What is the Future of Arts Criticism in Wales?

Today I attended a small part of the biannual Critics' Roundtable event organised by Wales Arts Review and for me the most thought provoking session was on the future of arts criticism in Wales. This panel discussion fired two debates in my head, the first being about maintaining paid income for arts critics.

Traditional models saw newspapers and magazines making money out of sales of hard copies and advertising, but with the shift from the physical to digital - panelist Gary Raymond, editor at Wales Arts Review, actual predicted the death of printed newspapers and magazines within the next ten years - and the huge amount of information, articles and reviews that are available for free at the touch of a button, how is it possible to make enough money to continue to pay critics for their work?

Advertising is the obvious transferable factor from the old model and is a tried and tested way of making money out of online content but it is by no means the magical wonder solution to all the problems surrounding paying critics for their work. In fact, the fight for advertising might even have a negative effect on arts criticism. The publications that can attract the largest number of hits are the ones that will secure the big advertising deals making articles about the mainstream far more attractive to publishers than the new and unusual or more challenging - a piece about a big well known musical will attract more hits than one about an unknown contemporary dance piece, no matter how amazing that work is. It was also mentioned by the panel today that people are more likely to read reviews with very high or very low star ratings rather than those in the middle. Is it cynical to think that reviews may become influenced by the need to gain hits?

The most popular solution with the panel today was to make readers pay for online content in the same way that they would buy a physical newspaper or magazine. Leading me onto the second debate in my head, is charging for online content really the way forward? The thinking was that if the big name publications started doing this then the smaller ones could do the same and actually earn some money. I personally don't think we should be thinking about online content in the same way as print. It's a completely different medium which people interact with in a completely different way - I certainly do anyway. I wouldn't go to a website and read each article in turn like reading a magazine from cover to cover. I'll read an article because I've spotted a link to it somewhere and it's sparked my interest. I don't just read articles from one publication like buying one newspaper, I'll read from a multitude of sources. If I find something interesting I want to be able to share it on my social networks so that people with the same interests as me can read it too - none of this is conducive with paid content. I don't think I'm devaluing the journalists that have written the articles and reviews that I read by interacting with digital content in this way, I firmly believe they should be paid for their work. I'm also not completely discounting paid for content, but this new and booming way of devouring information needs a new approach from the industry, not the same old ones that were applied to print.

I said in a Twitter discussion following today's event that I'm a solutions not problems kind of girl and I haven't offered up a single solution in this post. I do believe some thinking outside the box is needed to secure the future of arts criticism, but hey, these are just the ramblings of an Onion.

An observed story - part 8

Yesterday I saw a large builder wedged into the small space between a wall and the railings. He wasn't actually stuck but I think that was more by luck than judgement. Since we know Peter is a big guy I guess we now know he's a builder. Following this thread of the story, today I saw two men repairing the pavement with two little lads watching their every move with delightful facination. Made me think of Peter and Evan as children and an older influence in Peter's life that made him want to be a builder, whereas Evan followed in the footsteps of our magician - or tried at least; he can't perform any of the tricks that were left to him. Could these two builders be our magician's travelling companions? I like to think maybe they build the tricks for him.

Skipping to a different thread, yesterday I saw two women chatting away and as they passed me I heard "I don't know whether I can trust what's true and what's not after what he said." Not the best formed sentence but it gives us something. We have two women again so we're still not sure if this is Sarah and a friend or two separate women that were at Peter's birthday bash. One of them has trust issues with one of the guys, but which one. All we know about Gareth is that he punched someone so it could be him, Peter has been falsely imprisoned and Evan knows he's innocent but would you believe their pleas, and Phil stole Peter's girlfriend so he's clearly untrustworthy! We can add to this another act of untrustworthyness as I just witnessed a man trying to use a credit card that wasn't his. He was claiming it was his mother's so we know the card belonged to a woman, but whose card is it and who was trying to use it?

An observed story part 7

A while back on my travels I encountered two men, probably in their late 60's - early 70's travelling with a younger man in his late teens to early 20's. One of the older men was jokingly protesting that it wasn't the same having the youngster tagging along, "now they can't call us the Grey-Team!" They changed trains, the same as me, and met up with a third older man of about the same age and the bloke made the same joke again. Made me wonder if one of these older men is our magician?  And was the younger man either Evan or Peter? Had one of them shown an interest in following in the magicians footsteps before he died? To many blanks at the moment,  I guess we'll just have to wait and see. In the meantime I witnessed something else today, a lad turned up at the train station,  exclaimed "ah where are they" and disappeared making a phone call as he walked. He came back to catch the train but he was still on his own. Made me wonder if one of the lads gets lost on our chaotic night out. We know it's not Phil, he goes home with Sarah. Sounds like the kind of thing that would happen to Evan but I guess it could have been Peter or Gareth. More blanks to fill.

An observed story part 6

I'm on a train and I overheard the following sentence between two ladies travelling together, "If he'd been holding his pint when Gareth hit him, it would have gone all over the place." New character - Gareth. But who did he hit? Another piece of the puzzle of Peter's birthday night maybe. Were Gareth and these two ladies more friends on the night out? Or is one of these ladies Sarah?

An observed story part 5

I was standing waiting to cross the road the other day, the red man appeared just as I got to the crossing so the signal was about to change from red to green for the traffic. Two cars slowly approached the traffic lights side by side, their windows down as the drivers had a conversation that didn't look entirely friendly, as they reached the lights they changed to green so without stopping I overheard just the very last word of their conversation as they drove passed me then went their separate ways - "microwave." Both drivers were male and travelling alone and since the conversation didn't look completely amicable they could have been Peter and Phil or my preferred theory is that it was Evan and Phil with Evan defending his imprisoned brother.  But what's a microwave got to do with anything?

An observed story part 4

Tonight I overheard one half of a conversation that somewhat changes our timeline. A man on the train was on the phone to a girl that he is involved with, called Sarah - so Peter's girlfriend now has a name. Various things transpired through the course of our journey. There was a story of a present that she'd really wanted so he bought it for her before they were meant to meet for a date but she stood him up so he gave it to a complete stranger. There was a man in prison that she was afraid of - sounds like Sarah's attempt to frame Peter for breaking into her house worked and now he's in jail and not happy about it! There were also some issues involving Facebook and since part of our story involves Peter and Phil finding each other on Facebook maybe Sarah's latest victim is Phil. So joining the dots, our story begins with a Facebook friend request. Peter and Phil, two old school friends, find each other on Facebook then randomly bump into each other not long after. Phil joins Peter, Evan and Sarah for a night out for Peter's birthday but ends up going home with Sarah.  The next day Sarah convinces someone to break her door down then publicly accuses Peter of breaking into her house. He's arrested and sent to prison. Any idea where the dead magician comes into all this?