well spoken and thoughtful post, thank you.

And in closing I must say that limitations are the very nature of life in the 3 dimensional reality we call "living on planet earth." It is just a fact and cannot be rationally disputed. The concept of "no limitations" is the brainchild of the new age movement, and it is based on emotions and wishful thinking.

Comment by Bad Finger (Eric) on January 5, 2015 at 8:59am: I yield the remainder of my time to the gentleman from Texas. Good one, bro.

Comment by Ron "Oily" Sprague on January 5, 2015 at 8:55am: So...John...let's agree that there are actually material "rules" based on physics, primarily, but broadening out into genetics, and other areas affecting building and playing. The nut of your argument, yes? I'm a believer, who sees that belief challenged here almost daily.

And...Scott...you don't wanna limit yourself to "limitations," whether in building or philosophy. True? The words "limits," "boundaries," "rules," "policy" can be triggers.

And smilingdog1, the initiator of this blog, wants to keep everything on CBN as positive as possible, compared to other sites he's visited. That seems simple enough.

Ad hominem attacks, especially on Internet forums, are notoriously easy to fall into, through personality differences, beliefs, mores, education, ignorance, and even crankiness due to slow Internet speeds, among many contributing variables. They should be relatively easily averted with beer, facial expressions, vocal tone, and some hand waving. Or at least mitigated...

Given that I-Brews have not advanced to a realistic level of drinkability, that English is a highly nuanced mongrel language that makes communication amazingly difficult at times, that people have different personalities, and that Kumbayah is not my favorite song, what then can be done to bring amity and brotherhood back to this discussion?

Should everyone take a breather? Give it up as a bad job, and move on? Embrace one another as long lost cousins? CBGs are a big tent. There's room for all opinions. I'm positive that everyone here is a decent human being (except me, maybe. Sometimes.).

Nobody wants me to quote Rodney King. And nobody wants to have verbal knives slung at them. 2015 is a new year. Let's approach it and live in it, yes in spirited but respectful debate, but let's also take joy in the fact that these kewl instruments can be built and played by almost anyone, to quite varying levels of detail and complexity.

Oh, and there's a bug on someone's nose. >:-E

Comment by John Roberts on January 5, 2015 at 8:17am: "I wondered how long it would take until you choose to do the very thing the original blog was asking everyone not to do."

That is a strawman argument.

You base your views on emotion, and use no logic in your discussion. It is like trying to have a conversation with someone who avoids deductive reasoning to embrace faulty emotional beliefs, and backs them up with strawman arguments. Your would probably feel quite at home over at huffingtonpost.com.

Comment by Scott aka Farmer Ted on January 5, 2015 at 8:00am: I wondered how long it would take until you chose to do the very thing the original blog was asking everyone not to do. Pessimism is a difficult cloud to avoid when one dislikes sunshine. And the forecast on your side of the fence looks like rain.