As you read or listen to the news you probably hear a lot about how MySpace.com is getting bigger and bigger and even bigger still. You may also hear about how the whole point of joining is to see how many friends you can accumulate.
It may come as a surprise to you that Six Apart, the folks who brought you the Typepad, Movable Type and LiveJournal are offering a new social network service intended to limit what you blog to a small number of people. (Though that was the intent of Myspace.com too)
It took me a few minutes to realize that Six Apart was doing the smart thing and not trying to compete with MySpace.com but rather was going after the market of people who didn’t want to be associated with MySpace’s size and controversies.
The new free service called Vox promises highly customizable privacy features which lets you set limits on specific entries, photos and videos or globally restrict everything you do.
If this is true, there are some great applications for arts organizations. It can be used for a members-only site to let subscribers know about specific specials offers coming up. Not that I would encourage any more appearances of stratified levels of elitism in the arts, you could also set different levels of access for different groups of people. One area for subscribers only, another for donors who subscriber perhaps. (Although it appears that the only categories you can use are the pre-set family and/or friend, I will bet future versions will have customizable categories if they are smart.)
Another use might be for inexpensive project management and information sharing. Directors and designers located around the world geographically could share information at initial stages of performance planning. Script revisions can be posted as they are produced. Design sketches can be shared. The light grid and stage dimensions and inventory lists can always be stored there for continual reference. A choreographer can film what he/she envisions for dance and fight scenes and post it for comments.
The more I think about it, the more convinced I am that something like what I proposed in my last entry can be viable. Whether it is something open to the whole world like Myspace, smaller like Vox or all the blogs and websites in between, people want to express themselves to others. It’s in the music collections on iPods, YouTube videos included on webpages, and lists of favorite everythings in the margins. People are curating what they like and want to show it off.
People may view a chance to do live collaborating with a noted arts group as an opportunity to have a little respectability rub off on them and may jump at the chance. Some may be a little more reticent to become involved. Just as there is a place on the web for people who want to boast about having lotsa friends, groups that tailor their interactive programs for the talented but shy can find interested audience-partners, too.
