Did you get enough Fringe Crush? May 31, 2008
Posted by Ryan in : Blogging, Podcasts, Orlando, Events, Fringe, Web Sites, statistics, OrlandoScene, Arts, bloggingfringe , add a commentThis year I thought I’d employ a bit of science to my Blogging of Fringe - I was worried the site had turned into all Fringe Crush, all the time, and completely about local acts instead of National and International. I was mostly right.
Here are some handy graphs to point out why we suck:
Here we see Text only posts at 10%
VoiceMail Reviews and audio at 13%
Any non-Fringe Crush videos at 37%
Fringe Crush takes it home with 41%
My second criticism is that we favored local, and the numbers don’t lie:
International 6%
National Acts 13%
On the Fringe 38%
Local Artists 43%
This scale is even graded on a curve, because I counted Bric-a-Brac as national because they’re from Austin, but they all used to live here, and they were produced by Beth. And the only things in the “On the Fringe” category were folks who were not in shows, but many of them have been in the past.
That means we had a distribution like this:
I guess 19% isn’t bad for Long Tail content. I’d like to do better. It’s a mission of mine to keep that number above 20% all the time, so I guess we did pretty well this time.
The Videos and Audio did have some categories we threw them in:
The new Fringe Moments were 11%
The VoiceMail Reviews at only 13%
The favorite Fringe Crush with 41%
Everything else this year with 35%
Also, I was very proud of us when I found out Beth would be presenting a Fringe Crush award for the show with the most crushes. Denna counted up the results, and by no surprise, VarieTease won! I think that’s a challenge to the cast of Oral to do some more campaigning for next year.
One last statistic, of the 32 shows I saw, 55% of them were not local.
Again, we’re counting Bric-A-Brac and Parlour Games as National, because they are… sortof.
2008 Patron’s Picks at the Fringe May 24, 2008
Posted by Ryan in : Events, Trends, Fringe , add a commentPatron’s Pick is the only accolade our Fringe Festival bestows on shows, whether local or out of town. I think all of the Picks this year will end up being local, which is a crying shame. I should check previous years and see if out of town shows have earned this honor in the past.
Patron’s Pick day is great - you have the day off of work, you have already sort of seen everything you want to, and you’re also not rushing from one venue to the next and worried about scheduling things, because there is only one show playing at any given time - this makes parking a bit easier, too, from what I can remember.
Genevieve says in today’s newsletter:
Here are the Patron’s Pick winners and their performance times on Monday. We are still waiting on Blue and Brown, as it is a very tight race! As soon as we know, it will be posted on www.orlandofringe.org!
Yellow Venue: Skip Peril and the Players of the Lost Trunk, 10:15 am
Fringe Fundraiser: T.J. Dawe’s The Slip-Knot, a benefit for the Fringe, 11:30 am in the Orange Venue
Red Venue: Alice in Wonderland, 1:15 pm
Green Venue: Dysfunctional Fables, 2:20 pm
Orange Venue: When Pigs Fly at 3:30, pm
Silver Venue: Reefer Madness, 4:20 pm
Pink Venue: Here Be Dragons, 10:00 pm
Radio Rickshaw Fringe Podcast
Posted by Ryan in : Podcasts, Orlando, Events, Fringe, Radio, bloggingfringe , 1 comment so far
Greg and John, and someone else… maybe the tech?
Two years ago, John Valines and the Rickshaw Boy crew won the Fringe of the Fringe Award - last year they gave it to Blogging Fringe. Radio Rickshaw is a long-running podcast here in Orlando with a small network of shows, and a barbershop quartet.
Also hosting this episode is Greg Barris from the Heart of Darkness Rock and Roll Circus. I actually don’t know much about Greg, except he used to live in Orlando, and he was involved with SAK Comedy Lab. His show was part monologue and part stand-up comedy, and it was pretty good.
Sometime during the week, I bumped into John and Greg with the Marantz recorder interviewing folks, and they talked to me a bit. I talk about Twitter, USB Humping Dogs and Fringe Shows, and I might be on mushrooms.
Radio Rickshaw Episode 62: Fringe 2008
Listen to the show.
Final Weekend of Fringe May 23, 2008
Posted by Ryan in : Blogging, Orlando, Links, Events, Reviews, Fringe, OrlandoScene, Theatre, bloggingfringe , 1 comment so farOnly 3 more days! (plus Patron’s Pick Day) Looks like When Pigs Fly and Alice in Wonderland have already been announced as Patron’s Picks for their venues, which sort of makes sense. If you’re interested in supporting the Fringe AND seeing TJ Dawe, check out Monday morning at 11:30, when TJ will be performing the Slip Knot.
As we rolled into the weekend last night with some light rain and lots of folks crowding the Shakespeare Center, I noticed three college-looking kids soliciting people for photographs. I walked up to tell them about Blogging Fringe, and it turned out they were the Orlando Metromix “SHOCK SQUAD”! Is Metromix the Sentinel one, that’s going to be changing their name? It’s not CityBeat, is it? It’s one of those. I went to see what coverage they had of the festival, and it was exactly one article - recommendations based on watching the preview. Also, no comments allowed. They asked me to link to them, and in hopes that they link back, here we go.
Check out Orlando Metromix’s Fringe Photoset - lots of familiar faces in there.
Last night, I lost my festival program. Normally no big deal, but this was different - I had written all sorts of notes in my program, marked down page numbers of shows, kept my tickets inside, and started to feel like my program was a treasured item - sort of like a stuffed animal or something, now lost. I checked the Brown Venue, the Blue Venue, the Ticket Booth, and the Garbage Can too, but my program was gone. I went to the box office to get some tickets re-printed ( handy reason for using credit card or the internet to buy your tickets), and proceeded to go through the tickets I did have with the volunteer to make sure I wasn’t missing any others.
Apparently, I’ve seen a lot of shows:
- A Brief History of Petty Crime
- American Squatter
- Boom
- *Flamenco con Fusion 08
- Galapagos: The Directors Cut
- **Here Be Dragons
- *Mark Baratelli
- Move!
- MR. FOX
- *Mr. Marmalade
- **New Rochelle
- On Second Thought
- *once upon a time: The End
- Oral
- Parlour Games
- perfectly broken
- Power To Pleasing: The Sex Lives of Teenage Girls
- *Red, White, and Ignorant: An American Love Story
- **Reefer Madness
- Shadows In Bloom
- Skip Peril and the Players of the Lost Trunk
- *Swell
- The Boy’s Own Jedi Handbook
- *The Bric-a-Brac Vagabond Vintage Variety Show
- The Cody Rivers Show presents: Stick to Glue
- The Greg Barris Heart of Darkness Rock and Roll Circus
- *The Slipknot: A Benefit for the Orlando Fringe
- Totem Figures
- TV iMature
- *Wet
- **VarieTEASE: No. 24 Doll Factory
- When Pigs Fly
* Indicates shows I have not seen, but I have a ticket for.
** Shows I saw after writing this blog post.
All of these shows (that I have seen) are awesome. Go see them all. If I could only tell you three, I would include The Cody Rivers Show, On Second Thought and Boom (not in that order). I would say Power to Pleasing, but it’s sold out. I continue to tell folks that if they haven’t seen any dance, they MUST go - we always have great dance at this festival, and I’m seeing all of the 5 dance shows this year. Lastly, (not leastly) if you’ve never seen TJ Dawe, Barry Smith, Jimmy Hogg, Greg Landucci, Gemma Wilcox or any of the other out-of-town monologists (like Paul Hutcheson from On Second Thought, mentioned earlier), they are all worth your time and money. This is also not counting Patron’s Pick day, where I plan to see some shows that have floated to the top, but I managed to miss. It should be a fun experience.
What was also a fun experience was getting a random contact from some folks from Rake Theatre down in Boynton Beach - they’re putting on Fluency this week at the Fringe. Apparently, they are wanting to start an all-Florida arts blog - a very ambitious project. I have about 3 such very ambitious projects in my head, in the works with locals, or I at least own the domain name for them.
The South Florida folks’ project is called, of all things, Florida Arts Blog, which is a Wordpress.com site right now, but for some reason the posts about Fringe have disappeared… ::shrug:: Something and someone to watch in the coming weeks and months. I am trying to sell them on Florida Creatives myself, blogging can come later. They’ve also got a link to Mark’s Orlando Arts Blog up there… I wonder if they’ve been emailing him too…?
Other things happening this weekend would be:
Orlando Silent Rave (see a video)
Saturday, May 24th, 5:24PM @ the Green Lawn of Fabulosity
Kite Flying 2.0 with Radio Rickshaw and Greg Barris
Sunday, May 25th 11AM - 5PM @ the Green Lawn on Drunkenness
Zombie March 3.7 with Rich Weirdos and Friends
Saturday, May 24th @ 3PM Park Ave and 5PM Lake Eola
If you know of more cool stuff, leave a comment and we’ll get it listed.
Orlando Fringe Begins! May 16, 2008
Posted by Ryan in : Orlando, Events, Reviews, Fringe, floridacreatives, bloggingfringe , add a commentLast night was the first day of shows for the 2008 Orlando International Fringe Theatre Festival, and I must say the Fringe has got a lot of great stuff going on! So many wonderful shows, both from Orlando regulars and some new folks as well - there’s even a show that takes place in the women’s bathroom! No matter what happens at this year’s festival, you’ll be sure to find daily updates at http://www.bloggingfringe.com
First thing you’ll notice is that the size of “The Green” has about tripled in size, with the Beer Tent remaining the center of attention. Because of the Fringe Membership drive and the special treatment for VIP members, beer/wine tickets are now $4 each, but I’ve seen some folks getting $1 off with their badges.
I saw Voci Dance’s “Perfectly Broken” at the Red (outdoor) Venue at the Orlando Shakes (the old beer tent location, and I think this is such a great use of this space! Even if the conflicts with the Orlando REP are resolved next year, I still would love to see this extra venue stick around or replace the old Red Venue, which was so tiny and hard to find.
Voci didn’t disappoint either, with an all-new show - lots of solos, more dance pieces that tell short stories over the course of two or three pieces, a live two-piece band and some really amazing dancing. I also liked the “Vocitini” table they had set up outside.
Some cool things to check out are Tod Caviness’ Poetry Vending Machine - $5 gets you a custom-written poem by one of the poets in residence. Also check out the Saturday night Poetry Smackdown events.
Another interesting addition is the Digi-Dada Theatre - Mark Biddle from The Office Art Gallery has written a series of short skits for Fringe Patrons to perform on camera in his mini-TV studio at the Shakes Fest, and he will be compiling the clips into a longer surreal piece to show off sometime soon.
Check out both Tod and Mark talking up their respective projects over at bloggingfringe.com/category/video/
I also went to the opening night of Gemma Wilcox’s “Shadows in Bloom”, which feels like a prequel to last year’s “The Honeymoon Period is Officially Over”. I’d like to ask Gemma and see what she has to say about this. Lots more characters, and lots more Gemma!
We are just getting started, but there is one more thing I’d like to mention - anyone and everyone has the ability to get their 15 minutes in this year, thanks to Blogging Fringe. I will be syndicating blogs - it’s simple and you get to keep all the publicity! Just send me a link to your blog or your blog’s feed - I’ll filter out posts that mention the Fringe Festival and re-post them to Blogging Fringe. When people check out the most recent posts on the site or do a search, they’ll see your posts, but when they click the links, they are directed to your blog, so you get to keep all the comments and maybe make some new friends in the process. Contact me through www.BloggingFringe.com or MySpace/Facebook to get listed as a Contributor.
Last but not least, come join the Florida Creatives on Monday for a visit to the beer tent and some socializing - we’ll be there from 6PM until 7:30, then we’ll head to the Shakes for Barry Smith’s show, American Squatter.
Hope to see you all out at Loch Haven Park this week! Happy Fringe!
May is a Kickass Month for Arts Events in Orlando May 15, 2008
Posted by Ryan in : Orlando, Music, Drupal, Events, Film, Fringe, floridacreatives, Likemind.orl, OrlandoScene, Arts, bloggingfringe , add a commentWhy is May such a great month for holding events? Sure, for our Northern friends, it means the end of bad weather, the opening of roller coaster parks, and a change in the scenery as the trees and flowers start to show their summer colors, but here in Florida, it’s more like the start of the summer’s hot, humid, rainy monotony, the arrival of the tourists, time-share owners, kids on summer vacation, religious zealots protesting Gay Days, and of course, bad drivers in rental cars.
The main reason I look forward to May every year is the arrival of the Orlando International Fringe Theatre Festival (Thursday the 15th through Monday the 26th). Every year, theatre companies, dancers, comedians, clowns, musicians, improv actors, writer/directors, solo acts and large ensembles, exuberant teenagers and road-hardened veterans alike grace Loch Haven Park with their creativity and energy, and Orlando gives every ounce of it (and more) back to them as many of the national and international acts begin their Canadian Fringe circuit, which brings them to a new city every two weeks. Show prices range from free (as in free software) to $10, and all shows require the one-time purchase of a $6 festival button - 100% of your ticket money goes to the artist. This is one of the only unjuried, uncensored events I know of in Orlando outside of a few open-mic nights, and even some of those are passing judgment on the performers (the other best example here is BarCamp).
18 months ago, I started gathering a group of my friends together every third Monday of the month for an event called Florida Creatives Happy Hour (Monday the 19th, 6PM @ Loch Haven Park). Now, those original 8 friends are hardly in the same room, but the group has grown to something resembling a small political party representing the creative professionals and hobbyists here in Central Florida (with a group getting started in Jacksonville as I write this). This month’s Florida Creatives falls during the Fringe Festival, so at 6PM on the 19th we will be descending upon their “Green Lawn of Fabulousness” to have a beer and some soul food and socialize. At 7:45, we will be attending American Squatter, starring Barry Smith, the creator of last year’s sell-out hit Jesus in Montana. Tickets are $10 plus your $6 Fringe button.
Despite the fact that Fringe starts on the same day every year, another festival seems to think they are better than the Fringe, by starting on the exact same day. Yes, the Florida Music Festival runs Thursday the 15th through Sunday the 18th this year, at pretty much every available venue downtown. In past years, you’ve been able to buy a one-time pass that gets you in to all the shows for the whole weekend, as well as nightly passes - buying a ticket to just one show will hardly do such an event justice. The festival also has a short film as well as an art contest, check these out too if you can find the time in between all of the other events happening at the exact same time.
What other events? How about that bizarre craft bazaar held semi-bi-anually at Stardust Video & Coffee, Grandma Party? (Saturday the 17th, 10AM to Sunset) For some reason they opted out of celebrating Earth Day in favor of overlapping with FMF and Fringe this year - the reason why is left as homework for the reader. Actually, if you find out, please try to explain this one to me too. At G-ma Party, you’ll not only find loads of handmade goods, like the cereal-and-eggs inspired work of the Breakfast Bunch, but trendy t-shirts, buckets of buttons, live music by some of Orlando’s best local bands (at least those who are friends with the festival organizers), a bal-looney community pool, and of course rummage piles and raffles.
Not as culturally significant, but still worth a mention, the second ever Florida Drupal User Group meeting will be held at the offices of MindComet in Maitland this Saturday (May 17th, 1PM). Check out the event and any follow-up at groups.drupal.org/florida.
Still more to come in this round-up of events, because I couldn’t write such a blog post without mentioning the Corazon Art and Music Festival being held at the Orlando Brewing Company (Sunday the 18th, starts 1PM, All Day). As I’m writing this I don’t have access to any listings, but I know tickets are $5, and I can give a serious recommendation, as this event is being thrown by Robert and Jonathan from Gamble Records, the folks who brought us the ELLA Music Festival in October. I expect you will see lots of singer-songwriter type acts, and you can trust Robert Johnson’s rolodex to bring you some great music (and art?).
There must be more happening during the next two weeks, but isn’t that enough? Of course, we can’t forget about this Friday (May 16th, 8AM-11AM) and the Likemind Orlando coffee meetup at the Lake Eola Panera Bread. This month there will be free coffee and hopefully a few free copies of a book called Murketing - I don’t have a lot of details about it, but I know the publishers of the book are sponsoring the coffee and snacks all over the US, so they get serious props.
If I’m missing anything here, please leave a shout-out, and I’ll try to include it in the next bulletin. Until next time, have a great May!
Nice website, but not very “community” COME ON! November 26, 2007
Posted by Ryan in : Markteting, Blogging, Orlando, Links, Events, Trends, Fringe, Web Sites, floridacreatives, Revver, Historic , 1 comment so farLet me start off by saying that it is so utterly amazing that Central Florida has groups with funding who can do stuff like this, and we wouldn’t be where we are now without CFACA and UA. Love ya, mean it.
Jim Morris of the Central Florida Arts & Cultural Alliance (they changed their name from Performing Arts Alliance) posted an article called “I get the change, but how are you different than United Arts?“. He then tries to describe it. I think I get it, but it’s hard to keep tabs…
Who works for UA? Who’s in charge of the Red Chair Project? How do I get Florida Creatives Happy Hour listed there? How can I blog for them?
Why isn’t there an official RCP blog, and why do Jim and Jessica have their blogs hosted on Google’s server instead of their own?
Where are the graphics for the Red Chair Project I can post an official link on my website? (see the Miro logo, for example) 
Where’s the iCal/gCal/RSS of upcoming events? Where are the comments on events? Why use a proprietary system? If you didn’t use a proprietary system, where are the dang comments and RSS feeds? GO OPEN SOURCE, guys, you’ll never regret it! EVER.
Give me a call 407-484-8528. If you don’t see this post, I’m sure I’ll see Jessica around town.
Edit: This is a re-post from May 21, as Mark Baratelli pointed out.
Why did I post this twice? I just haven’t seen a move towards anything like this in the last 5 months, and Jim and I haven’t really gotten in constant contact. They have this great opportunity in that they are at the center of public attention with this stuff. Me, as a lowly developer, can hardly make waves as big as United Arts and the Arts & Cultural Alliance.
Ryan Price and Julie Norris on Front Porch Radio September 21, 2007
Posted by Ryan in : Tech, Podcasts, Orlando, Music, Events, Earth, Fringe, Radio, floridacreatives, Likemind.orl , add a comment
Julie hosts new locals only show on WPRK 91.5 | Dandelion Communitea Cafe
Front Porch is a weekly radio show hosted by Julie Norris, Proprietor of Dandelion Communitea Cafe, and focuses on all things local. Each week features a different guest making a difference locally with eclectic blends of local music and various ramblings about what is happening in OurLando.
Tune your dial to WPRK 91.5 or listen online at wprkdj.org every Wednesday at noon.
Front Porch Radio is now a podcast as well.
Flock Blogging with Photos September 14, 2007
Posted by Ryan in : Tech, Blogging, Podcasts, HowTo, Events, Video, Browsers, Fringe, MySpace, Liberatr, Web Sites, photos, interface, Teaching , 1 comment so farPart II, Electric Boogaloo!
This screencast demonstrates how to use Flickr photosharing and the Flock browser to add photos to a WordPress blog (or any blog or web page, really). Flock makes it dead-simple to upload, tag, and post photos. You can probably download the browser, sign up for Flickr and post photos to you blog faster than you can watch this video (about 7 minutes). Let me know what you think or if there are any tough spots.
Download the Screencast (in stunning 480×320 optimized for iPhone!)
There was a time when I was thinking of doing lots of screencasts and trying to build a whole site around it. Mike G of CFPHP and I were talking about something along these lines today - he’s the reason why you have an iPod-sized ‘cast. If you want to see anything else demonstrated, like if you want to teach your boss how to subscribe to RSS feeds, I would be happy to oblige. I am just sort of doing these as they come up until we come up with some cirricula.
OrlandoScene.TV and BloggingFringe.com Video on Revver June 20, 2007
Posted by Ryan in : Tech, Site News, Podcasts, Orlando, Video, Film, Trends, Fringe, Liberatr, Restaurants, Entrepreneurship, itunes, statistics, Revver, Contributors, OrlandoScene , 1 comment so farI’m posting this because there should be an 8th video in this widget by the time you see it. I wish this thing would show the videos in reverse order, and perhaps it will - the first video should be OrlandoScene.TV 03 Taste, the second Heart of Coal, etc.
I’ve learned through the very useful and very pretty Revver statistics that about 5% of people who see my video play it to the end, and of those about 8% click on the ad. I think 8.16% ain’t half bad at all - what I wonder is if the “views” includes people who see the player and don’t push play. I don’t think it does.
If you haven’t seen all 8 of these videos yet, they are more than worth watching. If you’re using a feedreader right now, I’m not sure if you can see the player because of JavaScript. You can find my videos on the web at Revver.
OrlandoScene.TV, BloggingFringe.com - that’s where these videos live.
