Well, it’s a crisp January afternoon with overcast skies as I’m sitting here in my Chelsea office, looking north up the isle of Manhattan, and contemplating the annual hullabaloo surrounding APAP which, for me, is really kicking off this evening when I head down to the Public Theater for Edit Kaldor’s fascinating C’est du Chinois (here’s to learning some Chinese!) and the opening night party of Under the Radar.

Culturebot is trying something new this year: as APAP-time is our biggest time of year, being (well, we like to think) the premier resource on contemporary performance in the US, we’ve set up a new bloggier site called CultureBytes, which allows us to offer briefer and more frequent commentary over the next ten days to two weeks of show- and party-going. This is going to be our primary outlet for responses to work presented, news, and gossip-mongering, and CultureBytes will furthermore feature a rotating cast of Culturebot regulars and guest commenters. In fact, should you wish to share your thoughts with our readers this January–anything from strongly encouraging seeing a show to complaining about this or that–you can feel free to email them to me at jeremy(at)culturebot.org, and assuming they’re not too libelous, I’ll publish them.

We’re also working with the American Realness Festival, who are producing (in the spirit of the DIY attitude) a ‘zine of supplementary writing surrounding the work in this year’s festival. As their exclusive content partner, Culturebot will be reproducing excerpts of select texts during the festival, while the published zine, READING, will be available at festival venues this week.

Meanwhile, Culturebot.org, our flagship site, will remain a hub for important previews and long-form criticism. It’s all in tandem, see, a fantastic multi-platform system! And speaking of multiple platforms: For the second year in a row, Culturebot has been invited to host a series of discussions as part of the Under the Radar Festival. “Scanning the Landscape” unfolds as four talks: “Arts, Culture + Economy in a Post-Crash World” (Sat. Jan. 12); “Social Practice and Performance” (Sun. Jan. 13); “The Theater of Tomorrow, Today” (Sat. Jan 19); and “The Politics of Cultural Production” (Sun. Jan. 20). Andy Horwitz has curated these talks, to unfold as Long Table discussions (thanks Lois Weaver!), so please come join us and take part.

And keep in touch: In addition to my email address, which I’ve inadvisedly posted above, you can follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and the APAPP iPhone and Android app, courtesy of Caden Manson and our pals over at Contemporary Performance.