Though my research leading me to this conclusion was hardly exhaustive, I believe there’s never been an opera written about dinosaurs. “Tyrannosaurus Rex” is nothing more than the name of an extinct animal.
That doesn’t mean that opera dinosaurs aren’t lurking among us. Because they are.
Who are these opera dinosaurs you ask (and is she going to cast aspersions, you may be thinking?)
I’m talking about leading arts organizations and people who represent premier arts organizations who haven’t stepped into the digital age, who aren’t digitally literate.
Case in point: The other evening I was listening to the Metropolitan Opera Radio broadcast of Madame Butterfly via Met Radio on my laptop, provided by SiriusXM. While I listen to their radio broadcasts, which I do frequently, since I can’t see anything (obviously), I often have a libretto at my elbow and am logged into my Twitter account. Yes, despite the fact that the Metropolitan Opera (@MetOpera) doesn’t embrace its Twitter audience, I still log in and go searching for others who are listening to the broadcast.
Why do I claim they don’t embrace its Twitter audience? No hashtags regularly provided. So, Twitter users throw out a line to followers, trying to hit key words, sending messages like love notes in bottles out to sea, “Anyone out there listening to @MetOpera production of (insert name)?” Micro love notes, 140 characters long, hurled into the black hole of cyberspace.
Oh, except for the Met’s Season opening night. There was an opening night hashtag. And we all found other Twitter followers listening to Anna Bolena, and many of us made new friends. It was a fabulous time connecting in that space over the Met Opera production. People were doing pirouettes to the music and posting them as Twitpics. I honestly can’t remember having a better time on Twitter connecting, sharing, commenting.
Imagine that people not even physically attending the show, having FUN together, listening to opera!
Since opening night of Anna Bolena, though, not one single show-specific hashtag has been provided, which I don’t fault the Met Opera Radio hosts for, but surely someone at the Met is thinking about their listeners in digital spaces? (Obviously not.)
Margaret Juntwait / (Richard Blinkhoff)
Then the other evening during the radio broadcast of Butterfly, the venerable Margaret Juntwait, whom I happen to enjoy most of the time, says to @William_Berger, “Tweet. I don’t Tweet. What’s a hashtag?” Honestly, you could hear her disparagement of Twitter and Twitterfolk in her voice, like we are somehow unclean–cyber-lepers–because we have embraced Twitter.
With one single utterance Ms. Juntwait, who is only one year older than me (@Operatoonity; @Gale_Martin), has successfully estranged an entire online community who want to connect in cyberspace over their productions. She has also just admitted to thousands of listeners that she is in fact a digital dinosaur — zero digital literacy.
Now, while she may be ultra-knowledgeable about her opera and other things, moving into the 21st century, there is really no reason to wear your digitally illiteracy like it’s badge of honor anymore than an adult would admit to thousands of other adults that they can’t read words on a page.
In fact, according to Jeanne C. Meister (@jcmeister), author of The 2020 Workplace (@2020workplace), those leading organizations in the 21st Century, whether they are leader managers or leader figureheads like Ms. Juntwait will need to learn how to lead and manage people in digital spaces. Or be prepared to become irrelevant.
