DanceHop: Dance Events, Dance News, Dance Videos, Seattle Dance

Dance event reviews coming

Eric — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 02:07:07 +0000

Something interesting and valuable is coming down the pipe: Dance event reviews, and other video content. I feel like this will provide a lot of value to beginners, people looking for a better view of different events, and to help bring communities together.

We’re definitely interested in your perspective. Want us to review an event? Have other ideas on content you’d like to see? Let us know, and we’ll work on it.

Site challenges, and a new promise

Eric — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 18:30:48 +0000

Recenty it’s come to my attention that the quality of our service has not been meeting the standards we’ve previously known. We’ve been adding features too quickly without ensuring the quality of service that you deserve, and for that, I’m sorry.

To begin with, we found that our shoe supplier was somewhat unresponsive to customer’s needs, and thus we’ve pulled the shop. There have been errors with people using Facebook Connect that didn’t also have Dancehop accounts. I’ve also heard the site hasn’t been as fast as you deserve.

Here’s my promise to you: We will make sure that you have fast, bug free software, that will help you find out more of what’s going on in the dance community and with your friends. In the next month, we’ll be employing new technology to make sure lapses like this are rare indeed.

All we ask is that you get in touch if you notice problems, so that we can fix them quickly. As always, we’re listening, and want to know about the good, the bad, and the ugly. We feel that the dance community needs a site that helps bring them together with good information, and we want to make it happen.

Seattle DanceCamp

Eric — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 02:29:53 +0000

I’ve been thinking about a great format for a collaborative event, based on experiences of prior BarCamps, like this one, or this one. My current concept is a 30 hour non stop dance experience, with an evening dance Friday night, workshops starting around 11 AM Saturday, and a Saturday evening dance.

For those of you unfamiliar with BarCamp, it’s a collaborative, attendee run conference for geeks. In this case, I’d like to try out the concept and call it Seattle DanceCamp. It would allow people to:
-Practice leadership
-Learn about different dance communities
-Expand awareness of what they do to others in Seattle

Attendees would run workshops about anything dance related, from beginning salsa, to AcroYoga. Attendees would then vote on each submitted workshop, and we would have 3-4 workshops running simultaneously.

One original concept that I have is to host a couple of fusion exchange type dances. The format is 10 minute sets: salsa, blues/swing, tango, and possibly a surprise set (eg: Manamana). Emphasis would be on songs that could be danced in different genres, such as alternative tango. There would be a tango line of dance on the outside, and swing/salsa/blues in the center.

A note on the “camp” concept. People could also crash at the venue, and typically up to 1 of 5 attendees at such events actually do.

Want to help make this happen? We’re currently looking for:
-A venue
-Volunteers
-Sponsors (venue, refreshments, badges, shirts?)

Share events with the Dancehop Widget

Eric — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 22:33:39 +0000

We’re happy to announce the release of the Dancehop event widget:
www.dancehop.com/widget

Dancehop event widget

Just log in and take a peek. As you make widget choices, including color styles, genre, and city, you can see the changes on the right in real time.

We’re continuing to make improvements, and are open to feedback, as well as bug reports. You can get in touch at admin@dancehop.com

Our event widget instantly adds dance event content on the dance genre of your choice to your personal or business website. Now, events that you post on Dancehop will have even more exposure for people to hop on over to!

Dancehop will match your Haiti SMS donations

Eric — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 22:06:14 +0000

I’ve been racking my brains as to how to help with the earthquake tragedy in Haiti. My mother informed me that it’s in a critical state, a couple days out from rioting. If you haven’t seen details of it, watch this AP report, referred to me by Andru Edwards on gearlive.

Starting now, if you send an SMS donation to either the Red Cross (by texting the word HAITI to 90999) or to YELE (by texting the word YELE to 501501) Dancehop will match it, up to $50.

Join the dance community now in helping! Leave a comment after donating, and we’ll match your donation.

Help spread the word. For every post on Facebook and Twitter (reply to @dance_hop), we’ll donate $5. Let’s work together as world citizens of dance.

Mashup of Billboard’s top 25 hits, from 2009

Eric — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 02:16:29 +0000

I had to share this video from DJ Earworm, it’s one of the most ambitious mashups that I’ve seen, and is a much better execution than his 2008 effort.

Survey Results, and a new Dancehop release

Eric — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 03:02:13 +0000

It’s been a busy couple of months for the Dancehop team. We currently have two members working full time on it, and a couple of part time contributors. Last week, you told us what you think about Dancehop and your dance experience. Here are some of the results:

-Female dancers: 60%
-Average age: 29
-Dancers have been dancing at least 3 years: 62%
-Respondees wanting to improve their dance: 90%
-Half of the respondees found out about Dancehop through employee contact

We got a lot of great personal feedback as well, and will be implementing some key ideas in the coming months. We also found out that half of you would like more events on Dancehop, which will be a reality in the coming weeks. This last software release is going to help that:

-Fixed a large bug stopping us from adding new cities or having repeating events show up well
-Upgrade to a new version of Ruby on Rails
-Migration to a faster server with some nice features
-Improved Facebook integration

All of that work is paving the way for a lot of changes in the coming months. Also, two winners were chosen via a random number generator on random.org. Winners will be contacted with their $75 gift certificates to the Dancehop store.

Shoes have free returns, and we’ve currently got a 25% discount on a size 9 green silk women’s dance heel, returned because it was half a size too small, seen below:

Green Dance Shoes, Tango Brujo

Dancehop survey! Help us offer a better service, and you could win a gift certificate!

Eric — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 08:55:10 +0000

It’s time for Dancehop to start looking seriously at what you, the dancer, actually need. To assist in this, we’ve put up a survey here:

Click Here for Dancehop survey

Participants will be placed in a drawing for $75 gift certificates to the Dancehop shoe store, where we’ll be rewarding 2 participants next Monday. Fill out a survey now, and help us to serve the dance community even better!

Dance community building with Clay Nelson

Eric — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 23:17:31 +0000

Portland stands as an example of how to run a successful dance community. Tango in Portland is arguably the most vibrant, cooperative, and inviting dance community in the US. Even blues dancers that I’ve talked to in Seattle are impressed. So what’s the secret to their success? Clay Nelson, founder of the Portland tango community, has written the ultimate guide to community building.

Synopsis and comments:
Clay lists the major qualities of a dance scene as: quantity, dance level, and cooperative spirit.

For quantity, Clay mentions recruiting. Recruiting includes classes, which he feels are easiest held at community centers, city park districts, and universities. He emphasizes that everyone should be involved in teaching, and I feel it’s fun and educational to teach, no matter your level. As my friend Wesley says, “If you know 50% more about a subject than someone, you’re the expert”

Extending Clay’s views on ads, I feel that free ads, flyers, and google adwords are the way to go.

In order to keep things going, new dancers need evening dances, and solid dj’ing. What’s the point in getting good at social dancing if you can’t go out and enjoy being social?

Clay gets very specific about tango in his section on how to help foster quality dancers. To generalize, it makes sense to teach dancers what they need to connect, and navigate on the floor, before a series of steps. Having weekend workshops can be a major motivational factor, and out of town teacher visiting can inject more excitement into a community.

In my opinion, his final section on cooperation is the most important one, particularly for existing dance communities. To start, its important to allow people to have a sense of contribution for their community. If they want to DJ, decorate, host people, or even become professional teachers, it should be encouraged. In my personal experience, one surefire way to make a community implode is to have fear of new teachers and infighting. It’s important to realize the bigger a scene gets, the more everyone benefits. It’s a positive feedback loop. As a side bonus, the longer you’ve been teaching, the more your reputation will help despite what fresh blood might do.

Everyone should be encouraged to participate, even in small ways. Clay’s example of students copying cd’s that a teacher brings to a class is a prime example. When people join the dance community, they don’t know the rules, so why not help foster cooperation from the beginning? Clay also talks about the importance of accepting people doing their own thing. Dance is a personal thing, and so if there’s a clique doing something “exclusive” it’s ok to tolerate and even encourage this.

A final and important point from Clay is to not accept toxic behavior. After reflection in a small group, find consensus. If that includes action, gently confront an individual’s behavior. If need be, more persistent and forceful over time, and shun as a last resort.

Something Clay discusses that’s part recuiting, and part cooperation is e-mail lists. E-mail is still THE best way to keep in touch, as long as people opt-in to your list. Weekly or monthly mailings of what you’re up to helps keep active. I fully expect Dancehop will help in this task. Something interesting he mentions: Sharing your e-mail list. I would agree the occasional guest e-mail or message in your e-mails will help tighten up the community. Remember, pay it forward.

Quoting Clay: “Keep in mind that although tango communities are extremely devisive in general, when I started in portland, no one else danced argentine tango. Thus I was starting from scratch–which is quite different then most cities with developed or existing communities.” Still, I think the principles he’s laid out are valid, and there are some great ideas here that community members may not have thought of yet.

Photo contest needs your votes!

Eric — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 20:43:00 +0000

The photo contest has its submissions, and we need your votes!

Head on over to our fan page, become a fan, and “like” or comment on your 3 favorite pics in the album “Top 10! Dancehop photo contest finalists”, so we can change the face of DanceHop!