Apr 13, 2015Artist Meets Hacker:How Technology is Changing the Arts The arts field must better leverage technology to stay relevant. Artists are exploring technology as an art form in itself. Arts organizations are now in competition with everyone from audiences to tech companies. Arts administrators that adopt a maker approach will be more likely to succeed. These are the insights…SXSW1 min read
Jul 2, 2014The Debate Around Life and Death in the ArtsIn response to the internet about why “We Should Allow Failing Arts Organizations to Die” — @artsobispo on Instagram From a fairly innocuous comment I made at Dinnervention, to an only somewhat well-attended breakout session I co-lead at AFTA last month, to a blog post that only a handful of people read, to the email newsletter that touched off a social media firestorm, it seems that…11 min read
Jun 15, 2014We should allow failing arts organizations to die.A debate that began (for me) nine months ago, finally gets real at #aftacon. — The following is the text from a debate I participated in at the Americans for the Arts annual conference in Nashville. Agree or disagree: we should let arts organizations that don’t adapt die. Arts organizations are already dying. In Detroit, in New York City, in the UK. From operas to art galleries. This is no longer an urban versus rural debate. A…14 min read
Published in I. M. H. O.·Sep 9, 2013The Arts are Not in TroublePost-Dessert Reflections from Dinnervention — BREAKING: the Arts Dinner-vention Party did not reach consensus on how to build a movement for the arts, nor how to save the (institutional) arts (organizations). We did discuss, debate, and disagree on a far range of topics: whether we want to be more like co-ops or soup kitchens, if…4 min read
Published in 24 Usable Hours·Jan 28, 2012Can Social Media Predict Sundance Film Award Winners?In about 2 hours, this year’s Sundance Film Festival award winners will be announced. In the past week, there’s been over 35,000 tweets with the #sundance hashtag; more than 40,000 people “talking about” Sundance films on the films’ Facebook page or on the official Sundance Facebook page; 1,300 people have…Conference2 min read
Published in 24 Usable Hours·Jan 10, 2012Sundance 2012 & Social Media: What’s a Filmmaker To Do?Last year, I took an in-depth look at how Sundance feature films used social media during the Festival, and if social media was a good predictor of a film’s critical or financial success. With 9 days and counting until the 2012 Festival kicks off, I thought I’d take a look…Case Study12 min read
Published in 24 Usable Hours·Sep 29, 2011High Impact Social MediaWhat’s working for arts organizations now? “Once someone likes us on Facebook, what do we do with them? How can we use Twitter to raise money? Can Foursquare really enhance the audience experience? How can Tumblr help us make sense of it all?” Yesterday’s half-day seminar, High Impact Social Media…Book Review5 min read
Published in 24 Usable Hours·Sep 23, 2011Crowdsourced Voting: Modeling User Behavior with MathThe Nonprofit Technology Conference uses crowdsourced voting (plus a panel of experts and NTEN staff) to determine which panels to host at their annual conference. …Conference3 min read
Published in 24 Usable Hours·Sep 18, 2011The Case for A New Arts Incubator ModelNext week I’ll be speaking at Arizona State University’s p.a.v.e. program — the performing arts venture experience, one of the few arts incubators in the country. The program offers “arts entrepreneurship classes,” financial ($1-$5k), in-kind (space & materials), and other support (faculty mentors) for “student initiated arts based ventures,” and…Conference6 min read
Published in 24 Usable Hours·Aug 30, 2011SXSWi 2012: Trends & PanelsVoting for SXSW 2012 ends this Friday, and I’ve been racing to scan through all 3, 278 submissions to try to find the gems, to find friends who are also proposing, to find some clue into the future of tech. I collected a bit of data during last year’s panelpicker…Conference5 min read