You’ve found DanceHere (and we’re glad you have)! But when you’re searching for other dance info online, do you make the most of the Internet’s resources?

Here’s a list of 10 websites and tools that will help you get your dance info more quickly and easily.

The Big Names

Ballet Talk for Dancers

http://dancers.invisionzone.com/index.php

This site houses one of the largest discussion forums–if not the largest forum–on topics for dancers. General topics include: nutrition and health; professional dancers and companies; and books, movies, videos, and music for dancers.

Whether you’re a teenager, an adult beginner, a long-time dancer, the parent of a dancer, or a dance instructor, you’ll find discussion on the topics that relate to you. Of course, if you don’t find a discussion, you can start one. You’ll get quick, thorough feedback.

One of the best things about Ballet Talk for Dancers is that it’s well moderated. You won’t find off-topic rants. And if someone posts incorrect information, it is quickly corrected or removed.

If you’re a ballet fan, you might want to check out the Ballet Talk Forum, which has a different aim but the same quality.

DancerUniverse Blogs

http://blog.danceruniverse.com/blog

One wonderful thing about the Internet is that everyone has a voice. You can hear from the little guys, as well as from the giant media companies. The blogs section on DancerUniverse helps those little guys share their thoughts.

These blog posts come from dancers all over the world. Many of these dancers have their own blogs (we’re on there!) And, many of the posts are very well-written. One advantage of visiting a blog hub like the one on DancerUniverse is that you can find lots of writers, all in one place. When you find writers you really like, you can follow them to their outside blogs to read all they have to offer.

Anyone can sign up at DancerUniverse. If you’re interested in writing about dance, create a profile, and start blogging.

If you’re a more visual communicator, check out Dance Media for videos from dancers around the world. (Dance Media is a division of Macfadden Performing Arts Media, the parent company of Dance Magazine, Dance Spirit, Dance Teacher Magazine, Pointe, and others.)

Voice of Dance

http://www.voiceofdance.com

Voice of Dance, which claims to be “the Google of the dance world,” collects headlines on dance, announcements from companies, and dance photos. The site maintains a calendar of dance events, and houses a forum for dancers.

This site hosts a ton of information, and browsing Voice of Dance quickly gets overwhelming. This is a good place to go if you know what kind of information you’re searching for.

Sites to Start Watching

Touring Dancers

http://www.touringdancers.com

This site doesn’t have a ton of activity yet, but it’s a good concept, and I hope it grows quickly. As the website’s name suggests, this site allows dancers to discuss their touring experiences: their favorite places, interesting sites to visit, good places to shop and eat, and more. The website is organized like a forum, and the layout is simple.

TenduTV

http://www.tendu.tv

We’ve posted on TenduTV before. Although the creators of this broadband Internet television station are still collecting content and signing up partners, this project promises to be great.

TenduTV will be available, for free, through broadband Internet tv providers (read our original post on TenduTV to learn how it works). Keep your eye out for developments–they’re coming soon.

DanceGround

http://danceground.net

DanceGround focuses on dance in the UK, providing event listings, news, and other information. Their notice board records headlines from UK dance companies, and you can easily submit your own dance events for publication in the site’s calendar.

dance-tech

http://www.dance-tech.net

Although this website might seem a little off-topic, I think the ideas being discussed on dance-tech will be important as we experiment with new methods of expression. Dance-tech creators describe the site as a “social on-line destination for international movement artist, theorists, technologist and organizations intersecting embodied performance and new media.” Even if you’re not quite sure what that means, you can be sure that dance-tech is interesting, experimental, and interactive.

Dance-tech also operates dance-techTV, an Internet television channel devoted to the kind of experimentation you see on dance-tech.net.

The Tools

Social Media: Face book, Myspace, Twitter, YouTube

I’ll assume that you have heard of these tools, and I imagine that you have used them. The exception to this 

assumption may be Twitter: it’s a service that allows you to create short messages (up to 140 characters) and publish them for all of your friends to see.

You probably use all of these tools in a casual way–which is exactly how they were meant to be used. But, you can connect with some pretty interesting people and events in the dance world when you find the right friends.

If you’re keeping an eye out for auditions, performances in your area, or special events, make friends with the dance companies that use these social media networks. They use these services to post announcements all the time. The information just comes to you.

Bookmarking: Mixx, Digg, Del.icio.us, Ma.gnolia, StumbleUpon, Xerpi, Propeller, etc.

If you’re like me, you bookmark any website that is remotely interesting, thinking that you’ll get back to it 

later. Bookmarking services can help you organize your bookmarks in an online account, tag them with keywords, and share them with other people. When you join one of these bookmarking sites, you also get to see what websites other people are bookmarking.

Most of these sites allow you to customize your account homepage. You can set it to show the most popular headlines and websites in only the categories you want to know about. Choose categories like “arts,” “entertainment,” “culture,”etc., that will probably contain dance news.

RSS

Nearly every website that you visit displays, somewhere, a little orange icon that looks like radiating waves.

(Scroll up and look in our right-hand sidebar: yep, it’s there.) And every website begs, “Please, please, subscribe to our RSS feed! ” And you wonder, What’s in it for me? (And what is RSS anyway?)

You see RSS everywhere for good reason. It’s a great tool. RSS (which can stand for “Rich Site Summary” or “Really Simple Syndication”) pulls headlines, stories, and updates from your favorite blogs and websites, and it delivers them to you. Choose an RSS platform (like GMail’s Reader, for instance). When you want to read the headlines from all your favorite places, all at once, just log into your reader. The RSS feed from each site will deliver your stories, and you’ll always have the newest information.

If you subscribe to the RSS feed from DanceHere, and from all the sites above, when you log into your RSS reader, you’ll automatically see all the new posts, updates, and even comments that have been posted on all of those websites. You won’t have to visit each website to figure out if there’s anything new.

If you have any tips, websites, or tools to add to this list, make sure you leave a comment telling us about them.