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New DanceHop Flyer
So I found a design I liked, modified it, got great feedback from Nicole, and we’ve got a flyer produced by EricB. This will be the 4×6 paper flyer until we get a nice glossy photo out. We’ll probably print this on orange paper, same color as the bouncing ball. Any feedback?
Hop to events with friends? Or promote your events?
This is another gorgeous image submission by Briggate.com. It’s looking like we’ve got a solid pool of photos to choose from, now to make sure that we’re covering our bases in terms of what DanceHop means to y’all.
C'mon Mr. DJ by briggate.com on flickr
Here’s the first photo submission by Lloyd Spencer, under the category of “Find great teachers”. What do you guys think?
Got photos? Pic by Dom Dada on Flickr
The photo contest has its submissions, and we need your votes!
Head on over to the photo album on our fan page, and “like” or comment on your 3 favorite pics, so we can change the face of DanceHop!
Original post:
Want to help the start of great new site for dance? Do you have fun, interesting photos to share? Do you like shoes?
Then this contest is for you.
DanceHop.com is creating a piece to promote what it does, and we need your help.
Top photos will be featured on the DanceHop blog, and contest finalists will have their profiles featured and links to their homepages. Winners receive a free pair of premiere Tango Brujo shoes of their choosing, custom made in Argentina. The 4 runners up get a $50 gift certificate at our store. Honorable mentions get free cover to a night out of dancing.
Contest rules:
1. Submit pics to fit one of three categories:
a. Hop with your friends to the best dance events everywhere
b. Find great teachers
c. Promote your events
2. We need to have permission to put your pics on the homepage. If people are recognizable, it should be you, or they need to sign a model release.
3. Pics will be cropped and or shrunk to around 600×300 pixels, with text on the left third of the image.
4. Contest ends by June 30th
Submit those pics by submitting photos to the flickr group, or e-mailing eric@dancehop.com, and tell your friends!
Look at all the posts related to this contest, using the contest tag. The display is a bit off, so click on specific post titles if you want to see more.
I’m pleased to announce the beta release of DanceHop.com, a place for dancers to:
To help spread the word, check out our Facebook fan page.
In the coming weeks, we’ll be adding:
This is just the beginning, help spread the word, and we all can do our part to spread the passion of dance!
When I look at the best social dance blogs, I have to pick an amazing salsa blog called addicted2salsa.com. On top of good design, the blog regularly posts original dance content, such as this video on how to improve your spins. I think addicted2salsa fits one really good genre of blogs that I’m interested in for dance, which is about the technical and fun aspects of the dance. The other is la vida con deby, covering the emotional and cultural background, in this case tango. Check em out!
I found a good article, Loving The Recession, on Biznik.com last week.
It’s surprising, Steven pretty much takes ideas that I’ve had, and distills them into a potent brew. He talks about 4 questions which are important when moving forward in life:
What are your core values?
What your vision for yourself?
What steps are needed to meet that vision?
What support do you need to pursue that vision?
When I talk to anyone, I try to get to know them through their core values. As an example, I find that really good tango dancing brings joy into my life. When I tried to figure out why, I found that I enjoyed the connection, creativity, and personal growth associated with the dance. Bear in mind this took a week for me to work this out.
Often we are hypercritical of ourselves. In a way, it’s a form of egoism. Why are we so special that we need to be better than everyone else? We’re stuck in this point of view, whereas if we were looking at anyone else with the exact same circumstances, we’d be much more constructive. If we’re able to be more objective, and work our goals incrementally, it’s possible to have a lot of progress.
Looking specifically at my personal productivity project, I’ve made some changes. First off, tracking each individual task while I’m doing it is a pain. I’ve been using Rescuetime instead to get a view of how much I actually work. I’ve also added the habit of journaling 3 times a week to track how I’m doing in relationship to my goals. I hope that this change will help me be more effective in creating a really good product for dancers.
Bridge to the future, Photo by fotopakismo
I found out recently that I’d be particularly at risk if my group were to have layoffs (still unlikely). In order to mitigate some of this risk, in terms of getting rave reviews for people inside and outside the company. I propose to increase my productivity by 5x in the next 3 months. It sounds ridiculous, I know. I might as well say I want to become a kajillion times more productive than I am now, but I firmly believe it’s achievable. I actually am shooting to surpass it.
I have fairly selfish goals involved in this. First off, I want to see if I can do it, since it affects my entire life and personal success. How amazing would it be to get so much done during a day? Would that free up time to allow me to do whatever it is that I’ve been putting off, such as vacationing, or side projects?
Secondly, I can see myself becoming a productivity expert, using myself as the case study. For full disclosure, I have this crazy image of myself consulting with other groups, and being a guest speaker who receives the adoration of thousands of people whose quality of life I improve. Obviously this is an unlikely scenario, but it’s still motivating.
One major factor of productivity is delivering useful objectives, not only completing work or appearing busy. It’s time to make the challenging decisions that I would be putting off for later, not doing work for work’s sake.
I’d like to thank everyone who has helped alpha test DanceHop so far, you guys are great! We’ve been gradually incorporating feedback and ideas, and are getting a lot closer to sharing this with everyone.
A lot of bugs that bog down the user experience have been cleaned up. We have a few more to take care of, and some great features coming up before we move to an open beta. It’s my hope that within a week or two we’ll be able to help you find events in your city, and make it easy to share with your friends. In the mean time, get in touch to have your voice heard.
Here’s the start of something interesting: what happens when you take months of planning, code up some of it, and release it? That’s up to you.
DanceHop is an attempt to service the US dance community by creating a full listing of social dance events in all genres, and making communication with friends about events seamless. In order to do this, we need your help in this exclusive limited release. If you’re interested in shaping this project, contact me via e-mail (tangosource(at)gmail(dot)com), through Facebook, or the blog. I’ll give you login details, and you can mention what you like, dislike, want added or removed.
When I first started dancing 5 1/2 years ago, I found social dance (salsa specifically) to be enjoyable, but it wasn’t amazing. A year later, I found my dance muse in tango. Later, after becoming hopelessly addicted to dance, I found blues. Nowadays, I enjoy one dance thoroughly, and the others particularly when I want a break or new inspiration.
I’ve been wondering if there’s a site that would help me do everything that I would want. Is it possible to help make a site to address the isolation of online spaces by bringing people onto the dance floor? Can we tighten the social dance scene in general? Can we bring in fresh energy and new blood? With your help, I’d like to find out.