Tales from the Body 2009: Online Post-Mortem

And welcome to the second installment of my reviews of 2009 storytelling events I didn't attend.

I feel like I should have a name for this. Like the "2009 Carnival of Crankiness."

As I wrote in my post ranting about how storytelling conferences are like shouting down a hole, I'm going to be reviewing storytelling conferences based on their online presence during but especially after the event.

I'm focusing on conferences because they are focused on "getting the word out." To allow practicioners to come together to experience professional development, share best practices, and, to some extent, allow networking to feed future collaborations and innovations. And it drives me nuts that in this day and age... when the marginal cost of disseminating discussions from an event like this is so low... that so little thought seems to be given to sharing out.

I may toss in a performance-centric event (e.g. Going Deep), mainly because the National Storytelling Network is co-sponsoring seven regional events this year in lieu of a national conference, and a couple of those events are more festival than conference.

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Chronologically, the first NSN Year of the Regions Event was: TALES FROM THE BODY: Storytelling About Illness and Disability, produced by the Storytelling Center of New York.
Date: January 25th, 2009
Location: New York Society for Ethical Culture, New York City
Format: Storytelling Concert, Panel Discussion, Story Swap

Kudos to the Storytelling Center for posting a post-event writeup with photos on their site: link.
NSN has posted a report from organizer Donna Minkowitz on its website. link.
Seems like it was a small event, so just by attendance numbers alone I didn't expect any blog posts or tweets. But documentation on two web sites? I can't get cranky about that.

Philip David Morgan, who handles the web site for the Storytelling Center, let me know that he did record most of the event, but getting the video files edited and online will take some time... and the Center isn't clamoring for its own regular Twitter feed or Facebook presence. Oh, but Philip... I look forward to seeing the highlight reel.