Best of Technology in the Arts 2010 -- David's Favorites

As we move into 2011, it's time to take a look back at my favorite articles and podcast episodes from Technology in the Arts in 2010.

My Top 10 TITA Articles (in chronological order)

1. Building Audience Diversity Through Social Networking - Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3 -- Amelia investigates why arts organizations use certain social networking sites but not others (such as ethnically specific sites like Black Planet) and what impact this has on their ability to use social networking as a tool for building diverse audiences. [Okay, okay...I'm counting this three-part series as one really looooonnnggg article.]

2. SEOoooo….what? Improving your organization’s search engine optimization. -- Corwin takes a look at search engine optimization: what it is; why it is important; and what you can do to optimize it for your website. [And it was published on my birthday, which makes it extra special.]

3. Micro-donations: Proving Size Doesn’t Always Matter -- Joe highlights reasons and tips for starting a micro-donation campaign for your organization.

4. Social Media Spotlight: Vancouver Opera -- Amelia kicks off our Social Media Spotlight series by interviewing Ling Chan, Social Media Manager for the Vancouver Opera, about her social media strategy and experiments.

5. Online Group Discounts and the Arts - Tara unearths some of the buzz around the use of online group discount sites like Groupon and Living Social.

6. Is your organization engaging older adults through social media? -- Molly questions our assumptions about social media sites as places to primarily engage younger audiences.

7. Going Mobile - Websites vs Apps -- Reprinted from Americans for the Arts' Arts Marketing Blog Salon, I break down the differences between mobile apps and mobile websites with an eye toward where arts organizations should invest their time and money.

8. The Handheld Guide: Experimenting with Mobile Technology in Museums -- Tom digs deeper into mobile apps by exploring how they are used by and within art museums.

9. Social Media Spotlight: The Guggenheim and YouTube Play -- Thomas interviews Guggenheim Associate Curator Hanne Mugaas about YouTube Play, a biennial celebrating creative talent in the realm of online video.

10. 7 steps to a Successful Facebook Ad Campaign -- Tara discusses the benefits of and best practices for creating Facebook Ads.

My Top 4 Podcast Episodes (in chronological order)

#66 – Google Wave, Google Buzz and the iPad -- A humorous (yet informative) conversation with Brad, Amelia and me wherein I make this ridiculous prediction that the iPad was not going to take off. LOL.

#70 – Discussion of "Theatre & Social Media in 2009″ with Devon Smith -- Pat interviews Yale Repertory Theatre's Devon Smith about her research report “Theatre & Social Media in 2009.”

#71 – Audience 2.0, Smartphone Apps and Tips for Working with Developers -- Brad, Jeff and I get into a rowdy conversation about everything from the NEA's Audience 2.0 report to smartphone apps for the arts.

#78 – Seven Digital Trends and Their Implications for the Creative Sector -- My interview with thought leader and arts consultant Brian Newman about trends in the technology sector and what they (will) mean for the arts industry.

Happy New Year to all of our fans, friends, readers and listeners! We'll see you on the flip side in 2011.

Social Media Spotlight: SF Playhouse Pluggers

Welcome to the fourth installment of the Social Media Spotlight, our monthly feature focusing on arts organizations’ social media strategies.

Earlier this year, the SF Playhouse invited Bay Area Twitter users to apply for the SF Playhouse Pluggers, a group of individuals invited to "plug in and Tweet during the performance in special 'tweet seats' where their thoughts will be instantly be shared with the Bay Area and the world." I recently had an opportunity to talk with Dan Meagher, Director of Marketing for SF Playhouse, about this controversial and highly debated social media program.

What inspired the SF Playhouse to explore a Twitter program?

When I came to the SF Playhouse as Director of Marketing, I wanted to devise a program that would be unique plus tap into social media. Since I had been using Twitter for quite some time and liked the "real-time" aspect of it, I saw the potential for using it in conjunction with a live performance. More importantly, it lets us give folks a voice for their criticism and instant thoughts of our shows. Twitter lives in the moment, just like theatre. We're creating our own critics. There couldn't be a better combination.

How did you arrive at the program name?

The name came about after thinking about what people were doing with this program. They are "plugging" into the show, into social media, and into the SF Playhouse. Plus, it's darn catchy!

How does the program work? How do you find program participants? What are the criteria for participation?

A few weeks before a Plugger event, we start advertising on our Facebook and Twitter pages. The requirements are: - Must be 18 years or older - Must be a Bay Area resident - Must have an active Twitter account - Must have a portable texting device that can last a least 90 minutes.

Participants are selected on a first-applied basis and receive one complimentary ticket to the show, where they sit in the last row. We also extend to them a special ticket offer if they want to bring a friend (who won't be tweeting). We've had Pluggers use everything from cell phones to iPads! We accept 8-101 Pluggers for the event and usually end up with a wait list.

Do they tweet for a single performance or are they invited to come back to tweet throughout the season?

The Pluggers are initially invited for the one performance. Some love it..some find it challenging and not their thing. It's not a program for everyone. We have about a 70% rate of people asking to come back to plug for the next show, but it is important to me to have new people with us each session. We have one guy who has been with us for every Plugger session! It's great to see them arrive and become a group...they get each other's Twitter screen names and even start tweeting to each other during the performance. For that show, they become a community.

Our Pluggers come from all over - different backgrounds, communities, jobs, you name it. We've had them as young as 18 and up to their 60s. Our average age in 30 -40.

What rules (if any) govern the program?

We have a few basic rules: must turn ringers/any sound elements off; all screens must be dimmed; no talking; and no photos or recording devices may be used (we're an Equity theatre). We do let them drink from their seats, which, with a laptop or iPhone, has caused a few spills!

The biggest rule (well, not really a rule) we have is that we will not censor anything our Pluggers have to say. We retweet all of their messages about the show, whether they be good and bad. This has allowed us to gain a trust with our Pluggers and our audience, because they know that they are seeing all of the instant reactions - not just selected ones.

Someone once asked me if this is bad, letting people possibly criticize your production. Actually, I see it as a good thing. Theatre must be able to take the good and the bad. It allows us to see things from another perspective. We've had some Pluggers be very direct about what they didn't like in a show.

Is there a particular hashtag for the Pluggers’ tweets?

#sfplay - We started using this hashtag during our last Pluggers session in the hopes of making the feed more streamlined. Also, in the past, we have crashed our Twitter page because of too many feeds going out at the same time. I have been in touch with the folks at Twitter to ask for their help in maintaining our feed, but they weren't very responsive.

Do you post the hashtag feed on a screen in the lobby for your audience before the show, during intermission, and after the show?

That's a great idea! Unfortunately, we don't have the capability to do that right now. We do mention at the start of the performance to the audience that they should go home and look at our Twitter page and see the live feed.

What are your benchmarks for measuring the success of the program?

I don't use any specific bench marks for the Playhouse Pluggers.  Since it's a very "organic" kind of program, I don't feel the need to throw in tickets codes or other marketing positions.  We know it works because we have people come to the SF Playhouse and mention that they read the Plugger feed from the last show.  We've also received much press coverage.

What feedback has the program received from your on-site audience?

It's funny.  When we first announced this program, we received emails from patrons unhappy with the idea.  Of course, we heard this before we even did a Pluggers night!  However, Executive Director Susi Damilano and Artistic Director Bill English were unwaivering in their support for trying this crazy new idea.  Without their support, this would have never gone forward.

After our first session went off without a hitch, we didn't hear many complaints.  We have had audience members sitting right behind our Pluggers and, at the end of the show, say they didn't even know the Pluggers were there.  The non-Tweeting audience members wouldn't even know it was happening if we didn't tell them.  Now that people see that this isn't disruptive to the show, they seem to have embraced it.

What type of response and interaction have the Pluggers’ received from the Twitter community?

The Twitter community has been very supportive of the idea. I've heard from people all over the US and the world about how much they enjoy following the live feed.

Twitter has also brought us some surprises.  During our last Pluggers session for the new musical Coraline, who should join in the tweeting but the author himself - Neil Gaiman!

Another wonderful thing happened during our Plugger session for Cormac McCarthy's The Sunset Limited.  We were about 40 minutes into the show and suddenly, someone from Twitter-land sent one of our Pluggers a direct message asking them a question about something they just tweeted.  That was a first for us.  We now had Twitter users from other places asking questions of our Pluggers during the show!  It helped me realize the scope this program.  Those interactions took the Playhouse Plugger program to a whole new, unexpected level.

Why do you think there has been so much controversy and debate about the program?

Many theatre people are afraid of the "new."   Technology scares a lot of folks.  We're taught that theatre is a revered place where you come, sit, watch, and applaud.  Interaction is not allowed or encouraged.  So when you create something that breaks down a wall, people are going to jump up and say, "Not in my backyard!"  Here's the bottom line...the Playhouse Pluggers program is not going to end the world or change theatre as we know it.  This program will not cause thousands to run out and start tweeting during Romeo & Juliet.

Theatre is about change...about evolution.  The basic nature of theatre requires us to adapt to the new, or else we would be going to see plays by Euripides on Broadway.  Theatre is a shared experience and this program is just a way to let the theatergoer have voice in the theatre going experience by sharing their thoughts.  That's it..it's a very simple concept.

In an article earlier this year, Theatre Bay Area quoted Artistic Director Bill English as saying of the program, “It’s an experiment. We're trying to check out the balance between social media and theatre.”  Eight months into the experiment, what has SF Playhouse learned?

We have learned that social media (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Skype, etc.) has become a major force in everyday life.  It's here to stay.  We've also learned that people love to discuss theatre using these platforms.  It can connect a theatre fan in England with a theater fan in the US instantly.  If anything, social media has opened up lines of instant communication that never existed before and encourage discussion.

I'm happy to share my knowledge about this progam with all!  Feel free to contact me at Dan@SFPlayhouse.org

This has lead to the creation of citizen critics. Everyone today has a voice and the ability to broadcast their thoughts. With the demise of print and media criticism, theatre needs to find and cultivate these new voices that will talk, criticize, and promote.

Planning for Engagement: Tech Strategy & the Visitor Experience

Earlier this week, the Pittsburgh Children’s Museum hosted a talk by Nina K. Simon, author of The Participatory Museum and the Museum 2.0 blog. Simon works with museums throughout the country to develop programs for improving visitor engagement.

Simon brought up some great ideas about the ways in which museums could use programming to increase engagement and create meaningful experiences between visitors.  Might arts organizations be able to apply her ideas about museums when designing their own strategies with technology and social media?

Here are a few of her ideas from the talk and how I think they might be applied:

Museums should be seen as places for everyday use

Simon argued that many museums are seen as tourist destinations that have a long-standing stereotype of being a place to be visited maybe only once a year. This is also true for many other types of arts organizations.  Many of us would like to see that change and for arts organizations to become places that people consider frequenting practically everyday. Social media could be a strong tool for stimulating this impression. Offering frequent, engaging content online and creating a personal connection with our organizations’ constituents can help counter the idea that arts organizations are aloof and impersonal tourist destinations.  Social media offers an opportunity to communicate the frequent, sometimes daily offerings of your organization.

Museums should be trusted hosts for social experiences

Simon spoke last night about the success some museums have had with programs that involve voting, encourage competition, and prioritize face-to-face interaction between visitors.  Arts organizations could apply this idea towards utilizing social event sites like meetup.com, where the end result is a real-life, social interaction. Or this idea could be applied towards using such tools as real time tagging of artworks from any discipline or mobile device voting systems as a way to create conversation and interaction between visitors. The Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra went the mobile voting route when they had audience members vote, via text, to choose which encore the symphony performed.

Museums should be places for seeing and exploring as well as sharing and making

Another great way to engage visitors in a meaningful way is to encourage them to share their experiences of the organization with their friends and to create their own content. Social networking sites are centered on this idea of sharing experiences online and many organizations have taken advantage of this by encouraging their visitors to share photos and stories on the organizations’ social networks. The Vancouver Opera has a flickr fashion page that gives visitors who have “dressed to the nines” a place to shine online. The Mattress Factory’s iConfess is a confessional booth for visitors to express their ideas about the museum and publish those ideas directly to YouTube. Photos and personal experiences are definitely visitor-created content, but current technology can push this idea of participation even further. The success the Guggenheim had with YouTube Play, an online exhibition of user-created videos, and online projects like The Johnny Cash Project, where users re-interpret a Johnny Cash video by drawing over each frame, are two great examples.

As technology and social networks continue to expand and grow at a rapid rate, it’s hard to know which to develop programming for. These ideas presented at Ms. Simon’s talk can serve as great starting points to that conversation. As your organization moves forward developing technological programming, some questions should be asked, such as: Is the technology serving the end goal of bringing people to our institution? Is it helping to create a worthwhile experience for visitors, or is it just tech for tech’s sake? How varied of an audience can a particular technology or social network reach? Are there better, low-tech solutions to visitor engagement? New technology and advances in web 2.0 can offer powerful tools that can help expand audiences and increase visitor engagement, but remember to step back and look at which strategy best serves your organization's visitors and creates a meaningful experience.

Learning to Lead (and Follow) from Any Position

This article originally appeared in the Leading Creatively Blog Salon, a week-long exploration of leadership in the creative sector, hosted by the National Alliance for Media Arts and Culture.

When I first entered the workforce after graduate school, I believed that leadership originated at the top of the organizational pyramid and flowed downward. My first two jobs reinforced this belief: the senior leadership set the agenda for the organization, provided directives to the staff, and neither solicited nor desired the input of the junior staff. We were solely there to follow…or so I thought.

In retrospect, I see that my professional life has always contained the simultaneous duality of leading and following. When I worked in entry-level positions, I followed my supervisor’s directives for actualizing the executive director’s vision in service of the mission. And I was happy to be doing it. Following the lead of the senior staff allowed me to learn a great deal about management and leadership in the arts. So where did I lead in those early days? In the organization’s blind spots.

Small and mid-sized organizations in the creative sector are often faced with human resource capacity issues. Everyone on staff tends to wear numerous “hats.” Correspondingly, there are always areas within these organizations in need of attention and innovation. Turning these blind spots into areas of opportunity takes three key leadership traits: vision, initiative and persuasiveness.

In my personal experience, the organizations that I worked with had significant blind spots in their technology infrastructures. Once I recognized this, I started envisioning ways in which the incorporation of new and/or different technologies could improve organizational efficiency, audience reach, depth of engagement, etc. Having the vision for change was not enough by itself, I had to take the initiative to approach the senior leadership and persuade them to pursue change via technology adoption.

As I rose through the ranks, those three traits remained pivotal for leadership. Now as an executive director, I have tried to consciously foster a working environment wherein other members of the staff are encouraged to lead. Obviously, this requires me to follow. When I first took on the executive role, I wondered if I would be one of those executives who just could not follow someone else’s lead. I mean, I was hired to lead, right? Wouldn’t choosing to let someone else take the lead in an area be shirking my duties?

Three years into the role, I know that the answer to this is “no.” We must embrace the duality of leading and following throughout our professional lives in order to foster and ensure the continuous development of our organizations and ourselves.

Fill in the ________: A New, Social Entertainment Website

MySpace, the original social networking site, has relaunched and re-branded itself as My_______ ,the world's first “Social entertainment” website.  The purpose of the website has shifted from a social networking site motivated by the slogan “a place for friends” to a site intent on “becoming the leading entertainment destination that is socially powered by the passions of fans and curators.” Essentially, the new My_______ focuses less on people and more on media and digital content sharing. The sleek new site combines the most popular features of Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, and Youtube into a single media focused platform. Users can now follow artists and organizations on topic pages, similar to Facebook fan pages, while receiving real time updates on the music, videos and content being heard, viewed, or uploaded by them (very reminiscent of Twitter).

In this way, members will be able to see what music their favorite opera company is listening to as well as what they are posting. Users will be shown the media that their friends are consuming, not just the media that their friends and topics are posting. It opens a new opportunity for media recommendations, community building, viral marketing, and content sharing.

These updates appear on the new homepage now referred to as the dashboard which can be viewed in three modes: list, grid, or full screen.

The list mode looks almost exactly like a Facebook news feed.  The grid view integrates watchable videos, playable songs, pictures, and micro-blogs in a chronological collage of media tiles, and the full screen mode allows users to experience their media updates in an interface similar to iTunes coverflow.

My_______ has combined multiple features from across the web  that have never been offered in tandem before - creating a unique media viewing and sharing experience.  Some of the other new features include: interactive games, karaoke (Opera?), free music playlists creation (competing with Pandora?), and media trending.

The new interface and combination of features could prove very useful to cultural institutions and arts managers if the user base is willing to readopt a floundering platform.

The largest obstacle for the new My______ is the old MySpace.  The relaunch comes after one of the worst years in the company's history.  MySpace lost 50% of its user base between 2009 and 2010, a critical hit for the organization and a terrible loss for its functional use as a communications tool and social network.  The new My________ is much more in line with Internet usage interests and behaviors of Millenials, but it is not yet clear if they will return to the site.

In order to make the transition smoother and help regain customers, My______ has paired with Facebook to create what they are calling a mashup, in which My_______ takes all of a user’s profile information, friends, and likes from Facebook and imports them into a My_______ page; making the process of setting up a new functioning account much quicker and helping users grasp the changes and full functionality of the site much faster.  This partnership bodes well for My_______ and provides a clear focus away from social networking and onto new media and digital content sharing.

For arts organizations and non-profits that are currently tweeting links to content on Twitter, uploading videos to YouTube, and sharing pictures and events on Facebook, the new My_______ offers a single platform that will combine all three. A one-stop shop for all of your social entertainment and digital media needs. The ability for pictures and videos to appear directly in a news feed like Twitter but with a usable interface like Facebook is very desirable and something that I believe has huge potential.  Pairing the interface with the content and media focus allows for a more streamlined experience that is not diluted by the social aspect of Facebook and Twitter.  The New My_______ is definitely trying to steer away from content that does not surround music, media or artists in some way.

The ability to create opera karaoke, post audio excerpts from a concert, or share video from a stage production or event that are instantly previewable and clickable in a media focused feed that is more graphic than Twitter, less convoluted than a YouTube subscription, and easier to deliver than Facebook is very enticing.  If users begin to adopt the new My_______, it seems only natural for organizations to follow. Only time will tell if this snazzy new facelift will take off, but the potential is definitely real.

Exhibiting Online with Open Source Software

Has your organization been giving some thought to creating online components for its upcoming exhibitions? The demand for having exhibition-related content available online is not only increasing, it has grown into an expectation. Web publishing can be a costly process for many arts organizations, especially if a web developer and designer is required for each exhibition.  A more cost-friendly alternative is to consider using open-source, publishing software for creating collections and exhibitions online. Here are two currently available, free downloadable options designed specifically with cultural institutions in mind:

Omeka – Launched this past year, Omeka was designed by the Center for History and New Media at George Mason University. Omeka features a variety of themes and plugins while offering a management system similar to that of the blogging site Wordpress. Here is a great video tour of the software.

Collective Access – Also utilizing a management system similar to many blogging platforms, Collective Access was developed by software firm Whirl-i-Gig in 2007. Click here to demo the software.

Both sites offer links to exhibition sites built with their software, which are worth checking out to see what’s possible using these open source systems.

So what is open-source software, anyway? A software is considered open source when the firm who created the software makes the source code available to the public and opts out of certain other copyrights that are normally reserved.  This means that any user can alter, customize and develop for that software as they sit fit to meet their project’s needs. An important thing to keep in mind is that in the tradition of open source software, the user must share this new, modified code with the public as well.

Before your organization goes forward with publishing an exhibition or collection online with this kind of software, there are some questions you should consider:

What is the user experience like?

No two web publishing software systems are exactly alike, so make sure to take a detailed tour before committing to one.  A clean and simple user interface will drastically shorten training time for your staff and save a lot of future headaches if you pursue more complex projects. Omeka and Collective Access are both strong examples since each offers a blog-like user-interface specifically designed with cultural institutions in mind.

Omeka offers services that cover a wide range of needs for cultural institutions

An example of how Collective Access allows you to build relationships between items in your online collection.

How much storage will you need?

What kind of content and media will your project involve? What kind of storage and back-up will be needed? Remember that server space is essential, whether it’s your organization’s internal server, a web-hosting service’s server, or buying some space from a server provider online. In addition to their software, Omeka offers a web-hosting service with different plans priced according to number of sites and the amount of storage needed.

How easy is it to customize?

This goes back to the importance of taking a detailed demo of the software. Many of the platforms have multiple themes available to make the task of designing your organization’s site a lot easier. However, you should test the platform to determine how difficult it will be to change those themes and customize them to fit your organization’s unique brand image without requiring the help of a web designer.

What kind of support is there for the software?

When an open source software is downloaded and installed on your server, all of the support and maintenance responsibilities for that software rests with your organization. A server provider will be able to fix bugs and issues specific to your server, but maintaining the software is up to you. Omeka and Collective access offer extensive documentation and guides as well as online forums, but support and troubleshooting are left to you. This is one of the advantages to Omeka’s hosted option; they will provide service support for both server and software issues.

How is the software upgraded?

When the system you use comes out with a new version, who installs the upgrade? How easily can an upgrade in the software be installed and configured? With both Omeka and Collective Access, the users have to manually perform the upgrades, but extensive documentation and guides are provided. This is another benefit of a hosted service option like Omeka.net; they will install and configure software upgrades for you.

So while these open-source, publishing software systems are free, there are some costs to consider.  Be sure to do your research in order to determine if these open source tools will meet your budgetary and technical constraints for experimenting with online collections and exhibitions.

NAMP 2010 - Day Two - Recap Discussions

David, Corwin and Amelia report out on Day Two of the 2010 National Arts Marketing Project Conference. Items discussed: disembodied panelists, Vimeo analytics, the Audience Engagement Platform, the value of quantifying intrinsic impact, and more.

Arts & Technology Round-up

Happy Friday everyone! Here are some interesting happenings in arts and technology to round out your week:

• Magic Fiddle app turns your iPad into a violin.
• A team of conservators digitally recreate a missing part of Brömserhof Museum's 16th century mural.
• Integrating technology into the theatrical performance.
• Check out this Museum of Soviet Arcade Games outside of Moscow.
• Artist Mark Bradford and the J. Paul Getty Museum offer online art classes with Open Studio.
• Google and the Gagosian invest in art startup Art.sy.
• Digital projection mapping: turning building facades into canvasses.

Enjoy the weekend!

Fair Use of Dance-Related Materials: A Discussion

In response to CAMT's "Social Media, Video Footage and the Law" white paper, Lisa Niedermeyer from Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival contacted us with a related video about fair use as it relates to dance-related materials. As the white paper mentions, fair use can be a nebulous concept as far as what, how, and how much copyrighted material can be legally used. The video is a more detailed discussion of The Dance Heritage Coalition's published statement "Best Practices in Fair Use of Dance-Related Materials". It features curators, archivists, documentary filmmakers, librarians and other collectors of dance-related materials discussing what they currently regard as reasonable application of the Copyright Act's fair use doctrine.

An Easier Way to Text-to-Pay

Recently, Obopay Inc., an online mobile payment company, and Benevity Social Ventures Inc., a company focusing on the social practices and giving habits of corporate America, partnered to create a new text-to-donate platform for non-profits.  This new easy-to-setup, easy-to-manage platform takes away many of the problems that have been associated with text-to-give in the past.

The new platform:

• Is FREE for all registered organizations with active 501(c)3 status
• Takes less than 24 hours to setup
• Pays organizations within 30 days
• E-mails tax receipts to donors immediately

Prior to this texting platform, setting up a text-to-give campaign took months and the providers that were available focused mainly on larger high profile clients (the Obama campaign and the Haitian relief effort are just two examples). Payment often took 60-90 days and there were a multitude of fees and charges associated with the products.

In an earlier post, I discussed the merits and benefits of micro-donation campaigns and ways they can best be implemented. Unfortunately, I did not have many suggestions on available products at that time. Many local non-profits and arts organizations simply did not have the budgets or profile to take on such campaigns.

This new text-to-give platform (which currently has no specific name) allows for easy setup and processing of text-to-give donations. A non-profit organization goes to the Obopay website, registers for a key word and the Benevity Corporation, in partnership with the American Endowment Foundation (AEF), creates the account and sets up the service on behalf of the non-profit. No extra work, no forms, no hassle.

When using this service:

• Tax receipts are provided directly to the donor from Benevity via e-mail
• Donations are received by the non-profit every 30 days
• A 7% processing fee is collected from the donation by Benevity and AEF to process the transactions
• The non-profit only receives 93% of the total donated amount
• 100% of the donation is tax deductable (Benevity & AEF are also non-profits)

Overall, this simplistic process combines Obopay’s easy text-to-pay platform with Benevity’s non-profit database and backend billing system, allowing for an easy-to-setup, easy-to-manage platform. A patron texts the organization's keyword to a short code (usually 5 numbers long) and immediately receives an SMS text in response. Potential donors are then prompted to enter a phone number and pin code to donate or they can use the mobile donation website which, on average, takes less than 90 seconds to complete.

Future expansion of this service will include corporate matching and a customizable database with a recommendation function. Benevity already has all registered US non-profits in their searchable database. Soon, the non-profits themselves will be able to be personalize their profiles, and a recommendation function for donors will be added.

Donors prefer push button solutions, mobile applications and ease of use. This new text-to-give solution by Benevity and Obopay opens the doors for arts organizations and other non-profits to provide cutting edge solutions to this problem.

Arts organizations across the country should be looking at this as a huge opportunity to expand micro-donation campaigns and reach new audiences. Patrons are most likely to give directly after or during an experience involving a non-profit. This quick and easy solution for instant giving provides a way for people to support organizations they care about while the experience is still fresh in their minds. Both companies recommend event based marketing for text-to-give donation campaigns.

Arts organizations should advertise how to donate via SMS text during intermissions, around galleries or surrounding specific events. It is a quick way for people to show their support and generally has little effect on their other giving habits. More importantly, the platform can provide a  new revenue stream that opens up giving to a wider range of people and secures multiple gifts from long time donors.

Social Media Spotlight: The Guggenheim and YouTube Play

Welcome to the third installment of the Social Media Spotlight, our monthly feature focusing on arts organizations’ social media strategies.

This month’s spotlight is the Guggenheim Museum’s strategy with YouTube Play, the recently debuted biennial celebrating creative talent in the realm of online video. The response leading up to Youtube play was massive, with over 23,000 video submissions and over 46,000 subscribers to the YouTube Play channel. The channel, to date, has been viewed over 23 million times. 25 videos were selected by an esteemed jury and celebrated on October 21^st with an event at the Guggenheim in New York that was live streamed worldwide.

I recently had a chance to chat with Associate Curator Hanne Mugaas about YouTube Play:

Where did the idea originate for the Guggenheim to team up with a social media site like YouTube?

The Guggenheim had already collaborated with Google on Design It: A Shelter Competition, where on the occasion of the exhibitions Frank Lloyd Wright: From Within Outward and Learning By Doing, the Guggenheim and Google SketchUp invited amateur and professional designers from around the world to submit a 3-D shelter for any location in the world using Google SketchUp and Google Earth. Ideas for new collaborations originated from this project, and a celebration of online video became the next step.

Instead of using their existing YouTube channel, the Guggenheim decided to create an entirely new channel for YouTube Play. What drove that decision? Did it have a positive effect on your original channel?

Since the project is a collaboration between YouTube and the Guggenheim, we wanted a channel for Play content exclusively. The fact that it is a biennial (the project will continue every second year) is another reason why we wanted a separate platform. The project has certainly had a positive effect on the Guggenheim YouTube channel, and it has made it possible for us to reach new audiences.

Since its creation last May, the YouTube Play channel has gained over 46,000 subscribers. How did the Guggenheim cultivate such a large number of fans?

The project is unique in its global scope, which has generated extensive interest. We got 23,358 submissions, which is unheard of in a traditional art context. The pairing of YouTube and Guggenheim made people curious about the outcome. Most importantly, the shortlist and the top 25 videos have a diverse range of high quality works; videos that make you want to spend time on and revisit the channel.

In addition to YouTube, the Guggenheim also has a major presence on other social networks and social media sites like Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, & Flickr. What roles did these other sites play in your social media strategy with YouTube Play? Did the fact that YouTube Play culminated with a specific event affect your overall social media strategy?

The social media sites were important in getting the word out, and to drive submissions. We also started a blog, The Take, which contextualizes the project through writing by art, film, and Internet experts. We did frequent YouTube Play updates on Facebook and Twitter to keep people informed about the progression of the project. These were certainly important tools for the event, especially to make people aware of the live stream, and the external projections on the Guggenheim building in New York.

Speaking of events, the Guggenheim took full advantage of YouTube's new streaming service to live stream the YouTube Play event from the Guggenheim Museum in New York City.  How was your experience with streaming video?

The live stream was a very important element given the global scope of the biennial; this way, anyone anywhere could watch the event live. It was a successful experience for us, and the feedback has been very good.

What advice would you give to other, smaller arts organizations that want to experiment with live streaming their own events?

Streaming video is a great way to make your content available to a global audience, either it’s an event, a panel or a talk. To watch a live stream is special, and as a cultural producer, it is a great asset to know that people around the globe are watching.

Thanks again to Hanne Mugaas and the Guggenheim Museum. Visit the YouTube Play channel to check out the 25 selected videos from the exhibition and view selected clips from the live streamed event.

Is your organization doing exciting work in social media? Leave us a comment and let us know. We may feature you in an upcoming spotlight!

Internet Revived the Music Video Star

On August 1, 1981, America was introduced to the cultural phenomenon of Music Television. The television network revolutionized the world of music programming and would forever change the landscape of the music industry. In addition to promoting music through traditional radio, live performances and albums, musicians began to utilize the medium of television to promote their singles. Independent and underground musicians also took advantage of this new technology by shooting lower budget videos to distribute on local cable access shows that were similar to MTV. The cultural innovation of music videos has since evolved along with the rest of the music industry. One of the most interesting trends is the advent of interactive music videos on the internet. An increasing number of artists and arts organizations have begun examining the ways in which they can engage and connect with potential audience members and fans online. The dynamic, fast-paced nature of smart phones, social media and other technology has prompted this shift to interactivity and collaboration.

Here's a look at three of the most innovative videos on the web.

1:Arcade Fire’s “The Wilderness Downtown”

One of the most ambitious projects comes from the indie rock band sensation, Arcade Fire. The band designed a video that uses Google Chrome, Google Maps and HTML5 standard to immerse users into a unique, interactive experience. The music video (designed to work best with the Google Chrome browser) prompts users to enter the street address of their childhood homes and creates a custom video based on images taken from Google Maps’ Street View of your childhood home.

Wilderness Downtown Screenshot

Director, Chris Milk (who just produced another collaborative video for Johnny Cash's final studio recording ), has also worked on videos for Kanye West and Gnarls Barkley and is at the forefront of this revolution in music video production.

For more behind-the-scenes information on the shoot, check out Creativity Online's  article.

2. Andy Grammer’s “Keep Your Head Up”

Choose Your Own Adventure...

A slight variation on this theme comes from pop artist, Andy Grammer. The video for Grammer's song 'Keep Your Head Up' is a real life example of a 'Choose Your Own Adventure' story and users can choose what actions they want Andy to take in the video. In November, the most popular choices will be compiled into one video  and the result will be uploaded to Vevo.

While shooting the video scenes for each choice did not require any specialized equipment,  the process of stringing the different choices today required some cutting edge technology. So cutting edge, in fact, that Grammer's label has taken an equity stake in the company that developed it, according to a recent Wall Street Journal article.

Watch (and interact) with the full video, here.

3. The Cold War Kids’ “I’ve Seen Enough”

'I've Seen Enough' was directed by Sam Jones, who also directed a documentary about the band, Wilco. The video, developed in Flash 10, was nicely compressed to cut down on loading times. The interactive bars at the top allow users to mix and match different styles of the same song, from reggae to acoustic. Users can also click on individual band members to mute or unmute them.

Interactive Videos and the Arts...

While some of the technology utilized in the above experiments can be classified as cutting edge, artists and arts organizations shouldn't be deterred from dabbling in creating their own interactive video experiments. One of the most popular ways musicians have interacted with fans is by streaming concerts, informal jam sessions and interviews online via Ustream. Once logged into Ustream, users can interact with the artist and other fans in real-time. Musicians have also encouraged fans to create slideshows set to their music and upload them to sites like YouTube and Vimeo. As open source software and user collaboration becomes more popular, there's no doubt that more and more artists will be producing this type of content.

What you need to know about viral video and the law

Technology in the Arts has just released a publication reviewing legal issues surrounding using video footage online. (Access the PDF publication here.) Whether you are in marketing, development, education or operations, chances are that you will encounter some kind of contract or legal issue involving performance footage, either online or offline.  This white paper serves as a survey of current industry trends and practices, as well as a guide to those exploring the ever-changing landscape of online media and the intellectual property and union issues associated with it. While nothing can replace the advice of a good lawyer on legal issues, this guide can alert you to potential problems while you are planning online media campaigns involving performance footage.

Do you have a story about issues you've had distributing performance footage online? Please share below.

Why the Arts Matter - Video Contest Winner

Earlier this year, Americans for the Arts launched an online video contest to encourage U.S. residents over the age of 13 to answer the question, "Why do the arts matter to you?" Congratulations to all of the winners!

Grand Prize Winner - Starting Artists, Inc. Over 18 Winner - Student Advocates for the Arts Under 18 Winner - Linzy Paige

Focus on the data: LSO's Digital Season Brochure

A page from the 10/11 LSO brochure. Click image to see the whole brochure.

Last year I wrote about the London Symphony Orchestra’s digital season brochure. As technology and environmental concerns cause more printed pieces to go online, the arts industry will see more season brochures go digital. According to a recent Technology in the Arts poll, 56% of arts organizations already have their season brochure online in some form (PDF or interactive).

Last season was the first that they made the brochure, launching it in February of 2009 with their season announcement. Based on its success, they have released another brochure this year with plans to distribute it more widely. Today I have a follow-up with Digital Marketing Manager Jo Johnson about the success of last year’s brochure.

The marketing team at the London Symphony Orchestra chose to make last year’s season brochure after deciding to plan the online and offline elements of our season campaign together.  Jo said, “we had produced films to illustrate the season's themes, but it was a few months after the season had first gone on sale, and so felt rather like an afterthought. Also we had decided that we were going to put our season on sale online before we opened to telephone booking, so turning to online channels (email, web and social networks) to send info out to the bookers felt natural. A digital brochure was the obvious choice.”

The first page of the brochure created by Ceros includes an instruction window for newcomers.

For newcomers to the digital brochure, it may be hard to know where to get the technology to make the brochure, as well as how much lead time to allow for it. This year symphony again used interactive publication platform Ceros to create their season brochure, complete with audio and video. Other platforms that were suggested in our poll included Issuu and Yudu.

According to Jo, after the art and copy was approved for the print brochure, the digital brochure only took about two additional weeks. “[The print version] needs to be made suitable for online readers (adding some buttons, changing some bits of text to make it obvious that their links, making the images 16:9 ratio so that you can embed a video over it). That's about a week. Then because I don't have Flash skills, the digital brochure company did all the Flash work for me. They were pretty quick, but leave time for changes, testing and sign off. That was about another week.”

Jo found that the brochure was driving traffic primarily to concert pages (where tickets can be purchased). “The top 20 clicked links are all to concerts, with the season opening concert on 20 September being the most clicked.” Using Google Analytics, Jo determined that roughly 1 in 5 viewers played a video, and viewing figures correspond to page numbers (i.e. the least viewed video is last in the brochure). Viewers stayed on the digital season brochure an average of about four minutes.  Overall, the 2009/10 digital brochure was viewed 10,870 times. Based on the data she pulled she concluded that the amount of revenue directly from the brochure covered its costs, but that the brochure “played a more of a role in decision making than direct purchasing." She said:

On the financial side, I could see purchases made on our website that had come directly from the digital brochure. Added up, the income was just over the figure it cost to make the brochure. But as with all marketing, I'm also interested in the purchases that were made as a result of someone having the digital brochure, but not directly. At the LSO we talk about multi-channel marketing and CRM, whereby we allow the customer to make his own decision on which method to use to make the final purchase. So although the brochure had embedded links back to the LSO website where tickets can be bought, a customer may have browsed the brochure, seen a concert they like, gone away to chat to a friend about going together, made a decision a week later, and then gone back directly to the website to make the purchase, or called the box office on the phone. In this case I would not have seen the income from his ticket in the analysis I did on the brochure; and this is what I meant when I said 'It's likely it plays more of a role in decision making than direct purchasing.'

When taking on these technological innovations, it’s difficult to know how to measure success. As Jo said in our conversation, “This is the challenge marketers face every day--how to track customers as they hop through our available channels.” Your outreach program or social media site may have paid for itself in tickets, but how do we measure things like brand recognition? Social marketing experts like Charlene Li and David Berkowitz have come out with suggestions, some of which go beyond mere revenue. Jo saw two huge benefits to producing the brochure, beyond its break-even point.

The very fact that we had produced one at all gave the LSO a huge amount of coverage. It was passed around as a 'novelty' item, which people enjoyed looking at, turning the pages, watching the videos, just to see what it did. This is the same kind of benefit as social media brings an organization--people talking about your group. They might be on the other side of the world, they might not come and buy a ticket, but the fact that you have come to their attention is almost as valuable as a ticket sale - in our case it may eventually assist in ticket sales when we go on tour, or on sales of our CDs (our own label). Unfortunately, the "buzz" isn't really trackable in any meaningful sense, other than clicks and views and Retweets. But it still counts.

Lastly, the digital brochure brought a small environmental benefit. We reduced the number of brochures we printed, since we sent it out to people on our database that had email addresses instead of the print in the post. We also used the digital brochure in the information we emailed out to journalists at the season launch, instead of posting them one. Our Managing Director likes to email the digital brochure to prospective festivals and venues abroad as our "flagship" publications, thus saving more paper and postage. I'm sure the effects are negligible in the bigger picture, but any boost to our green credentials helps!

So, is investing time and money worth it for your company? Here are Jo’s thoughts:

Probably the most useful thing I can offer is some thoughts into whether others should follow suit and produce a digital brochure. Here's some:

• A digital brochure should never replace your printed one, but should be complementary to it. A good marketing campaign should have all the online and offline elements planned in together at the same time.
• Personally I think the key to it is to have good content which makes it worthwhile - video content is the obvious one. There are plenty of free options for making a digital brochure out of your PDF, but mostly these don't offer the rich media content like embedded videos and soundclips.
• Make sure you have the mechanisms and a plan in place to market the digital brochure - which can only really be done online. Social networks are ideal, but don't ignore your own website! There's no point in having one if you don't market it - people will not stumble upon it randomly.
• Ideally the digital brochure should be designed with online usage in mind - and possibly independently from the print version. We weren't able to do this wholesale though because of the cost of the designers! We chose the route of adapting the printed version.

Firing Up Museums With Sparks! Ignition Grants

From digital archiving techniques to mobile websites, museums around the country are finding news ways to innovate in our current and rapidly changing information age. There is now an emphasis on experimentation and testing the boundaries of what traditionally defines a museum. The Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) has initiated a new grant program with this emphasis in mind and is seeking proposals for the current fiscal year. The Sparks! Ignition grants can be up to $25,000, are available for a period of up to one year, and have no matching requirements. Yes, you read that correctly. No matching requirements.

The Sparks! Ignition program is intended for all eligible institutions that want to utilize innovative methods to address some of the current problems that museums and libraries in the U.S. are experiencing. For more information about the application and to find out if your institution meets the criteria for eligibility, visit the IMLS website .

On November 3^rd, IMLS staff will be offering a webinar explaining the purpose of the grants, articulating the application process, and answering questions. Your organization will have to move quickly though, the application deadline for all Sparks! grants is November 15^th, 2010.

Future Focus: The Public Art Archive

Sharing information and digital media about public art has never been an easy task for arts administrators. The Western States Arts Federation (WESTAF) seeks to change that when they launch the Public Art Archive - an online, searchable database for public art in the United States. A tool for both arts administrators and the general public, WESTAF’s vision is for the Archive to serve as an easy to use, central source of information about public art. I recently had a chance to speak with the creators of the Public Art Archive and take a guided tour through the site.

The Public Art Archive has a straightforward, user-friendly interface.  Entry to the Archive takes place through a simple search bar on the front page, powered by Solr, an open-source search platform from by the Apache Lucene project.  You may already be familiar with Solr, as it is the search engine used by both Etsy.com and FoodNetwork.com.

Solr allows you to refine simple searches on the Archive through multiple filters with a variety of search criteria such as artist, location, materials, collections and even nicknames. The search criteria and vocabulary for the site was built from the same standards as those used by reference websites like ARTstor and the digital library projects at Harvard.

Once they’ve found the artwork they are searching for, users are presented with a variety of information and media about the work. In addition to the artwork’s basic info, users can view pictures and video, download PDFs about the artwork, and listen to audio describing the piece.

While the capability for all this content is built in, individual administrators must submit all information and media for each artwork. The Archive has no limit on the amount of content that can be submitted for each work and submission of the content is free. At a minimum, the site requires a full description for each work, as well as its location, and one high quality image.

To enable use of the Archive when an individual is physically in front of a work of public art,  the Archive will be accessible from any web-enabled mobile device. No specific apps will be required, users just plug the main url for the Archive into their phone's web browser to access the full functionality of the site.

The Public Art Archive will also be fully integrated with Google Maps.  By clicking the site’s “Map This” icon, users will be able to view exactly where the artworks are located and build custom maps of artworks that can be shared with others or saved for later use.   Administrators can use the mapping function to create custom maps for use in tours of their collection, maintenance tasks, and advocacy initiatives.

The ability for organizations to create personalized pages so they can maintain their identity will be added as the Archive progresses. WESTAF also plans to have licenses available to give organizations access to the more administrative functions of the Archive.

The Public Art Archive will be launching in the near future, but until then visit westaf.org to check out some of WESTAF's other projects that offer technological solutions for arts administrators.

Social Media Spotlight: New York Theatre Network

Welcome to the second installment of the Social Media Spotlight, our monthly feature focusing on arts organizations’ social media strategies.

The global trend of participation in social networks and social media is one to which arts managers have been paying a great deal of attention. With over 500 million active Facebook users, 55 million tweets being sent per day and over 133 million active bloggers in the United States alone, arts organizations and arts managers are growing increasingly interested in identifying ways to engage their audiences and connect to new audiences via social media.

One of the more recent example of the intersection of social media and audience development is the creation of the New York Theatre Network (NYTN). Launched on September 28, NYTN seeks to be “your hub for what’s happening on New York City Stages”. The network focuses specifically on theatre events in New York City, and while any theatre fan can check out the latest happenings, only member theatres are able to upload content about their organization onto the website.

NYTN is unique in that it was designed to be an interactive social network as opposed to a static directory and listing of information. Its Facebook Connect feature enables users to find out what their friends are ‘liking’,  ‘attending’ and/or ‘recommending’ and also allows users to make their own recommendations.

Theatres are also encouraged to interact with audiences as they are able to upload YouTube videos, their Twitter stream, blog posts and an event calendar onto their pages. A gracious sponsorship from Flip Video’s Spotlight For Good Program made it possible for member theatres to record video and upload this content onto their page.

NYTN is the result of a cooperative effort between The Alliance of Resident Theatres/ New York and theatre industry website Theater Mania.  A.R.T. New York Executive Director Virginia Louloudes was inspired by a keynote speech delivered by Diane Ragsdale of the Andrew Mellon Foundation two years ago in which she addressed the decline in arts participation and examined possible solutions for this dilemma. One suggestion was for arts organizations to consider becoming “arts concierges” and help consumers find shows and performances based on their individual tastes.

Louloudes saw an opportunity to create a site that would serve as a “one stop shop” for theatre fans,  encourage a new level of interaction between theatres and audiences, and introduce fans to new theatres and upcoming shows they may not have been aware of.  The project was an extensive one and called for outside funding, workshops with member theatres, and a partnership with Theater Mania for technological support. While such an ambitious project may not be feasible for all arts organizations, Louloudes hopes that the creation of NYTN will encourage arts managers to develop their own social media strategies, especially since most platforms are free.

Those interested in further reading on NYTN's marketing efforts should also consult the following blog articles from Devon Smith, who served as project manager for NYTN and frequently blogs about social media:

Advertising ROI: a case for Facebook Ads

New York Theatre Network: it's launch day!

The Handheld Guide: Experimenting with Mobile Technology in Museums

There has been a lot of buzz lately about mobile technology with the release of mobile apps by some major museums like MoMA, The Brooklyn Museum, and the Museum of Natural History. Reviews have been mixed, but the discussion about the way mobile technology should be used in museums has definitely picked up speed.

The popular view of mobile technology seems to be focused (a little too much?) on one main format - having a downloadable, mobile application. While developing your own app can be a good way to deliver content to your visitors, it is definitely not the only approach. I decided to take a look at four different ways that some museums have been experimenting and implementing mobile tech in their institutions.

The TAP home screen and numeric input screen. via the Indianapolis Museum of Art blog

Providing not just an app, but also the device itself - TAP at The Indianapolis Museum of Art

The IMA wanted to include all their visitors in their mobile tech program, not just those who own a smartphone. So they took the extra step of providing gallery goers with an iPod Touch for the duration of their visit. By placing the device in the visitor’s hands, everyone has access to the digital content the IMA provides and no user is alienated for not owning or having an incorrect mobile device.

The iPods cost five dollars to rent and only contain the TAP app and an instructional video on how to use both the iPod and the app in tandem with the galleries. The app works on a numeric input system, a 3-digit code is associated with every piece in the tour that presents users with different content such as video interviews with artists, text files, pictures, and audio files explaining the artwork.

By sticking to one type of device, the IMA was able to tailor the user experience exactly the way they wanted, which was their main goal for developing a mobile program. This approach circumvents the need for an app store and allows for all content to be controlled in-house. The content management system is the same one used for their website and allows IMA to instantly edit and update their content without needing to go through a third-party developer.  The devices also have built-in polls and can provide both museum staff and TAP users with the real-time results.

Visit the IMA’s blog to check out the development process of the Tap Program and some of their ideas about developing a successful mobile standard for museums.

Integrating mobile websites and mobile apps: The Brooklyn Museum

A mobile website is the mobile-friendly version of an organization’s existing website. In a recent post, we examined the differences between mobile websites and mobile applications.

The Brooklyn Museum has developed a mobile website that is accessible from any web-enabled mobile device. In addition to sharing information about the institution, users are encouraged to get involved by recommending pieces of art work and apply descriptive tags through the Brknlynmuse and Gallery tag! features of the mobile website.

Brooklyn Museum's main website (left) and their mobile site (right). Via the Brooklyn Museum blog

To create a more accessible experience for those with more app-friendly devices, Brooklyn Museum also created downloadable apps for both iPhone and Android that simply wrap the current mobile website. The same functionality and features of the mobile site are there, the apps just act as a different port of entry. This has proven to be a more sustainable approach to their mobile strategy than building each app up from scratch.

You can find more info on Brooklyn Museum’s blog for their approach to their mobile website and their mobile applications.

Connecting to content with QR codes: The Mattress Factory

The Mattress Factory, an installation art museum in Pittsburgh, has been experimenting with implementing QR codes in their exhibits in an effort to reduce the number of brochures in their museum as part of a green initiative.  QR stands for “Quick Response”, connecting users to content within seconds of scanning the code with your phone. A QR code is a two-dimensional barcode that is readable by mobile devices with 3G access, a built-in camera and a barcode reading app.

A developer is not required to create QR codes; and with this method, a museum can start immediately experimenting with mobile technology.

QR code placement in the Mattress Factory's exhibition space. via the Mattress Factory blog.

The codes are free to generate and contain text information. Once you generate a code online, it can be printed out and placed next to the piece in your collection. For more media based content such as pictures, audio and video, the content must be uploaded to sites like YouTube or Flickr. The QR code will link users directly to that content.

More info on the Mattress Factory’s use of QR codes can be found on the Mattress Factory blog.

Taking advantage of an existing app: Augmented Reality with the Andy Warhol Museum

Augmented Reality (AR) refers to using a mobile device to view digital images overlaid onto real locations.  AR apps use a smartphone’s built-in camera and GPS to identify where the user is and overlays the content for that location.

Warhol, Warhol, Everywhere! A typical street view using the Andy Warhol layer. Via the Andy Warhol Museum.

The Andy Warhol Museum’s AR layer places images of Andy Warhol’s face over real-world locations in Pittsburgh and New York that were historically relevant to his life. Touching each icon provides users with pictures of artwork and/or content associated with each location and the way it played a part in Warhol’s career.  The Andy Warhol AR project is not an app itself, but a filter layer that is installed on an existing AR app called Layar, available for Android devices and iPhones.

You can find some more info on the Andy Warhol AR project here and how to create your own AR layers here.

So where does your organization weigh in? We would love to see some your opinions in the comments section of what you feel are some of the advantages and disadvantages of these approaches. What would most influence your organization’s approach to mobile technology?

Related Posts: Museums and the Web 2011: Thomas's Recap The State of the Mobile: The 2011 Museum & Mobile Survey

Online Video: We All Want The Same Thing

This post also appears as part of the Arts Marketing Blog Salon hosted by Americans for the Arts.

The world of arts management is changing, as all industries are changing, with the proliferation of technology. Especially with the increasing popularity of online media, we as arts managers have had to reconsider the way we see our performances. Is online video footage merely a vessel for our product? Or is it, in fact, our product? Or, can it also be a means to an end?

Many see social media and its democratization of internet content as the tool that will restore relevance to the arts, which critics claim is no longer present.

In recent weeks, we’ve seen changes in the social media landscape that make the issues surrounding performance footage all the more relevant. Twitter is adding video embedding capability. YouTube will soon be able to handle streaming video for content partners. These are signals of a trend that is already in progress—a movement of online video footage becoming not only accepted, but commonplace. Like it or not, online video is here to stay.

It was for this reason that I assembled a panel of experts on the rise of streaming video, and its interaction with our union relationships to speak at the NAMP Conference this November. It will be an opportunity to talk about the challenges that we face, as an industry, when it comes to video footage.

As an employee of an arts service organization and an arts management student at Carnegie Mellon, I’m in a unique position to examine performance footage in social media. Instead of having a vested interest in what would be best financially for a given organization, I can look at what is best for the arts industry as a whole and where the industry stands on these issues.

Over the past year, I’ve been looking at intellectual property issues as they pertain to performance footage. This research will culminate in an upcoming white paper for the Center for Arts Management and Technology. I’ve talked to unions, I’ve talked to organizations, and I’ve talked to artists. It’s fascinating to listen to their positions and how they perceive “the other side.”

Artists sometimes view online distribution of performance footage as a sort of Pandora’s Box: releasing their performance footage means relinquishing control of it and monetization of the content. They see organizations as trying to take advantage of their skills, or reducing the value of their work. Although they understand that organizations are struggling, they are struggling, too.

Organizations, on the other hand, are struggling with the realities of the economic downturn, as well as a decrease in newspaper circulation and in the general effectiveness of advertising in traditional media. They see new media as a lifeline, and take it on in order to secure their organization’s future. Some perceive that artists don’t equate saving the organization with saving the artform and the artist’s own career. This assumption leaves them puzzled and unsure how to proceed.

Although these positions seem diametrically opposed, both artists and organizations have common interests. In choosing and chatting with my panelists, who come from all different disciplines and affiliations, it seemed like there might be some fundamental conflicts between them. However, during our first conference call, I was amazed at how willing we were to listen and how much we genuinely wanted to understand each other’s viewpoints.

More often than not, I’ve found that we are all striving for the same thing—increased attendance, our own ensured success, and in turn, a bright future for the arts in America—we sometimes just have different ways of going about it.