So we've decided to share the latest with you, our recent email exchange with Bristol's venerable 'what's on' guide - Venue Magazine.
We hope you find it as inspiring as we did!
Susie x
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from: Shy Pony
to: J.Spurgeon@venue.co.uk,E.Byrne@venue.co.uk,editor@venue.co.uk
date: Mon, Feb 8, 2010 at 5:22 PM
subject: First Shy Pony's Bristol Art Power List, Now Venue have done one!
Dear Joe, Eugene and Mike
We were really thrilled to see Venue latching onto Shy Pony's idea of Bristol's Top 50 Art and Culture Power List, a month after we'd published our list.
It was fascinating to see the similarities in the two lists - even some of the wording was the same! And what a stroke of genius to place yourselves at number 5 - we'll be taking inspiration from you fun guys at Venue and placing ourselves in our own 2010 list!
We suddenly thought, isn't it crazy an established magazine like Venue is running out of original ideas, when we have so many!
Then, boom, another great idea popped up in the Shy Pony thought stable! Myself and the other girls in the office are currently spending our spare time doing bonkers stuff to raise money for the poor people in Haiti.
So here's our suggestion - for £1,000 (to be donated to the Oxfam Haitian Earthquake Appeal) we will supply Venue with another top idea for you guys to use in your magazine.
We've blind copied (now we don't want you stealing our mailing list too, some things are scared!) in our mailing list, including all the members of both Shy Pony's and Venue's Art and Culture Power List, just to spread the word on our appeal to Venue.
Looking forward to hearing from you,
bestest
Charlotte Lawson
Head of Campaigns
Shy Pony
email:shypony.top50@gmail.com
http://bristolculturepowerlist.blogspot.com
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from: Spurgeon, Joe - Venue
to: shypony.top50@googlemail.com
date: Tue, Feb 9, 2010 at 6:04 PM
subject: RE: First Shy Pony's Bristol Art Power List, Now Venue have done one!
Dear Charlotte,
Thank you for your email.
I can categorically assure you that we did not steal, adopt, latch onto, or otherwise appropriate your list.
Venue has been publishing arts ‘power lists’ (and variations thereof) for over 20 years, long before your “organisation” cropped up in the blogosphere in November 2009, and the idea for this particular list was one we began work on last autumn.
We became aware of your list (and your invite to improve upon it) prior to the publication of ours, and saw that as no reason to prevent us doing, quite frankly, a vastly improved job.
There is no similarity between the wording of the two lists, mainly due to yours being arbitrary, ill-informed and in some cases, downright inaccurate.
It is also absurd and delusional to worry about us stealing your mailing list. Venue has been covering the arts and entertainment scenes locally since 1982. Ergo, we’re pretty well stocked for email addresses and phone numbers.
If you genuinely are a “new Arts Media Management organisation” (I couldn’t find evidence of your website, office or previous work anywhere else) keen on promoting healthy debate “about Bristol and its cultural impact, nationally and internationally” then let me suggest it’s a pretty dim idea to start off by levelling false accusations against the region’s biggest-selling arts magazine. A professional PR/arts media management rep, had she genuinely suspected plagiarism, would certainly not have taken such an ill-conceived, unintelligent and counter-productive approach.
I do not intend to dignify your disgracefully cynical and opportunistic charity challenge with a response.
Judging by the comments on your blog and those following your recent posting on Indymedia, I’d suggest a re-think in your approach to communicating your aims and campaigns in Bristol. Feel free to pass my response on to your mailing list, and if you can not and will not tell them you have made a mistake, then please do not contact us again.
Joe Spurgeon
Editor
Venue magazine
Bristol News and Media, Temple Way, Bristol, BS99 7HE
Tel: 0117 942 8491
Email: j.spurgeon@venue.co.uk
Venue Magazine – Bristol and Bath’s what’s on guide – out every Wednesday.
www.venue.co.uk
