A few years ago, after seeing a cute, little bow-tie scarf at Anthropologie, I decided to sit down and knit one of my own. Not only was their scarf rather expensive, but it wasn't made with quality fibers. Off I set to create my "own" version.
Knowing that others might like to do the same, and realizing that the pattern wasn't exactly a difficult or original one, I wrote up my notes and posted them as a free pattern. I struggled with this because I am no pattern designer, yet I like to share with fellow knitters. Indeed, I typically just put my "patterns" in the notes section of my own projects. Given that some of the things I see posted as patterns (often for sale) are laughable, I figured, "why not?"
Which leads me to ask this, "What constitues a pattern?" Does opening a stitch dictionary, adding garter stitches to the sides, and calling it a scarf make a pattern? Does taking a standard mitten or sweater pattern and adding a cable to it make a pattern? On the other hand, if someone figures something out and wants to share it, shouldn't they be able to? I often wish there was one category for professional, technically-edited patterns and another for, "Hey, here's what I did."
After posting my "pattern" a few years ago, I began to see comments about how poorly it was written and how confusing it was. A few kind people said it was a great pattern and that they loved it. But more complained that they had to keep frogging their work and still didn't understand it.
I took each and every negative comment as a personal indictment. Indignantly I thought, 'if several hundred people were able to figure it out, then why do I continue to receive requests for help week after week?' And to the complainers, I wanted to scream, "IT'S A FREE PATTERN, PEOPLE!"
In the end, it bothered me to have a sloppy pattern, my ONLY pattern, representing me as a knitter. Yesterday, I sat down, reknit the scarflet, and rewrote the pattern line for line. If nothing else, it just makes me feel better.
