Wow. (Just wanted to say that first) New mind toys...
I'm very honored to be part of this. Thank you all.
On first hearing of this idea, I reflected on the old nappy "signed and unsigned artist sections" and how they degenerated into exhaustive lists of repetitious, uninformative and therefor ineffective self-promotional blurbs, -hey check out my music!!! it's badass!!! [link]-
So, obviously your layout here anticipates some of my concerns about that. I think the idea of 3 'sub forums' is great, although I think the subject matter could be just a bit more open and still retain consistency...
I think the main forum should definitely center on discussions concerning artists interfacing with the internet and with each other in general: not only p2p tech (criticisms, ideas, philosophies), but things like how to build an ftp site and up to and including things like home studios (equipment reviews, techniques), all phases of cd manufacturing, (from burning to shrinkwrapping, shipping, distribution) discussions about the recording industry at large, and even things like (perhaps eventually) regular musical shop-talk (picture guitar players trading chord charts, keyboardists trading sounds etc.) - keeping an eye on the emergence of collabrative online systems... (which I personally have no experience of.. yet) ... anyway, my initial feedback is I think I may feel this could be a bit more open-ended... ... maybe "Music and Technology"... something like that... I think there would be enough interesting information here to completely differentiate it from the P2P forum, bearing in mind that its main philosophical gear would be, quoting tankgirl "The presence of the artists becom(ing) especially meaningful and valuable in case we started to develop and test our own, 'socially intelligent' filesharing tool."
Similar feelings about the second forum: the music room. I don't really think discussion here should be discouraged in any way. The manifesto should obviously embrace self promotion here, but in an open environment. I don't see any reason really to have mini-fora here... I guess I'm saying we should let the artists themselves determine their own approach in a normal, threaded environment. ...see what develops. With bumping etc, I think we'd see the most interesting work, the most successful approaches, become interactive... I fear somewhat, perhaps, that even the suggestion of locking the threads (which is a general option anyway, right?) could only encourage the sort of informationlessness that really usually spells death to the user's interest.
As an artist, I know that in 'self promotion' of one's work generally one hopes to actually provoke response... either "i love it" or... well...anything, hopefully intelligent discussion. But what's happening here is the elimination, to some degree, of the usual buffer zone between artists and the perception, at large, of their work. lol. This is a shocking prospect to a lot of artists, and I think this is a significant factor...The interaction I think would create the sort of environment where people who are going to just post bland links etc would naturally be encouraged to be more creative, more communicative. I think the second forum should simply be called "Independent Music" or even "New Music" - and let it simply be as open-ended as that. For that matter, let that title be taken literally by all - let people post reviews of their latest finds...any interpretation of "New Music or Independent Music" that occurs to them. I strongly suggest encouraging any sort of "privatized objects" here would have a negative effect on the overall interest level...
The third forum, a test forum, obviously great idea, and something I hadn't really even considered. (This would also increase the coherence of the graphic test forum as well, as things like audio embedding and audio link testing etc migrated here.)
Anyway, my initial feedback are these considerations. In a sense, just a broader generalization of the concepts. I'm very open. Are these considerations too open-ended, or too inclusive of things that should remain elements of the main forum(s), too ambitious?
What do you guys think?
bless you guys,
shawn