Micro Blogging

Since Blogger was launched in the 1990s, blogs have reshaped the web, impacted politics, shaken up journalism, and enabled millions of people to have a voice and connect with others. And some of us thought that the entire enchilada was just getting started. It had evolved from Web sites into a more current information distributor. A dancing blog gave us our own voice on the internet. It was a place to collect and share things with our dance world that we found interesting - whether our political commentary, a personal dance diary, or links to web sites we wanted to remember. Then came the Trump Pandemic and Social Dancing came to a stand still.

“Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing

is not to stop questioning.” —Albert Einstein.

 

The Micros arrive slowly at the beginning of this century, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr and others. Micro blogging is an online medium that exists as a specific form of blogging. A micro-blog differs from a traditional blog in that its content is typically smaller in both actual and aggregated file size. Micro-blogs allow users to exchange small elements of content such as sentences, individual images, or video links, which may be the major reason for their popularity. These small messages are sometimes called micro posts. As with traditional blogging, micro-bloggers post about a wide range of topics.

"Blogging may be good for our dance reputation. A good entry in a blog

may set us apart as helpful people in our cultural dancing."

What we gonna do?

Social or recreational dancing has been our main focus on this island of Oahu for over a century. And it has evolved from the different ethnic types to a rather new style. Most of it had been imported from mainland styles, that came with the new arrivals during and after WWII. It was more formerly introduced in the Sixties by Hawaii Ballroom Dance Association and Wahiawa Ballroom Dance Club. And it took off with a new clubs formed just about every year. Eventually we got the International style of dancing and the Night Club sophisticated dancers, that took many dancers on a higher plane than us ordinary mortals.

“Many social dancers know that it is difficult to say what is 

impossible. The dream of yesterday is the hope of today

 and maybe the reality of tomorrow.”

In the last century social dancers have been somewhat elbowed aside. Dancing "correctly" was emphasized. However most people realize now, that we outnumber them (da bodadem together) two to one. And we have some very good dancers among us. Our social dancing had been meeting amicably on the dance floor with different dance partners and dancing movements that are well known by both partners. Most know each other and feel that they are among friends. Now what are going to do about that?

"Social dancers know that any kine dancin

is bettah than no dance at all."

Men Don't Dance

When you first start taking ballroom lessons a number of your male friends may reacted negatively. They may think it is funny or not manly enough. You may be told "Men don't dance". Are you kidding me? Men don't dance? How did we get to a point where it was considered unmanly to dance? Men, you are missing it! Married or single, the women in your life want to dance with YOU!!! How can you not want to dance You get to dress nice, meet and hold beautiful women in your arms (and they are all beautiful) and it's great exercise

“Social dancers think that sometimes it is stupid to hope,

but we all know that sometimes hope is all we have.”

Did I mention beautiful women? Men don't dance? The facts say something different: In Western aristocratic education, dancing was a requirement for a future courtier. A chivalrous knight was expected to achieve individual glory in war, as well as uphold virtues ranging from loyalty and humility to self-sacrifice and faith in Christian beliefs. He was expected to be courteous, loyal to his lady love, gifted in the arts of dance, conversation, music. So we have to adjust, somewhat here on Oahu, in 202

“The dance can reveal everything mysterious that is hidden in music,

and it has the additional merit of being human and palpable

Dancing is poetry with arms and legs.” – Charles Baudelaire

 

The American Style of Dance.

USA Dance, is the national governing body for DanceSport (the competitive version of ballroom dancing) in the United States. It is recognized as such by the World DanceSport Federation, the U.S. Olympic Committee, and the Amateur Sports Act of the United States Congress. In addition to promoting ballroom dancing as a recreational activity, USA Dance also promotes Dance Sport nationally and internationally. USA Dance organizes and hosts the annual USA Dance National Dance Sport Championships which awards United States National titles and the opportunity to represent the U.S. at the IDSF World Championships . The organization has over 25,000 paying members and claims a "connection and outreach" to an estimated 200,000 dancers.

"Social dancers know that once we choose HOPE,

anything is possible."

The American Style of Dance,  is most prevalent in the United States and Canada, where it's regulated by USA Dance and Canada Dancesport -- the respective national member bodies of the WDSF. It also consists of two categories analogous to the Standard and Latin categories of the International School, respectively called Smooth and Rhythm. The Smooth category consists of only four dances—American Waltz, American Tango, American Foxtrot, and American Viennese Waltz, omitting American Peabody (the American School equivalent to Quickstep)

"Fly Me To The Moon" by Jimmy Borges

The dances selected for competition in the Rhythm category are American Cha Cha Cha, American Rumba, American East Coast Swing, American Bolero, and American Mambo. A "Smooth" or "Rhythm" competition encompasses the dances in the respective category, and a "Nine Dance" competition encompassing all nine of these dances is analogous to the "Ten Dance" competition of the International School.

"Social dancers know that it will cost them nothing to dream

and everything not to."

The Internet

The Micro Blogs seem to be the maximum communication between Social Dancers on Oahu since dancing came to a screeching halt some time ago. The shortest ones like Twitter have a limit of 280 characters and a graphic which really not too bad considering that we don't have much dancing to talk about. You can safely go to 500 characters in Facebook but more is not recommended because most readers interest drop drastically at that place. Then it is easy to just add another post if you wish to add more information.

“Social dancers are not a bad people, we are just a little bit different

in moving to music and we are all suckers for that.”

Then we have the Standard Blog Sites such as Word Press and Blogger which are available in a free version simple enough to use for most people. They are usually pretty current, some as often as daily. They usually have two or three paragraphs and two or three Graphics. Anyone can see that they require much more time set up and publish. Then the blogs can be sectioned into columns. You can set up your main information column in the middle like  us. Then you have a choice of a column on the right or left or both. As offshoots of regular Website, they have surpassed the Websites in popularity simply because they are easier to handle.

"Morning Dew" by Melveen Leed

Then we have the Websites at one time very popular and it took a little more computer knowledge than the average good computer user. And there are many beautiful Websites in existence today that are designed to be less current than blogging A website is a collection of publicly accessible Web pages that share a single domain name. Websites can be created and maintained by an individual, group, business or organization to serve a variety of purposes. Although it is sometimes called “web page,” this definition is wrong, since a website may consist of several webpages. A website is also known as a “web presence” or simply “the site”.

Work like you don't need the money. Love like you've never been hurt.

Dance like nobody's watching.

Blogging

Many dance blogs are still personal accounts of one person’s dance experience. But blogging may be long pages of information and the Micro Blogs have emerged. Tweeter and Facebook among the most prominent and most have a very short paragraph and one graphic. If you surf the internet, you will come upon many of them. All of the blog readers are typically blog writers too. We are all reading each other’s stuff. And it is happening more in the Micro Blogs. Bloggers are starting to take a more deliberate approach to their content and finding a more solid audience via social media.

“Social dancers believe that if we lose hope, somehow we lose the vitality

that keeps us moving, Today we still have our dreams.”

Practically everyone that has a computer on Oahu is a blog reader today and, if you are breathing, you may have a web presence on at least one social network. In our dancing world on Oahu, it has all come to a crawl. No dancing to write about and no dancing photos and videos, Many have photos and videos from a few years back and they are very well received. A dancing blog may be a personal diary. A daily pulpit. A collaborative space. A political soapbox. A breaking-news outlet. Our own private thoughts. Memos to the world. Our dancing blogs are whatever we want them to be. There are thousands of them, in all shapes and sizes, so there are no real rules.

"Somewhere Over The Rainbow" by Bruddah Iz

Facebook and Twitter are much closer to home. The reader/dancers on this island are a smaller group and in a more personal manner.  In simple terms, a dance blog is a dance web site, where we write stuff on an ongoing basis. New stuff shows up at the top, so our visitors can read what's new. Then they comment on it or link to it or email us. Or whatever and it is all up to them, no requirements, no commitments. Cheer up folks, stay safe and we shall dance again.

"Social dancers know that you can make foolproof,

but you can't make it damnfoolproof."