Date: Wed, 22 Jul 2009 01:58:10 -0400 (EDT)
From: Michael Black mblack@ pubnix.net
To: letters@ thegazette.canwest.com
Subject: Theatre St. Catherine is a spam issue
The problem with this Theatre St. Catherine story is that every one is commenting on it without adding anything useful, and everyone is propagating the story because it's already a story.
It's not a linguistic issue, it's a spam issue.
Theatre St. Catherine spams.
I know, because I started getting email from them last year (at least), out of the blue and I've had no contact with them. It's to an email address that was visible for four months starting on November 30th 2005, and I haven't handed it out to anyone since then. I have a good idea where they got the email address from, another arts group that likewise spams.
It's what all the arts groups do. They have no internet strategy, so they stick to 1978 and collect email addresses. But now, they can do it anytime someone emails them, they don't have to ask.
Anyone looking at Theatre St. Catherine's website would see no place to sign up for emailings, just one single email address for info.
These groups are not using proper email list software, they just pop the addresses in their address book. Which means the only way to get off the list is emailing a real person. There is no place at Theatre St. Catherine's website to automatically get off the list.
These groups think what they have to sell (and it is selling) is so important that they'll just add you to their list. It's no wonder they react badly when someone emails them to get off the list.
These groups have lousy webpages. Often static, too often lacking in information, and too often not engaging the reader. They go for gloss, as if we'll be dazzled by fancy pictures of nothing. Too ofen they've abdicated, so they require a third party to put up new information, which keeps the pages static. They jump on all the latest trends, yet say very little.
They haven't worked with the internet, they stand alone rather than build up clusters where bicycle repair or used book sales are next to annoucements of a show at Studio 303 or the Yellow Door or someone's review of a show next to commentary on new buses. They think the internet is about a handful dominating the many, rather than giving power to the individual.
They think the internet is for advertising, rather than community where one has to engage the population to get them involved, where one may be merely a recipient of information in one case, while the next a source of information and wisdom. They don't learn from the internet, they cling to their old networks where everyone else is doing the same thing, so it must be right.
I decided I'd never go to Theatre St. Catherine after they started spamming me. Yet, I had sort of made that decision earlier, when I saw a lone poster for a show there and tried to find more information about it. Nothing at all at their website. Eric Amber came into town and followed what the other arts groups were doing, which is using the internet for pretty much nothing.
Witness the webpage of the imaginary "zoofest". I can't, my favorite browser is rejected by it, and even a more mainstream browser sees nothing of use. I've seen at least four comments about how awful the website is, and that is saying a lot. Just For Laughs ("zoofest.ca" is registered to the comedy festival, the whois look up is here ) has missed the important part of the internet, about getting the information out. They think gloss is what matters, so information doesn't get out.
Which is why these groups are so reliant on email spam. They don't use the websites properly because they think it's too complicated, then they think it needs to be glossy, which gets in the way of simple information. They don't understand that they have all the space needed to give detail, they don't understand that they don't need gloss to attract attention because nobody drives by a webpage, they don't understand that they need to keep feeding information if they expect people to come back for the important news. They don't grasp the fundamental of being simple so the information gets out.
Then they turn around and decide that we should get the information as email. It's worse, since they often end up sending webpages as email (they could just slap that up on the web), or large graphics that take forever to download, but say very little. Or they send things in some proprietary format (and specifically as attachments that might be virus-ridden), often large too, but which won't do a thing unless you have the right commercial software. They decide the frequency of the email, they decide that if they forget something in one, it's okay to send out another one right after. They are even so sloppy that multiple times from one group, they've sent out email where all the recipients email addresses are visible. When I took offense the third time (and I'd previously mentioned it was a no-no), I was treated like the problem rather than as someone concerned about such things, or an irate receiver of spam that wasn't even sent properly. They even decide whether you're allowed to get off the list or not.
This story is no different. Chances are good the group never signed up with Theatre St. Catherine. So they are getting email that they didn't ask for. Then, it's in English. It's intrusive already, but the venue can't even grasp that it becomes doubly unwanted when no consideration is given to the receiver? Note the English would not be intrusive if someone had signed up for the emailings, it becomes intrusive because someone was forced to receive the email. "If you really have to force me onto your email list, at least let it be in French".
The groups do not have a clue how invasive unwanted email is. Their need comes before the receiver, when the receivers are all paying for the internet access which makes it so cheap for the sender to spam. They don't tell us things of interest, "we went to Ottawa to try to get more funding for the arts", they tell us about shows they want us to buy tickets for. They fail, not only in being visible to all (an email list is all about people who have already found their way in, not about luring new people in), but they then do a lousy job engaging the people who might care when funding issues come up.
Why should I care about the arts when the arts groups that I've long patronized and helped out treat me like an idiot, to be told about shows and nothing else? Those groups often do a lousy job of telling us about shows anyway, they spend their time making glossy photos and barely say anything in words. Email about how to use the internet better, that's an opening for dialogue, not for me to be ignored until they want to use my email address to send me spam. If I point out a potential threat to funding, they'd better engage me rather than sending out email later about the matter like I don't exist.
When Theatre St. Catherine started up, their shows started showing up in email from another arts group that spams. But nobody bothered to tell us about this new venue, or why we should care. That's what's wrong. Gossip is a connecting thing, and these arts groups do a lousy job of it.
This Theatre St. Catherine story is no different from when one gay theatre group whined (see the email here) to their contact list four years ago. They objected to the Quebec Drama Federation and to everyone they had email addresses for, because some had asked to not be sent any more email. The group whined that it didn't spam, but I know it did since I was getting their junk (junk because I didn't ask for it). They saw it as an issue of homophobia, and were whining about that, and about how it wasn't right for people to want to be off the list. The only difference was nobody went to the press back then. It's the same issue, a group that spams, others who want off the list, and a reaction from the group as if the people wanting off the list are the problem. The only reason I stopped getting their emails, along with a lot of other groups, was because I changed ISPs and the email address they had ceased to work.
It's not my fault if these arts groups (and most small groups in general) feel so impotent at getting their word out that they have to cling to those they've already sold tickets to. I've wasted over a decade trying to change things, and all I get is spam. The internet makes the community the network, the internet allows information to flow around blockage, but these small groups want to live in old networks where outsider don't count, and they control things by not letting information loose. I cared enough about the arts to waste a lot of effort over 13 years, knowing it was important enough to be out there in the world, not hidden away on mailing lists.
Michael Black