November 16, 2005

Continuing the Conversation about the Dance Blogosphere

Leigh Witchel offers his thoughts about my white paper, "Embracing Blogs: A New Blueprint for Promoting Dance on the Internet."

A blog may be inexpensive but it is labor-intensive. The things Doug mentions - cultivation of a voice and consistency especially – are not to be taken lightly. Writing is a skill. It takes me a good hour to do a decent blog entry.

As Leigh points out writing a blog can be time-consuming - I often spend more time than I realize writing and editing a single blog entry. In my white paper I did not explicitly deal with topic of how much effort would have to be spent by a dancer or dance company to update their blogs. My guess and hope is that over time, a number of dance companies will turn to blogs as one of their primary marketing/communication mediums for reaching their audiences (dance audiences, sponsors, press and others). And, in the process, less time and resources will be spent on other, more traditional forms of communication such as creating direct mailing pieces and writing press releases. Since blogs, as I explain in my white paper, offer a better way to communicate and interact with audiences, the extra time spent sustaining quality blogs will be justifiable.

Yes, writing is a skill, but at the same time, successful blogs can be written and presented in many different ways by people who share their stories and insights in different manners. A photoblog, for example, that consists of pictures from performances or rehearsals with brief text annotations may prove to be very engaging.

Good blogging isn’t just a diary or an advertisement. It’s the careful cultivation of a public persona...My suggestion would be that if you enter into the blogosphere because you want to contribute to the discussion, you will do something of value. If you enter it to promote your dance concert people will, and should, smell it a mile off.

The issue of how dancers and dance companies use their blogs is critical. I agree 100% with Leigh that anybody who is serious about building a successful blog should carefully consider the "public persona" they wish to create. It will take time and energy. Using the example of promoting an upcoming performance, the question is how does a dance company write about it in their blog? I think the goal is to provide value to readers. Maybe you educate them, maybe you discuss the intentions of the choreographer or maybe you seek feedback and suggestions. But you definitely don't post a blatant promo piece and leave it at that - although you should highlight upcoming performances that is the goal in the end. For the most part, I avoid blogs that just list upcoming classes and performances - to me the people/organizations publishing this marketing material are using blogs, but they are not blogging in any meaningful manner.

Amateur voices in the blogosphere are essential. The blogosphere thrives on having a large number of voices. I’d also like to self-interestedly say something for recognizing the value of the pros...

...One reason I love writing for Danceview Times is that it adds the value of new media (immediacy, access and SPACE!) while preserving a level of quality associated with print. But there's plenty of dross on the Internet because of the low barrier to startup. I started writing because I thought too many people were looking at the dancers and too few at the dance. I find it disheartening when I see "You too can be a critic" articles. Writing on dance isn’t about voicing your opinions – I mean, who really cares what I think of Christopher Wheeldon or Ashley Bouder? I love her and you loathe her and that’s that. Why do I love her and what can I show you about her? Can I show you a different way of looking at a blackbird? The dance writers I admire are champions of an aesthetic. I skip the ones who write a self-centered and self-aggrandizing litany of opinions.

I want to stress that I'm not questioning the value of professional dance critics. The purpose of my white paper and recent blog post is to explore how the audience for dance can be expanded. One of my answers is that by having more bloggers writing about dance online, both professionals and amateurs, more people will learn about and experience dance for themselves. Clearly some blogs will be horrendous and others will be wonderful; some blogs will cover topics that may seem trivial to experienced dance-goers and others will feature posts that provide more "meaningful" commentary. In the end, I think it's all good if it grabs the attention of dance newcomers and helps dance companies be more successful.

I hope that Rachel, Doug and I aren't setting up an echo chamber of links and trackbacks. Rachel Howard wrote hopefully yesterday about the blossoming of the dance blogosphere. I think we need a few more people to join in before we can savor the bloom on the rose - so make a comment or post your own entry!

As things stand now the small number of dance bloggers does represent a type of echo chamber. But I think it is important that we are starting to build upon, react to and critique each other's ideas, and learn from each other in the process. More and more people within the dance world will visit our blogs and will see the comments and trackbacks - they'll see that we are in the early stages of building a dance-focused blogosphere. So the existence of our interactions are bound to give others ideas of how they can contribute and create their own vehicles for growing the conversation about dance.

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