But do you want to share your culture?

Doug and I have wrapped up our trip to B.C.

We are exploring the possibility of fundraising for the QCCC (left). I took some photos on my phone. They're not great quality but they show the potential of the site, which sits on the banks of the Cowichan River. The QCCC has an excellent business plan in hand, developed by Rod Smith and his colleagues at Festival management inc. (Fmi), for restoring the facilities and redeveloping their cultural programming. There are a number of great, new Aboriginal Cultural Centres in and around B.C. and the 2010 Vancouver Olympics have brought significant funding to B.C attractions. On the other hand it was still a stretch to find something to do in the off-season in and around Nanaimo as I had forgotten my hiking boots and we could not find a sea kayaking place still renting in November. Luckily, it was a beautiful day when we made the initial site visit.

We wanted to answer three key questions before taking a case for support to potential funders.

1) Why will the future of a funded QCCC be different from the past? (A past composed as far as we can tell of scandal, alleged theft and alleged embezzlement, questionable tourist appeal and little use or support from the Cowichan community itself).

2) What is the cultural centre for? The Khowutzun Development Corporation, the "economic development arm fo the Cowichan Tribes" seems to be primarily interested in job creation. But, as we suggested to the GM of the QCCC, if job creation and revenue generation is the most important thing, then why not create the hotel and conference centre and expand the banquet business currently in place? Inter-cultural learning and sharing is superfluous.

3) Whose project is this? (Who generated it? Who will provide oversight throughout? And, who will lead it through to completion?)

We arrived at the last question by way of a conversation with the Aboriginal Studies Department head of the newly formed Vancouver Island University, and through reflection on previous Aboriginal tourism projects. Doug was involved in creating a marketing plan for Six Nations' disparate tourist attractions in Ontario as well as a revitalization of Wanuskewin Heritage Park, out in the Prairies.

The issue of "Aboriginal tourism" is divisive. Even where tribe leaders or band councils decide to move forth with tourism planning and consulting, there has been dissent within the community, members who don't want tourists on the Reservation and certainly don't want to invest in bringing them there or making them feel welcome. Is the community interested in sharing its culture and history with non-Aboriginals? How much of it? What is sacred and cannot or should not be shared? Who will have the right to disseminate this information and in what way? These are questions that can only be answered by the communities themselves. And the answer has to be, yes, we do want to share because...in the case of Wanuskewin, "to increas[e] public awareness, understanding and appreciation of the cultural legacy of the Northern Plains First Nations people."

Do the Cowichan tribes want to share? And if so, why? These questions have to be answered before we can move their project forward.

(Photos: Julia Dow)

New project takes NetGain to Vancouver Island

Photo: Cowichan Feather Headdress, courtesy of First People

NetGain is off to Duncan, B.C. next week to contribute fundraising expertise to the redevelopment of the Quw'utsun' (Cowichan) Cultural and Conference Centre, located in the Cowichan Valley. It is a matter of public record that the Centre has been plagued by mismanagement, dwindling popularity amongst both the native community and tourists, and, as NetGain can say with confidence at the launch of most projects, "the status quo is intolerable."

B.C. interests have risen on a crest of excitement and goodwill around the 2010 Olympics, but business is general, as we are all aware, has not been great.

More to come and I promise to send photos when on site as well.

Who wants to go see contemporary dance?

You probably do...

if you already volunteer somewhere...

or have seen a live performance lately...

At least according to the stats.

I asked our research associate, Andrew Swales, to write something for the blog on the environmental scan of the Canadian contemporary dance “industry”. Essentially his findings, or more aptly, his lack of findings, confirmed our impressions of this marginal art practice. He was struck by the lack of reliable statistical data on contemporary dance and found his efforts to establish a potential audience for Kaha:wi Dance Theatre frustrated by unclear or downright contradictory data.

Without consistent numbers it was difficult to uncover which demographic finds contemporary dance the most appealing or to determine the share that Kaha:wi could claim.

Traditional demographic indicators (e.g. income, education) were not reliable predictors of a potential audience, but other indicators, such as whether someone is involved in his or her community, or whether someone has visited an art gallery, do appear to be more closely related to other arts participation rates that could be applied to dance.

Therefore, it is more beneficial for Kaha:wi, a small company with a negligible marketing budget, and niche artistic groups like it, to try to connect with arts audiences as they volunteer or take in other live performances, rather than spending advertising dollars on targeting a gender, income bracket or education level.

Specifically it suggests that those who are interested in art and performance of any kind could be interested in contemporary dance. There are undoubtedly huge marketing benefits that could be reaped simply by collaborating with artists in other disciplines.

It appears that dance “enthusiasts” make little distinction between enjoying dance and enjoying any other art form. The challenge for Kaha:wi and those working to broaden the audience for contemporary dance is to create bridges with other disciplines that people can cross with ease.

Photo by jere-me

TEDCO - Revelations and Leaks

Doug has been collaborating on a review of a "city agency" (now revealed as TEDCO, the Toronto Economic Development Corporation) for the past few months.

Yesterday we were called by Jeff Gray of the Globe and Mail. He was looking for one of the authors of the report. (Of course, the report that is eventually released by the City of Toronto is not the same report that was put together by NetGain and the Randolph group, as with many other consulting studies generated for city staff). The NetGain/Randolph report was the result of many hours of analysis, interviews and deliberations about the future of TEDCO.

The article by Jeff Gray, "Mayor unveils new development plan", can be found here.

Apparently the original NetGain/Randolph report was leaked by someone (possibly a member of City staff) to a blog.

And from my overview of various articles and the comments posted, very few people know what is actually going on or why change may be necessary (or why certain people resign or why certain positions remain unfilled or became empty in the first place).

TEDCO was formed in 1986. That's over 20 years that they've been working their magic. As Janet Jackson might say, speaking for Toronto, "What have you done for me lately?"

The guru of web usability

"He's also the man that some web designers love to hate. In particular, they love to heap abuse on his website - UseIt.com."

Here's a Guardian interview with the guru himself, Jakob Nielsen.

But first, a digression.

I like lists. So much that I have lists upon lists. Lists for everything. Lists of life goals, lists of tasks...really long lists of tasks. Then, people send me lists via email (usually more tasks). Those lists get added to my other lists. Then I have Outlook making lists for me everytime I flag something. So I have paper and Outlook lists. Then I go home and I have sheaves and sheaves of paper detailing tasks, things to do around the house, chore schedules, future goals, places to visit, websites to revisit, books to read, films to rent, errands to run, food shopping lists....etc.

Then I found this web application....

In one of my fits of internet browsing, I came across 37signals, an ingenious little company that makes ingenious little applications. I now have my own ta da list (which is a compilation of to do lists). I tried to share a list with both my brother (with whom I must collaborate on a number of house projects) and another one with a client. To my dismay, neither appear to have looked at the lists. Prior to finding Ta Da, I used "now do this", which is a very simple program that allows you to put in your tasks for the day and click the "done" button when you're done, until you uni-task your way through. However, after a couple of days I found that now-do-this was too simple. In fact, if you accidentally close your browser you lose your whole list and you're left thinking, now don't do that, stupid program. So, not functional enough.

I am waiting to see what the pick up is on the Ta Da to do lists before I introduce my client to Highrise or Basecamp. However, both of these web apps could be just what our small, minimally staffed, frequently travelling dance company needs.

Which brings us back to the issue of web usability. What does that mean, anyway? Well, from what I understand from 37signals and Jakob Nielsen (see his retro-looking site), it refers to web interfaces: web design, not graphic design.

Some interfaces work, some don't. We all know this intuitively. Like many semi-sophisticated web users, I do have some basic programming skills, I started a blog in 2000, I use dictionary.com, I get a lot of my news online, google is my best friend....I am loyal to good sites and don't both with bad ones.

From the point of view of the 'user', websites provide a service.
How well they provide that service is a question of their 'usability'.

A real time, enfolding as I write this, example of web usability:
My dear colleague Douglas, despite wearing two watches on his left wrist like a character in Alice in Wonderland, has somehow mistaken the departure time for his daughter's bus trip up to camp. This, he now claims, is the fault of the website. He could not find the departure time of the bus, and when he did find it, it was buried in many other numbers and dates so he mixed it up with some other time.

I just went to the website to find the relevant page and link it for our reference but...I couldn't find it. Disastrous!

Now, Camp Big Canoe is a very small organization that services a limited number of people. But any time you go to a website and get fed up that you can't find what you want, anytime a website drives you crazy by hiding the most important information behind layers of click, anytime they frustrate you as you try to: find a schedule; book a ticket; do a search; find a phone number; donate money; send an email-- they are crippling the functionality of the internet, wasting our time and their own money in the process.

I have gone to a website before, felt confused or irritated, and left right away. I no longer go to those websites (ie. nowdothis.com).

Anyhow, those issues are top of mind because since working for NetGain I have been responsible for generating content for one website and designing two others from scratch. Any sites you love lately or have been forced to use?

Decentralize the Hierarchy

One of the things that I think is a unique asset of the firm (not to toot our own horn, but well...ok) is we are small. I've been here for 2 years and I love that I am directly involved, learning from senior partners, no one has a secretary, when you call you talk to a real person...Some people don't know that we don't have secretaries and how someone communicates with someone he mistakenly thinks is a hireling can reveal a lot.

Anyhow, the NY Times agrees. Small teams can mean more creativity, better solutions, happier employees, happier customers, time and money saved.

update on the Cirque

Photo of Dubai airport by Flickr member goforchris.

If you are following the Cirque sale: here. Opinion on why Quebec lost out and Dubai won.