Dangers of Over-Exposure/Over-Hyping

I have two playwright friends with shows running right now. Friend X did a great job of publicizing their show in Web 2.0. They mentioned it just enough for me to know about it and learn enough about it to be intrigued. I want to see that show, even though the subject matter itself is one that I tend to steer away from. The way it’s being treated interests me.

Friend Y has completely over-exposed their show in Web 2.0. I’ve been hearing about it for months and quite frankly I’m tired of hearing about it. I have absolutely no interest in seeing it as a result, in spite of the fact that the subject matter itself is one that I ordinarily have great interest in.

It leaves me wondering if I over-expose my shows. Is it too much to blog every week about rehearsal on my improv blog? Then I remember that Friend Y posted statuses about their show nearly every day since the summer. It’s like they got a text book on how to market a show in Web 2.0 and followed it so religiously that they ended up sounding like a text book and not a person.

Movies, of course, are frequently guilty of the same thing. Take the new Sherlock Holmes movie for instance. Is that ever actually going to come out? They ran footage of it after the Oscars in February. It doesn’t come out until Christmas Day. Is it just me or is 10 months of hype a little much? By the time it comes out, it’ll feel old. Shouldn’t it be on DVD already?

I have similar thoughts about Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland movie. Sitting here I honestly believed it must have come out already and I missed it. No. It comes out in March of 2010!

Maybe it’s just me. Maybe I’ve been burned too many times and developed an ingrained opinion that the more hyped something is the less likely it is to be any good. But after all, if it’s good, it doesn’t need to be over-hyped.