I’m currently taking part in Birmingham Opera‘s production of Othello as part of the volunteer singing chorus and offered them an hour or so of my time to run through some things they could do with their Internet presence. So I was rather surprised to see my name appear twice in the program – once for the many hours of work I’ve put learning how to sing the thing properly and again for a little bit of “Interweb advice.”
Given the limited amount of work I can’t take too much credit (or blame!) for what they did with the Facebook page, Tumblr and Twitter but it was good to see them experiment and a surprising number of things I suggested sunk in. The only problem, it seems, was that age old issue of capacity and time. When you’re putting on a massive opera updating the blog isn’t really your priority, especially if it’s not built up a big audience yet.
I’ve really enjoyed being part of the chorus and am seriously thinking of joining in with the next production, whatever it may be. And if I do I’m considering proposing a more coherent online strategy to try and move it away from a ticket sales role (which isn’t really necessary given how each night sold out before the premier) and towards something which complements the reasons why Birmingham Opera put on large-scale performances in disused industrial spaces involving hundreds of volunteers taken from the communities of Birmingham. That would be a pretty interesting project.
And, as Jaki points out, anyone who’s using the term “Interweb” is already half way there.