New presentation tool, ecologies of entanglement, sign our year(ly) book, and more
Hello there, how are you?
As for us, September marks the start of cozy season – which, as you might imagine, is the most favored time of year for the people that work on Are.na. There’s a single tree outside with red leaves, can you believe it?
We’re listening to Nocturne by Oscillation Circuit and, as always, wondering what you’re thinking about these days. What are paying attention to?
We’re currently testing a lightweight presentation tool for channels with people in the Premium Supporter tier. Even if you’re not using a channel to do a presentation, this is a beautiful way to focus on blocks, one at a time.
If you’re in the Premium Supporter tier, you can activate this by clicking “More…” in the top right of a channel, and then “Present.”
If you’re not in the Premium Supporter tier and you’d like early access to this as it develops, consider upgrading? Otherwise, we will be rolling this out to all Premium members when everything is completed.
Functionality still to come on presentation mode: autoplay and shuffle (do you see where we’re going with this?)
The next feature up for early access for people in the Premium Supporter tier might be the most requested feature in Are.na history. Can you guess what it is?
Investor report
Another perk for people in the Premium Supporter tier is access to the bi-annual investor report, which we published last month.
It covers the major product and editorial work from the first half of the year, revenue reports and analysis and our plans for this quarter and beyond.
If you’d like to read it…that’s right…consider upgrading to Premium Supporter :)
Ecologies of Entanglement series
We’ve been publishing an editorial series with Dark Properties called Ecologies of Entanglement, exploring natural ecologies, networked technologies, and the people working across both. You can read about it in more depth in our introductory letter, and find the interviews published so far below. Our fifth and final interview, with Cortney Cassidy, will be published on September 29, both on Are.na Editorial and through the Dark Properties newsletter.
Claire Evans on slime mold computers, imagination as a form of computation, and the endless entanglement of our biological reality
Agnes Cameron on satellite imagery and ways of seeing that go beyond the human eye
Austin Wade Smith on subverting technological infrastructures to steward symbiotic relationships with the more-than-human world
Casey Tang on forest gardening, complex systems, and mapping ecological design onto software methodologies
More on Are.na Editorial
Last month we also published an interview with artist and organizer Margaret Lee, as a part of our It’s Not Business It’s Personal series. Charles Broskoski spoke to Margaret about retiring from her gallery 47 Canal, and how to make space for community without also neglecting personal infrastructure in the process.
This was the third installment in the series, which consists of interviews with people whose careers we find fascinating. The first two were with Emily Segal and Malte Müller.
We also published a piece with artists Travess Smalley and Daniel Lefcourt, who gave a Channel Walkthrough earlier in the month on their channels “Visualizing Sound: Tools, Notations, Drawings, Graphics, and Paintings” and “Graphic Traces.” We documented the event with both a video and an interview, during which they talk about graphic notation and how artists, musicians, choreographers, and educators have translated sound and music into visual language.
Check back here for future Channel Walkthrough events.
Are.na x Montez Press Radio
Tune in on September 23 at 1pm EST for episode four of Are.na Radio, featuring Sam Taylor, Rosemary Wexler, and Alex Tell. Sam will shares their Are.na channel “gathering essence,” Rosemary will narrate her channel “surfactant program,” and Alex will walk us through her Are.na channel “ornamental palms.”
Are.na Radio is an audio experiment with Montez Press Radio wherein members of the Are.na community verbally present their Are.na channels, describing what’s been collected and revealing the threads of thought therein.
Sign our Year(ly) Book
Every year we publish the Are.na Annual, an anthology of writings from the people of Are.na. And every year we ask for a collective contribution that chimes with the theme. This year the theme is “document” and we’re asking you to please sign your name here to be added to the book. Think of it like a yearbook. Signatures will be collected in this channel and then published in the next Are.na Annual, coming December 2024.
Press
We’ve been lucky to get some nice press mentions lately, including at the end of “It Was Delicious” by David Moore in Flaming Hydra. David traces the history of del.icio.us, a service that was a major influence on Are.na.
Our CEO Charles Broskoski also went on two podcasts last month to talk about taste: It’s Called Taste, a new podcast from our friends at Redoux (sign up for a free subscription here). And Tasteland, a new podcast from our friends at Dirt.
Roadmap
As always, you can check out our roadmap page which goes into the features we're building, our long-term goals, and our current numbers.
There are so many places you can spend your attention, and we’re touched that you spent it reading this letter.
Hope you’re taking care.