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Old 04-05-2007, 06:29 PM
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Ray Rogers Ray Rogers is offline
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Join Date: Jun 2002
Location: Wauconda, WA
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The way to avoid pigeon holing is simply to make the definitions tight enough to be a meaningful description without trying to be all emcompassing (this is where most of my original definitions fail). For instance, I'm trying to get people to concentrate first on the term 'Custom' (see my post two steps back). More than any of the other terms, that one has a basic, well established meaning in the English language and should be open to less interpretation than most of the terms we want to define. I suggest that we need not think of it as 'Custom Knifemaker' right now, but that we simply consider what the word Custom means by itself with consideration to how it would apply to us AS knife makers.

So, consider the word Custom. The dictionary is very clear that a customer has to order an object made a certain way and the craftsman makes that object to the customer's order. There is no real fudge factor in that common usage of the term. All that is necessary by this definition for a knife to qualify as custom is that a customer ask for a knife with a certain handle material/blade steel/blade length/whatever and you build the knife that way. This could be a model you have made a thousand of or it could be a one of a kind design that the customer provided - it doesn't matter. All that matters is that someone asked you to do it that way and you did.

In the 'old days' I wouldn't be surprised to find that many of those guys started out doing exactly that. Many makers today still do (I do, virtually every knife I make is 'Custom' by that definition).

So, I find that this definition both satisfies English common usage and at least a significant portion of modern knife making history. The question I would like everyone to address now is:

Do you agree with this definition of the word Custom as it applies to knife making? If not, please state how you thinkthe definiton should be modified SPECIFICALLY. At this point in the process, I don't think it matters as much WHY you think it should be modified as much as it matters HOW you think it should be changed ....


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