Yesterday’s post listed the unsettling effects of two very preventable things, getting an STD and having your laptop stolen. In today’s post we’ll review some of the prophylactic and protective measures you can put in place preventing your laptop from being stolen. The digital prevention measures covered today assume common sense, meaning we don’t have to cover “be smart about where you leave or keep your laptop.”

This is not to say that leaving your laptop out in plain sight is something that is unfamiliar. As independents we are constantly in situations where our laptop is out in public, some locations that are safe and some that are less comfortable. Especially somewhere not built on a community of trust, like a coffeeshop or any other shared space with randos, if you have to go to the bathroom, you’re up against the “laptop dilemma” covered by Lifehacker. If you’re regularly spending time in a space like this, you’re going to want to consider taking these steps that will provide you with the comfort to leave your laptop alone for a couple minutes.

The basic steps are to start with protecting your laptop in these situations. There are very nice programs that act as a car alarm for your laptop, making alot of noise and trouble for anyone who might want to snatch it. Some of these programs will turn your camera into a broadcast vehicle ready to send the picture information to your email inbox. Several of these tracking programs go even further to employ GPS to notify you of the location or notify a central hub of the location of your laptop when it checks into a network.

Measures that make the laptop less attractive to steal or worthless when stolen address data protection and encryption. These range from heavy encryption to simple things you can do to make sure that sensitive files are not accessed. Some of these procedures you should be doing already and are part of a healthy computer’s maintenance cycle, like password protection based systems and backups to disperse your data.

Alarms and Tracking systems

• Laptop Alarm goes off when someone trys to jack your stuff. For Mac there’s Lockdown.
• Grace Rodriguez turned up Prey, software that tracks your computer when it’s stolen.
• Other tracking and tracing programs to install before your laptop is stolen: The Laptop Lock, Adeona, LocatePC, GadgetTheft, Computrace,

Passwords

• Get your passwords fresh and regularly from a Random Password Generator
• Store your passwords with Keepass, a free, open-source password manager.
• Set a password for your computer. If you want to get crazy, set a BIOS password. Lockdown has a tutorial here.
• Monica Danna brought up this technique for people who like to keep their passwords in a text file on their hard drive: “Select a short string of characters and numbers to be placed at the end of every password you use. When you write down your passwords never include that string, making any password that is written down identifiably correct only to you.”
• Another tip for people who like to use that password text file, use Steganography to hide your passwords in plain site encoded into images or mp3s. For more information on steganography, check Wikipedia. A commercially available tool is called Steganos.

Data Protection

• Encrypt your hard drive’s data with TrueCrypt, here’s how thanks to Lifehacker (hat tip Lifehacker).
• For long term protection, encode your programs. This can set you up to prevent against identity theft. Again, Lifehacker has a great post about this.
• Set a backup schedule for your data that folds into an online backup service. If you’re on Twitter enough you know @iJustine and are probably familiar with Mozes. Another good reason to have a regular backup schedule is that it can fold into your maintence schedule.
• Remote data destruction? That sounds awesome. Thanks to Chris Pirillo for the tip here.
• Another digital destruction device, this time submitted by Warren Free. Called BackStopp, this program employs GSM, Internet, WiFi and RFID to destroy data. Thanks for the tip, Warren

Good Habits

• Plan for the worst. No one wants to ever have to call or email old contacts so proactively organize your old contacts or delete the ones who are no longer mailed. Delete or combine into an encrypted solution any information that contains passwords, account numbers, PINs or sensitive materials.
• ‘Save early, save often” for a laptop looks something like “save multiple copies, on multiple formats”

Come back tomorrow where we’ll discuss physical steps you can take for theft prevention.

As always, comments are appreciated. What are some of the steps you take to protect and prevent laptop theft?

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This last weekend during Caroline Collective’s anniversary party, while we were celebrating one year of helping the community and striving to improve conditions in Houston’s cultural and technological landscap, someone stole my laptop. My. laptop. The co-founder of Caroline Collective’s laptop. This laptop was sitting next to Grace Rodriguez’s (who provides a great deal of CC’s mindshare) and Ned Dodington’s (the other co-founder of CC). Additionally, Grace’s wallet was in plain view, yet, they chose to steal my laptop, clearly identifiable because it’s covered in stickers. The culprit also made off with a flip camera. Whatever. For a picture of my laptop and more information, please go to the Caroline Collective site here.

In the wake of this utterly disappointing situation the feelings running through my body were pain, discomfort and remorse. Kind of like getting an STD.

Other reasons why having your laptop stolen are like getting an STD:

• Having your laptop stolen and getting an STD are both preventable
• People warn you all the time about having your laptop stolen or getting an STD
• They sell things that prevent your laptop from being stolen and you from getting an STD
• Having your laptop stolen and getting an STD are both more likely to happen when you utter the words ‘it’ll be ok just this one time’
• Having your laptop stolen and getting an STD can both be costly to remedy
• Having your laptop stolen and getting an STD can have a lasting effect long after the symptoms go away
• You ponder what you’ve lost and how you’ll recover when your laptop is stolen or you get an STD
• Having your laptop stolen and getting an STD both require you to call up people you never want to speak to again warning them they might want to go to the doctor or change their business’ passwords
• You think of all the foolish things you’ve done in the past when your laptop is stolen or you get an STD
• Having your laptop stolen or getting an STD makes you angry at the person that put you in this position
• Having your laptop stolen is like getting an STD except your stolen laptop doesn’t itch, burn or erupt
• Having your laptop stolen or getting an STD can be the result of a long night of drinking
• Having your laptop stolen and  getting an STD both can be discovered after it’s too late
• Having your laptop stolen and getting an STD are similar except stolen laptops can affect gentiles too

From the Community:

• Having your laptop stolen and getting an STD both result in a huge loss of trust (hat tip @photine for coming up with this. Thanks!)

What are some other ways in which having your laptop stolen and getting an STD are similar?

This week is Stolen Laptop Week: come back tomorrow where you’ll learn how to prevent your laptop from being stolen in the first place and receive a list of some prophylactic services/programs that prepare you in the case of theft.

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This summer Rice University is offering a new paid summer internship for undergraduates in any discipline. The Art and Artifact Design Program will provide an opportunity for undergraduate students to spend the summer working in a multi-disciplinary team applying the design process to community problems.

Student activities will include class instruction, design work and preparation for an upcoming course. Students will collaborate with the instructor and the Museum of Fine Arts Houston to develop custom archival solutions for priceless works from the museum’s permanent collection. Over the course of the internship a salon-style discussion series will run addressing unique facets of this design problem and multi-disciplinary approaches to civic issues, presented by members of the community. Students will additionally assist the instructor in the development of a course addressing civic engagement from a multi-disciplinary standpoint. Students will be taught engineering design approach, rapid prototyping, use of online collaboration and documentation methods. Student will have the opportunity to attend a summer course on entrepreneurship and will present the results of their summer internship in a professional forum.

Undergraduate students in any discipline or department are eligible and invited to apply. This is a full-time, 8 week summer program commencing in June providing a $4,000 stipend and put on by Rice’s School of Engineering in conjunction with Rice’s Center for Civic Engagement. Four positions are available.

For more information please contact the Instructor, Dr. Matthew Wettergreen (mwettergreen @ gmail.com). To apply for this internship, please email a resume, a brief personal statement and why this internship is of interest.

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We’d like to take this opportunity to thank the bands who attended and the creative professionals who volunteered at Bandcamp: SXSW PREP. Because of this event bands were prepared to promote themselves and be discovered when they attended SXSW a couple of weeks ago. Special thanks to the bands who made the drive up to Austin a couple days early and played the Houston @ SXSW party (sponsored by Kirtsy, Schipul, Werkadoo and AYN Brand).  We heard from national members of the tech and music community for the remainder of the week about the party and how positive a party of this sort was for the success of Houston’s music, film and technology communities.

SXSW is now over for this year, all that’s left is that hope that you learned something and came back with new ideas and contacts. We recognize that the summation of each individual experience totals to a wealth of knowledge for the community. In an attempt to share that knowledge and capitalize upon that creative energy, this Bandcamp: SXSW AUTOPSY will be a discussion of the results of SXSW. We’re interested to hear your activities, the successes, failures, new ideas, people to look out for, tips and any tricks to share with your community. The result of this Bandcamp should be a document of new ideas and new concepts for everyone to ponder, execute or employ to maximize your exposure over the course of this year.

Even if your band didn’t hit SXSW, attend this Bandcamp to learn some new ideas that would work anywhere, not just at SXSW. If you’re not in a band but you like Houston community, attend this Bandcamp to hear about the successes from your local musicians. The best part about this Bandcamp is that it will be run by YOU as Matthew Wettergreen will be speaking at a conference the exact time as Bandcamp except in Chicago. Grace Rodriguez of AYN Brand and Ned Dodington of Caroline Collective will be on hand to facilitate but the knowledge and sharing should come from YOU the bands.

Did you know that Bandcamp has now been running for 6 months? We think this meeting would be a good time to let us know what is and is not working for you or what you’d like to see from Bandcamp in the future. If you’d like to let us know privately: mwettergreen@gmail.com.

WHAT: Bandcamp: SXSW AUTOPSY

WHEN: April 5th, 2009 1-3pm

WHERE: Caroline Collective, 4820 Caroline Houston TX

Please note that the originally scheduled Bandcamp: COPYRIGHT will be rescheduled for May 3rd so that Joe Stallone of Bracewell and Giuliani and Grounded in Music may teach the session.

About Bandcamp

Regular BandCamp sessions are held on the First Sunday of every month at Caroline Collective sometime in between the hours of 1pm and 5pm. Please mark your calendar accordingly for future events where the community education model teaches specific skills to musical artists such as, online/offline promotion, tour booking, financials, and recording. Please speak about this event to your colleagues, band members and other interested members of the Houston Music Community.

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This weekend is Biocamp, an informal community participatory unconference addressing biotechnology in Houston. Leading up to Biocamp over the course of the week several events bring together the members of the biotechnology, medical device, and chemical therapeutic communities. Warm up over the week by meeting some of these people in a relaxing atmosphere and end your week with the main event.

Biocamp is focused on Houston’s biotech sphere and all the shapes and sizes that make up that community. This is a monumental event for Houston to be holding one of the first Biocamps in the nation and we are looking forward to such a transformative event. Biocamp is a different conference than any other science conference because the primary goals are transparency, communication, openness and sharing between the community. Instead of being focused on delivering the current research progress in a specfic thrust, this conference is a state of the union sort, being a better forum for a review presentation on the state of research in a particular vein or an overview of the climate of biotechnology in light of the recent economic situation. To help maximize your Biocamp experience, here are some tips for attending the conference.

How to speak at Biocamp

This is the easiest part. no abstract submissions, no review panel. Simply arrive at the conference in the morning. Check out the presentation board which will have a grid with rooms and times. Put your name and presentation title into any open slot. Note, if you do not arrive early you may not have the opportunity to speak on a given topic. Remember that your topic should be accessible to the general public which in itself should exercise your communication skills.

What to expect at Biocamp

The attendees of the conference should be people in the biotech industry, academics, students, venture capitalists, angel investors, and science enthusiasts. While the talks at regular science conferences are usually hyper-specific, these talks will probably be bigger picture and survey the state of a field rather than dissect a current study. Expect the equivalent of a review paper in presentation form for the conference. Look for investors to give talks about what they’re promoting right now and what they’re looking for in the future.

What this conference could do for your career

If a standard career parth is starting to make you nervous, this conference is a good step towards an alternate path. Community members who usually attend unconferences of this sort are usually more open to change, welcome especially in a firm discipline such as science. Meeting people in your community who think alike could be the first step to launch a company, start a science non-profit, explore your educator interests, or meet people who are doing things that you might think are cool and innovative.

The Goals of Biocamp

Unconferences of this sort are a great way to discuss the arc or direction that a particular community is moving towards. With respect to the Houston biotech community, a meeting of the minds and sharing session will help everyone to discover the state of the community and unique challenges that we face in Houston and elsewhere.

Meetings of this sort can share knowledge that would otherwise be locked up in specific institutions, laboratories or with individuals. Those with a trend of openness and sharing will come away with great returns and those with an open mind will come away with a great deal learned about the community in general and the people who make up the community itself.

The full list of Bioweekend activities:

• Houston Startup Happy Hour and BioWeekend Kick-off Party the BioWeekend festivities kickoff at Saute Bistro with the help of Startup Houston and the Houston Technology Center. April 2, 2009 from 6pm to 9pm at Saute Bistro, 2303 Richmond Ave.
• 6th Annual BioHouston Chili Cook-Off The BioHouston Chili Cook-Off is more than just chili - it brings the life science community together. BioHouston invites you to join us on April 3rd for the 6th annual day of fun in the sun, full of prizes and everyone’s favorite–CHILI! April 3, 2009 from 12pm to 5pmat BioHouston, 2555 Holly Hall St., Ste. 100
• BioCamp The main event. BioCamp Houston ‘09 is an informal, participatory, unconference BarCamp event to bring college/graduate students, postgraduate trainees, junior academic faculty, entrepreneurs, would be entrepreneurs and inventors as well as, technology champions from the Greater Houston area together to learn and network. April 4, 2009 from 9am to 4pm at Keck Hall on Rice Campus, 6100 Main Street
• BioWeekend Closing Reception Immediately following BioCamp Houston ‘09, the after party is at Vallhala right next door to the conference. Join us for a few drinks and a final adieu. April 4, 2009 from 4pm til 9pm at Vahalla in Keck Hall on Rice Campus

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Hurry. up. As soon as this is finished and some clothes and the laptop are thrown into a bag, we head to Austin. For the next nine days, SXSW is where you’ll find me.

Houston’s Focus on Regionalism
I strongly believe that regionalism is a viable path to greater success for groups and communities. This is reflected in the wealth of Houston-specific programs occurring over the course of the Festival:

• Houston Film Commission is cohosting a Film Texas Happy Hour Saturday March 14th at Iron Cactus (6th Street@Trinity) from 4P-6P. Registration is closed but show up and see what’s what
• Kirtsy and Alltop’s Girl/Guy Party hosted by Alltop & Kirtsy at Allen’s Boots from 5P - 9P. Look out for girls handing out red bandannas, those are the VIP badges
• Houston @ SXSW, on March 17 at GRUV (101 W 5th St) to showcase, support and promote Houston and its vibrant Film, Interactive, and Music communities, and make sure Houston innovators and talent aren’t overlooked by the numerous influencers and tastemakers at SXSW. See films curated by Michelle Mower of SWAMP, meet tech companies curated by Marc Nathan of Houston Technology Center and see Houston musicians curated by myself. This party is completely free, please register at the Amiando page here. This party is graciously sponsored by Kirtsy, Schipul, Werkadoo and AYN Brand.
  
• IndieHouston.org Day party on March 20th featuring free beer and 17 or so Houston bands. Event information is here, remember to register at http://colab.org. Caroline Collective is a cosponsor of this event.
  

Coworking and Whuffie
Last year at SXSW I had the opportunity to learn from some of the leaders in the field of coworking. Those interactions framed my year and contributed to my individual and our collective success. This year I’m looking to share what Ned and I have learned and in turn inspire others to successfully open their own coworking spaces. Join us tonight at the Coworking Meetup at Hotel San Jose (1316 S. Congress) from 7:30P til whenever.

One of my coworking mentors, Alex Hillman, of Indy Hall will be leading a core conversation on Saturday at 11:30AM entitled “Working Alone Sucks: Join the Coworking Revolution.”

Start off your Sunday by catching Tara Hunt’s Keynote “Making Whuffie: Raising Social Capital in Online Communities” at 11:30AM.

Later on Sunday at 3:30pm join us for the panel “Regional Whuffie Building: Attracting Innovation to Your City” where Tony Bacigalupo (New Work City), Geoff DiMasi (P’unk Avenue, Independents Hall), Susan Evans (Office Nomads), Julie Duryea (Souk) and I will be talking about creating a spirit of entrepreneurship and inspiring a regional sense of innovation.

Music Related
As the week shifts from Interactive to Music, there are several events we’re participating in related to the Music portion of SXSW:

• Grace Rodriguez and myself are speaking on a panel at The Band Bootcamp on Wednesday, March 18th on “Why Your Fans Are Your Tickets To Success.” We’ll be talking about how to crowd-source management of your career employing fans as evangelists, booking agents, promoters, designers, microlenders and sources of inspiration.
• Saturday, March 21st, several Houston artists will be participating in guerrilla shows somewhere in downtown Austin. No details yet, you’ll have to pay attention to the twitters and the txts.

Coverage
Over the course of SXSW I’ll be blogging for Chicago Public Radio/WBEZ. Read the daily updates on WBEZ’s blog here and follow the coverage at the WBEZ Live twitter account @WBEZLive.

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Rice University has asked me to plan a summer program and course addressing civic engagement from a multi-disciplinary standpoint. I look at this as a synthesis of everything learned during graduate student and accrued over the year of running Caroline Collective. My CV appears a bit schizophrenic thus a personal statement is required to explain my story arc. Because this took me all day and because it serves as a good framework to discuss at both my SXSW panel and the SOS panel at the end of March I thought it should be shared.  Probably overarching and of course verbose (If I had a super power it’d be cogent writing). All the more reason to put it out there for public consumption and comments.

Individual
Bioengineering is at its essence a multi-disciplinary approach to problem solving for biological issues. Those basic tenets have been applied as an individual in both my professional and creative life attempting at a well-rounded academic and cultural education. While at Rice University studying bioengineering for bone defect repair, aspects of architecture, clinical plastic surgery and industrial design were combined with more standard bioengineering aspects of mechanical engineering, materials research and imaging modalities. The incorporation of these fields resulted in novel designs and solutions supported by engaging and dynamic presentations and graphic design telling a story easy to understand for the lay person. Continued discussion with the architecture school resulted in students and professors incorporating the ideals of bioengineering into their architecture projects, including concepts of scaffold ingrowth, duality/singularity between host and body and symbiotic relationships between construct and program interaction. As an instructor, classes were run with equal parts teaching and learning, instructing the students on CAD methods and then employing the students to teach others to accomplish the tasks. Outside of graduate school, I applied this multidisciplinary approach to producing live events incorporating art, music, and film accessible to lovers of any art medium.

Caroline Collective
This multi-disciplinary education and approach to problem solving has been applied at Caroline Collective, founded in June 2008 with Ned Dodington. Taking the belief that being well rounded as an individual can be a platform for discussion and interaction with other similar like-minded people, Caroline Collective’s goal is to positively impact the cultural landscape of Houston. Our programming develops community-based education models and creates opportunities for individuals and groups to be more successful incorporating seemingly disparate disciplines of technology, music, film, arts and non-profits. We’ve demonstrated that each community has unique challenges but those challenges can be met with similar methods: listening to the needs of the members, incorporating equal parts teaching/learning and arriving at a solution incorporating all of the facets of the problem. Since October we have been running a monthly series called Bandcamp that is a community-focused teaching program to educate musicians on the path to success in their career. A similar community focused meeting, Artcamp, was held last month. In developing sustainable methods to address the art community’s challenges we collectively arrived at the decision to create a Houston Arts Wiki and to hold a day long Houston-wide art fair to introduce all of the resources and arts groups in Houston. We have recently launched a bi-weekly series of business classes with a partner startup, Werkadoo, that teaches independents in any discipline the skills they need to manage a successful independent career. Several companies are forming underneath the umbrella of Caroline Collective pooled from the complementary talents of the members and community groups that inhabit the space.

Community
This transparent and multi-disciplinary approach to problem solving on a community level is akin to the Long Tail effect online. People with niche interests meet to discuss commonalities and find that challenges and interests are parallel rather than perpendicular. Coworking is the physical manifestation of that and Caroline Collective one of many staging points for that interaction in Houston. In Houston you can witness technology focused individuals attending arts events and arts focused individuals attending technology focused events. Communities are experiencing greater engagement, richer relationships and more accessible resources, all due to the framework of a multi-disciplinary approach to solving collective problems. Opera in the Heights is exploring incorporating technology into its performances and digital archiving. Two new coworking spaces have opened based on Caroline Collective’s model, one in the Village focusing on green companies and one in Katy opened by the Houston Technology Center; another is slated to open in the Woodlands. The passive belief that all groups can contribute to and provide solutions to individuals’ problems and the active incorporation of those ideals has resulted in greater collaboration among community groups and greater insight to addressing community and societal challenges.

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There was a time in my life when I quoted Fight Club religiously. Any remark could be deftly answered with a snarky remark from the movie, demonstrating my discontent with our capitalistic and materialistic society rewarding personality rather than character.

At that time I had an extreme amount of entitlement for my skills and what I was owed. When things went wrong I failed to look inward, instead, blame shifting or allowing this entitlement and a sense of animosity to blossom inside myself.

Now, not so angry, I attempt to keep an open mind in all situations and approach every situation as if I know nothing. I’ve found that learning is accelerated because my brain is set up to be a sponge rather than resisting or preparing to provide counterpoint at every step. People are more willing to help when they see an open nature and someone is interested in enrichment and personal growth.

Watching the flurry of activity at Sunday’s Bandcamp I couldn’t help but remember those days of watching Fight Club regularly. Looking at the cracks in the walls of Caroline Collective I was immediately transported to the Paper Street Soap Company where a crowd of Project Mayhem members were working towards something bigger. There was one big difference though; they were working to bring equality and success through destruction — we were working to build up and support each other through education, openness and a strong sense of community. And the entitlement and pretension characterised by some unsuccessful and angry bands wasn’t present, as each group was soaking up the information flying around the room like a sponge.

As I compared the activity from Paper Street Soap Company and Bandcamp: SXSW PREP I realized that each community had a greater sense of accomplishment and mission and each group worked fervently towards that common goal. But the difference was in the attitudes; you could witness the excitement and openness each band had to new ideas and setting up these systems. Infomation was volunteered and readily shared as idividual groups showed eachother what they had set up or explained how technology and an online presence had helped them in the past. At the end of the  two hour session, everyone felt better about their band’s position online and everyone realized the potential of putting together their toolbox to help  not only promote themselves but also EACH OTHER.

Most Bandcamps have ended with exhaustion, as the speakers give as much information about a particular topic as they can and the attendees’ heads fill with new ideas and new methods of promoting and running their careers. Something different happened this time as bands met each other and got excited about the prospects of showing themselves at SXSW. Not only did we not run over time but everyone was excited and energized at the end of the session. We selected the topic of April’s Bandcamp: COPYRIGHT and left for Coffee Groundz for post-Bandcamp discussion.

This Bandcamp was a reflection of the success of the event over the past several months. We are building something and it’s just as disruptive and passionate as Project Mayhem. The difference is that it’s not based in anger or entitlement; it’s based in hard work, education and dedication. The result will be a strong, united and educated Music Community that is self-sustained and self-supporting.

Check the twitter stream for Bandcamp: SXSW PREP by searching the hashtag: #bandcamph.

Thanks to @audioADD, @danjoyce and of course @dryvetyme for live tweeting the event.

Check out these bands on multiple digital outposts:

Bands in Attendance:

• Adam & Lena
• Benjamin Wesley
• B L A C K I E
• Davie Graves
• Days Drive
• Desmond Zavala
• Dizzy Pilot
• Espantapajaros
• Fat Tony
• Female Demand
• Giant Battle Monster
• Glasnost
• Golden Cities
• Insert Name Here
• Motion Turns It On
• Narreme
• Prairie Cadets
• Something Fierce
• Tambersauro
• Tax The Wolf
• The American Sharks
• The Bottom Four
• The Liquid Kitchen
• The Snake Charmers
• The Tontons
• The Western Civilization
• Wall With One Side
• Warblerpl
• Wayside Drive
• You (Genious)

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On a blustery day in Houston on the last day of February members of the Houston Arts Community met for an open discussion about the state of the Houston Arts Community. We met earlier than most usually get up on a Saturday morning but aided by bagels provided by Sarah Gabbart of Sew Crafty we had the energy to tackle issues and challenges surrounding the Arts in Houston. People came and people left, we ate lunch donated by Les Givrals and before we knew it the end of the day had arrived. In the end we covered a range of topics surrounding promotion, resources, challenges and steps to look forward.

The Barcamp model provided a simple and manageable framework to run a community based discussion and forum for social change. Similar to Bandcamp, we shed the formal educational sessions in lieu of a community driven conversation. This ensured that all opinions and topics were covered and dealt with all topics in a comfortable and collegial atmosphere. Several issues continued to come up and while facets of these issues were discussed, we are clearly only at the beginning of this process:

There seems to be a need to share available resources in the arts community at all levels, from staging an independent show to running a successful gallery. As an independent artist new to Houston, Jen Mathis mentioned that it is daunting to know where to start to stage a show or which organization to contact. Nancy Zastudil of the Mitchell Center for the Arts pointed out that Skydive studio, one of the newest in Houston, is a great model for an artist run gallery and has begun to run weekly classes on Saturdays entitled Saturday Free School of the Arts (SFSA).

Bringing Awareness about the Houston Arts Community
Addressing what seems to be a systemic identity issue, the fertility of Houston Arts is known outside of Houston but internally greater awareness is needed. In the afternoon session, Rainey Knudson of Glasstire discussed the formation of the online magazine and her attempts to bring awareness of the Houston arts community internally and nationally. It seems that, while engagement exists, on the whole, awareness and education is lacking.

Dichotomy between Underground and Overground
Sean Morrissey Carroll provided perspective on some of his favorite shows over the past 10 years, all underground. Many were staged as guerrilla shows among friends, held at alternate venues an included such ridiculousness as pyramids of jello shots. He commented on the difference between the underground and the overground in terms of methods of promotion, inclusion of artists and desired attendance for success.

It seems that the guerrilla shows are staged to cut through the noise but also as a way to show art without pretense or rigid guidelines. There is a cycle that exists where the people staging these shows put on so many successful shows that they eventually gain the respect of the establishment, who then adopts them into the fold. Without the need to be innovative in staging and promotion, these people become the establishment and a new breed of guerrilla artists stage shows and the cycle repeats. The group agreed that it would make sense to harness the power of this arts cycle, bringing the underground and the overground together for resource sharing and documenting our rich arts community.

The best ideas that came out of the day are the following:

• Houston arts wiki to share best practices and provide a living document
• City-wide art fair
• Aggregated list of events and city map

Houston Arts Wiki
David Herrold of the Houston Chronicle, joining us on UstreamTV put forth the idea for a Houston Arts Wiki (not myself, as incorrectly stated by Sean Morrissey Carroll in his recap). This wiki could serve as a community curated list of resources, artists and history of the Houston Arts Community. It could function as a living document of the city’s arts scene and will be a valuable resource for people to use for learning or what already exists or what could exist.  Already showing success in providing a living document of a community, the Houston Scene Wiki off of now defunct Skyline Network has provided valuable information for the Houston Music Community. We are looking for a site that is unafilliated to host this wiki and have thought of purchasing houstonartswiki.com

City-Wide Art Fair
Grace Rodriguez had an idea for a city-wide art fair. Nancy Zastudil chimed in that Chicago has such a fair every year. The idea was to get every arts organization and gallery into a large open space, give them tables and showcase everything that Houston has to offer in the arts community.  While this is a large undertaking we feel that this could be one way to showcase the arts in Houston.

Aggregated List and map of Venues and Events
Elliot Cole of Caroline Collective mentioned that his mother runs an aggregated blog of events happening in Austin. While the process that she uses is labor intensive it would be great to create something that would allow all events to be pulled in and seen by Houston members. As Marc Nathan said “You want to build the castle and then hand the keys to the community.”

Closing and What’s Next
The best recap of the day was provided by Houston’s contrarian art representative: Sean Morrissey Carroll.
Grace Rodriguez recorded the entire day, thanks to UstreamTV. Morning Session is here and Afternon Session is here.
You can check the #artcamph twitter stream for a running commentary of the day.

Going into the event one of our goals was to work towards developing a sustainable system for improving the arts in Houston. This meeting was a huge step but only the first towards open lines of communication along the vertical hierarchy. Regular events of this type that will allow the community as a whole to arrive at a fully informed picture of the challenges and unique situations that we face in the Houston Arts Community.

Looking forward, we covered some challenges and came up with some solutions but this was only the beginning of the discussion. While two great ideas came out of Artcamp’s session, there are many more that this community could develop. It is our job as leaders in the community to discuss and listen to the community’s needs and direction for the Houston arts community for the goal of raising awareness for the Houston arts community, as well as making people in Houston proud of the art that they have in their city.

What do you think are the unique challenges that exist in Houston Arts?

What do you think some solutions are?

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In October of 2008 Caroline Collective hosted the first Bandcamp. The event was a full afternoon of education and community discussion surrounding the challenges and successes of the local music community. Through a several hour townhall discussion, community members were able to voice their concerns, ideas and success stories in the Houston Music Community. Fast forward several months and Bandcamp is a regular monthly event addressing the facets of career development that bands need to be successful as well as providing continued resources for local artists.

As a community based education model, Bandcamp has been a resounding success. Sessions are led by experts in the particular topic but the open discussion format results in information sharing about some of the best practices and experiences other artists have learned from. Bandcamp organizers have also recently begun to offer one-on-one consultation sessions with bands looking for extra guidance. Regular attendees have reported that Bandcamp has resulted in more gigs, better online presence and a new and richer relationships with members of the Houston Music Community.

Bandcamp’s success is a demonstration of the power of community based education models and what can result from open forums for discussion and idea sharing that ultimately create opportunities for individuals and groups to be more successful. The best part about these models is that they can work for any genre or specialization. For that reason we’ve decided to hold a similar event but this time focused on the Houston Arts Community.

Join us this Saturday, February 28th for ArtCamp. Artcamp is an informal, community-based event to discuss the state of the arts in Houston and develop an informed strategy on how we can collectively support our arts community. The format is open and decided upon by those in attendance but we have several goals that we will achieve through open discussion and peer-to-peer educational sessions:

• Inform participants of available resources online and offline
• Share best practices among organizations, including audience development, fundraising, board and volunteer recruitment, and online outreach
• Share best practices among artists, such as developing their careers, promoting themselves and their work, obtaining gallery representation, and building an online presence

The schedule for the day will include educational sessions and a townhall discussion section just like at Bandcamp. Through this discussion we hope to determine the difficulties that local artists and members of the art community experience, the common solutions to problems, and voice concerns, comments and suggestions for improvement. The final session of the day will be a focused townhall discussion proposing sustainable solutions to educate and deliver resources to members of the community to ensure the improved success and continued communication at all levels.

Check out this great quote about ArtCamp from co-organizer Grace Rodriguez of AYN Brand:

The trigger for this event was Wayne Dolcefino’s scathing editorial (disguised as an investigative report) that derided funding for the arts in Houston. Members and supporters of our arts community were appalled at the lack of factual context and objectivity in his broadcast; and were disappointed that private objection to Dolcefino’s “reports” were not reflected in a unified voice, publicly. Several of us recognized that we need to facilitate better communication and improve relationships among the various arts organizations, stakeholders, and supporters to strengthen our community, so that we could disseminate information and correct misunderstandings more quickly in the future.

We hope to bring the general public and arts supporters together with those directly involved in the arts community to discuss the state of the arts in Houston, share best practices, and develop strategies on how we can *collectively* support and contribute to our arts community. Basically, we want everyone who “hearts” art to get to know each other and figure out how we can best vitalize and support our cultural community.

The signup and event listing is here: http://barcamp.org/ArtCampHouston

For more information, please contact Matthew Wettergreen at mwettergreen@gmail.com or Grace Rodriguez at grace@aynbrand.com.

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