"Great hat!"

I don't just wear my own creations. I have a lot of hats that I did not make, and I wear them often. And I've received countless compliments on one mass-produced hat or other. Usually it's "great hat!" That's not strictly a compliment for me because I didn't make the hat.

And then I realized: When people say "great hat," they're not usually complimenting the hat at all. I might be wearing a mass-produced hat that is a good hat or an okay hat, but not a great hat.

What people are really saying is "You're wearing a hat! That's so great! Good for you for rocking that hat!" And that is a compliment. :)

Now we just need to increase hatty awareness so that merely wearing a hat isn't novel enough to earn a compliment and so that people can start to appreciate the difference between an okay hat and a "great" hat.