RE: [-empyre-] subscription

["Axel Bruns" <snurb@snurb.info>]

G'day !

Alan wrote:
> The point I'm making, even in the quote, is in terms of 
> _audience_. Again, you have to _subscribe_ to a list. You 
> don't have to _subscribe_ to a gallery to wander in. You can 
> show in a gallery without being a member of a governing 
> board. This has nothing to do with parameters - every venue 
> has parameters - but it has to do with audience. Lists are 
> much smaller, closed, even though anyone can sub. Galleries 
> are much more open. Many non-profits btw have websites as 
> well - you can look at them from a zoo.

We shouldn't forget that many mailing-lists have Website archives, too - and
in some, maybe many, cases viewing them is possible for anyone. (In your
analogy: anyone can wander in to have a look.) It would be interesting to
know the ratio of open to closed archives for mailing-lists, incidentally.
Also, as I've suggested before, there's a certain promiscuity to
mailing-list use: as a result, 'good' information tends to skip from one
list to the other. (Think of the amount of lists that interesting nettime
posts end up on, for exapmle.)

I think there's a conflation of various levels of participation here,
though: between 'simple' viewing and active participation (showing of works
and ideas).

Viewing:

- in galleries, anyone can wander in

- in some mailing-lists, anyone can view the archives; in all mailing-lists,
people need to subscribe to view current content. Subscription is often a
fairly quick and easy process, though.


Active participation:

- in galleries, to show you have to catch the eye of the owner/curator

- in mailing-lists, after subscribing your posts are usually shown
automatically


-- 
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snurb@snurb.info - Axel Bruns Ph.D., Brisbane, Australia \ X /  |_)