Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2005 22:37:30 -0400 (EDT)
From: Michael Black <blackm00@cam.org>
To: peter@ peteranthonyholder
Cc: anulman  wetlabel.com
info  airborne-e.com
Subject: The "debacle of 2001"


No, it has nothing to do with Andy Nulman on stage in 2001
at the Fringe Festival.

I wrote, at http://www.cam.org/~blackm00/in-news2005.html, this year:

"At the Beer Tent last night I notice that the forms for the Buzz is
different this year, and down at the bottom in fine print is "What are
others saying? Find out at wetlabel.com" Another carpetbagger apparently. As
always, the Fringe seems to think it's okay if something is commercial but
overlooks completely that the internet is about giving power to people.
What's the purpose of this site, how come we've never heard of it before,
and who are these other people? Oh wait, someone with the last name of
"Nulman" is connected, so another foray into the internet world? Remember
the fans from 2000? Get a clue kids, your page takes way too long to 
load."

In 2000 Andy Nulman had a company named thefunniest.com  I still have
no idea what it was about, since my browser couldn't access the site.
(I don't care for commercial enterprises, but too many small groups
are loaded with bloat on their webpages, or are too browser-specific
and  they can't afford to turn away viewers.)

They were a sponsor of the Fringe that year, though at one point
the Fringe issued posters that referred to it as "the funniest.com".
When I saw that one, I went home and checked it, and couldn't figure
out what a website apparently in New Jersey and just holding a domain
had anything to do with our Fringe.  (When the Fringe can't tell
there is a difference, you know they have no internet policy.)

They ran a contest, obviously to promote the business/website, with
the prize being an air conditioner.  They also had laminated plastic
fans to give away, promoting the contest.  The fans bombed because
it was fairly cool that year.  We must have tossed the remaining boxes
of them when we took down the Beer Tent.  The winner of the air conditioner
was supposed to be announced at the Frankie Awards the final night,
and the air conditioner was even seen right before.  But no mention
of the contest, and no public mention of the winner.

The next year, no sign of the business.  Amy Barratt, in her Mirror 
preview piece for the Fringe the next year, in the June 14, 2001 issue,
said (in explaining why there was a $2 mandatory pin that year),
   "The reason for this development, which is common at many similar
    events throughout the world, is that one of its big sponsors
    --Internet company Thefunniest.com--has gone the way of many
   dot-coms in the past year and, well, the festival needs the
   revenue."

I don't care who sponsors the Fringe, but I do care about the internet,
and I do care about the Fringe as a small thing where you want to
see underdogs do well.

What drew me into the Fringe was an online forum dedicated to the Fringe 
on The Mirror's BBS back in 1995.  That was the "printing press" and 
suddenly all those groups that whined about not being able to get out 
their message suddenly had it.  That year I posted a sizeable number
of posts, going beyond the simplistic buzz that appeared at the Beer
Tent, and the next year I was posting extended  comments on a daily
basis about the Fringe.  Trying to put online the essence of the Fringe
that you miss if you don't see it first hand.  I saw the potential, so
I used it.  Few people viewed the stuff because it was still an early part 
of the curve, but had it kept going it would have grown.

I don't do reviews, but I must have written the most about the
Montreal Fringe on the internet if you subtract the professionals
who's material is online only incidentally.   I was "blogging" the
Fringe  before the term was even invented. I don't even claim
to have done a good job.  Since the Fringe doesn't talk to me
about this stuff there is a limit about what information I have.
But I do it infinitely better than just about anyone else, because
very few people are doing it.  Besides, my point was to stake out
the internet for small groups like the Fringe, that getting the
word out was more important than being fancy, that small groups
should have as much standing as some commercial enterprise like
thefunniest.com or wetlabel.com

The Fringe basically has no policy about the internet.  While
you have all the troupes begging for audience and trying all
kinds of schemes to get the attention of the press and the audience,
very little happened for much of those ten years online.  Some
would have websites but the Fringe couldn't even get them all into
the program, let alone put the links up early.  While in 1995 and
'96, before Jeremy became chief, there was an open forum to discuss
things, most of the years since we don't even know who is coming
until late May when the program went online.

So if a decade ago the word was "the internet is too technical"
now we have the same groups saying "it's too much work, I need
it to be glossy".  So rather than at the very minimum being able
to read their press release, for groups that may not even get
a mention in the press, we get nothing.

For years I was printing out what was online about the Fringe
and handing it to whoever was in charge at the Fringe, first
David Gobeil Taylor and then after 96 to Jeremy.  Gaetan Charlebois
with the Mirror and then Hour, was putting reviews up daily,
a way to use the internet to get around the problem of a weekly
that will only have one chance for reviews during the festival,
but the Fringe didn't have links to it from their website.

In 2000, I finally decided nobody was going to get the hint, so
I wrote up some of this stuff, and gave it to Jeremy.  No response.
So I turned around and put it into html and put it online, in
effect breaking the concept that it's too difficult to make webpages.
No it's not pretty, but the point was that any groups starving to
reach an audience had better start somewhere and can get fancy later.

Ironically I've spent more time promoting the Fringe website, a key
part of any internet policy, than in promoting my site.

So yes, I resent internet carpetbaggers coming into the Fringe
because they want to make some money off the internet.  So long as
that's the image of what the internet is for, the small groups
who need to make use of it, be they art groups or political groups,
will suffer.  I mean, groups can't even grasp that webpages aren't
billboards where people will pass by.  They have glossy opening
pages that take forever to load but have no purpose.  Yet they
aren't promoting them properly, and in the case of the Fringe
up till this year the troupes that had webpages couldn't even
benefit because there were no links to their pages from the Fringe
site until this year.

We've had years when some guy was doing really good reviews on
his blog, adding significantly to the available reviews, and
no link to them from the Fringe website, so he either had to promote
it himself (he didn't do that much) or not be found.  (As part of my
ad-hoc work to make use of the internet, I showed one performer
the review of her show, and she put stickers on her posters pointing
to the blog).  We had some good years when the Gazette was running 
reviews, but no links to them until 2001, which was about when their 
online policy changed so less was online and later you basically had to be 
a subscriber to read it online.

We've had years when http://www.montreal.com which seems anything but
commercial had a significant number of reviews online, yet no links.
In 2001, when the Fringe finally did put links to online reviews,
they didn't even get it right, pointing to newspaper articles online
rather than to the new material that was only viewable online.

All the while we had as sponsors thefunniest.com (apparently went out
of business without doing much), thesetunes.com (after one year of
arranging the music at the Beer Tent they lost their domain, leaving
the woman scrambling to register it under a different top level domain
and in effect lost to the world; she never returned), montrealplus.com
doing some silly murder mystery (their prize wasn't announced at the 
Frankies either, though that was the announced plan), and the "Internet 
Wrestling Syndicate", all coming in with some grand plan for the internet
when the most important thing was seeing it as an enabling thing for
those who need to reach an audience.

Starting in 2001, I started doing tedious searches to find out who
was coming to the Fringe, and who had websites.  Not easy when too
many websites are simply lists of upcoming Fringe Festivals.  The point
was that if the Fringe wasn't doing it, the information should be 
collected in one place.  In 2002, one group I mentioned it to said
the Fringe was "disorganized"; no, they simply don't have a clue
about the internet.  Each year we see acts come from out of town,
lured by who knows what, and go home disappointed by the lack of
audience.  Yet if we were sitting down on the internet ahead of
time, they could be helped.  There should be an audience for every
show, it just has to be found.  And the more people who can offer
suggestions for promotion the more likely to find a very specific
and useful place to promote.  Instead, some kid out of journalism
school handles press each year, never to return, and since few
are really looking at the internet (instead they seek the grail of
being in the paper, and that ain't going to happen for the hundred
or so troupes that are now coming to the Fringe), it's not being
used.

I'd not have mentioned wetlabel in that way except that they obviously
paid to put their logo on the Buzz of the Beer Tent forms.  There is 
something foul when the wild internet is ignored, but someone with
commercial interests gets to the front of the line.  And 
yes, given that I complain about bloated graphics that say nothing, I did 
comment on the slowness of the photos when I checked wetlabel the first 
time. I am tired of websites that take forever to load but say really 
nothing.

I had the most comprehensive list of reviews on the internet this
year, as I've had for years, making it easy (if anyone actually
looks at my website) to check for reviews of a given show.  But I
treated unknown bloggers the same as the commercial reviews, including
wetlabel.  That's what the internet equalizes.  Ironically, I might
have simply added them to the list had I come across their reviews
without comment, but since they wanted to brand, they get the comment.

There is a vast chasm between Just for Laughs and the Fringe. The former
is vastly larger, and they pay the acts, and do the promotion for
the different acts.  The Fringe is small.  While it's gotten to
the point where too much gets lost, it still only sees 20,000 tickets
sold (I don't even know if that includes freebies to the press,
the superpass owners and the volunteers) while it was about half
that in 1995.  The acts have to promote themselves, and one of
the intriguing things about the Fringe is that you see cause and
effect when it comes to promotion.  They need any help they can get,
and a static webpage, as the Fringe site has been for most years and
only slightly better in recent years, cannot reflect that.  Just For
Laughs doesn't even need a website, because they've got the money
for big ads on radio, tv and in the papers.  The Fringe doesn't have
the money, and does not promote specific acts, who definitely can't
afford such promotion.  Yet the acts can barely talk to the potential
audience before they come to a show, and don't do a good job of it.

And yes, I believe that is the legacy of a policy where people like
Andy Nulman have more say than some guy who's one of the longest running 
Fringe audience members, and actually one of the longest running (if 
laziest) Fringe volunteer, who also happens to be the longest running 
third party talking about the Fringe on the internet.  A decade ago,
when I started this, the Fringe was still small, and what to do
with the internet was still an open book.  But instead of leading,
the Fringe follows.

Like I said in a letter to the Mirror last year on an unrelated matter,
we own the words, we own the space.  And that power is lost if people
think the only way to use the internet is to emulate old media.

    Michael