john

I think many just wing it and hope for the best. If you just run a podcast from home I think many think they are too small to attract attention. Attach a site the size of Songstuff and I would bet they’d feel more nervous… especially when the site is at real risk of being lost, and that isn’t the end of what they are risking. It’s not like we’d even need to lose a court case. Just the cost of mounting a defence could close a site. Still, it’s good to know how they handle it.

We’ve considered a podcast or internet radio station a few times. Also stream cast. You’ll be glad to know that we’ve been progressing these too. It’s a good shout. Doing a chat podcast is pretty straight forward with minimal cost implications and no real legal issues. Same goes for chat based video streaming. Include music and issues, costs and set up time go up, because we need to consider licensing: broadcasting pre-recorded music broadcasting live music re-broadcasting live recordings broadcasting video with pre-recorded music broadcasting video with live music re-broadcasting live video recordings If we want to upload recordings to YouTube, Twitch & Facebook (we would) then we also need permission to be able to assign limited permissions. It’s all do-able, but I am not a lawyer. I have a reasonable working knowledge for basic copyright permissions, especially as affects artists and writers, but much less concerning broadcast companies etc. In short we need to consult an Ents lawyer with experience in digital broadcast. Common approaches are: Pay for a broadcast license and play any music (pre-recorded music - artist) Pay for a broadcast license and play any music (live music - artist) Pay for a broadcast license and play any music (live music recording - artist) Pay for a broadcast license and play any music (pre-recorded music - songwriters) Pay for a broadcast license and play any music (live music - songwriters) Pay for a broadcast license and play any music (live music recording - songwriters) Have artists and writers sign a waiver with appropriate copyright permissions Do all of the above Do none of these and cross fingers Don’t include any music It’s late so I probably missed some. We do intend starting a chat livestream/podcast while we sort out the rest, and we may well be looking for DJ’s/show hosts. Like you, Greg, staff concluded it would be a great addition.

Good news John. Nice to see you back bud.

Gotta love Otis. Revisiting my youth atm…

Instead of creating a standalone blog, create a club. Within a club you can create a blog, gallery, forum boards, and I think you can add a calendar. You can also control privacy to a degree.

Funnily enough I started setting stuff up for mentoring a couple of years ago, but never finished. I created a new member category, a bunch of badges etc. It’s a good idea. We just to work out some details. As for payment/compensation, we can offer some board/community privileges in the short term. In the longer term I have some suggestions too. I can easily create a PM with interested members and we can discuss it?

Hey Julkka, welcome to Songstuff! Nice to meet you.

Welcome to Songstuff Troj! A very Happy New Year to you and yours too!

Maybe a Hemi-Demi-Semi-god of fleshy goods. It sounds sorta musical. Me? Wordy? Pffft. I was taking it easy! Let me explain…. on notifications : That setting concerning frequency makes a big difference. Also worth reviewing your individual notification types. Also, I haven’t reviewed them since the last software update. I will check the default settings.

Hey Walnut Love, Welcome to Songstuff! Good to have you with us. Cheers John

Before I started playing the guitar I had already been playing other instruments for a number of years. I started playing piano when I was 4. My mum was an opera singer and a piano teacher. I started piano lessons. I enjoyed piano, but after watching Yehudi Menuhin on television I was determined to play the violin. I played for years. Meanwhile I sang in a choir, played in an orchestra and then drums in a pipe band, and then bagpipes. I didn’t stop playing any instruments, I still played piano and violin. The pipe band I played with won the world championships in our grade. Although I listened to a lot of different types of music, up until this point (age 12 or 13 I think) I only performed classical or folk music. I had sung competitively in choirs, performed with orchestras, competed every weekend with the pipe band and performed special engagements, like playing at the national stadium for the cup final, plus since I was a wee boy I always performed with mum or sisters at family gatherings and special occasions. Trouble was I was listening to punk, ska, heavy rock, blues, 60’s beat music etc. So I took up the guitar. Smoke on the Water was the predictable first song I learned, though I still remember working out Stairway to Heaven, note by note. I didn’t know any chords, but I sat with a tape, rewind-play, rewind-play, over and over until I could play it. For me, playing guitar was my big break away from the restrictions of dots on a stave. It was my first real foray into improvisation too. Blues, Rock, folk, progressive music, funk, punk, I loved playing it all. At 16 I loved Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, David Bowie, Lou Reed, the Animals, the Yardbirds, the Beatles, the Stones, AC/DC, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Crosby, Stills and Nash, Jethro Tull, Roy Harper and Fairport Convention… to name just a few of the excellent bands there were about. I was like a sponge. I soaked it all up. I was playing in bands. Playing is somewhat generous. We tortured people. Lol my songwriting was emotional, but naive. At 18 I was playing all the time. Jamming with people relentlessly. I rode my motorbike, partied and played. Not much else. I was learning lead guitar, rhythm guitar, finger style, 12-string, bass guitar. Jack of all trades and master of none. It was damn good fun. Guitar was by now my main instrument. I had no pretensions to being a guitar god. My thing was songwriting, arrangement and production. I had been into recording since I was 16. My first job after school was working in a recording studio. That was where I well and truly got the bug. Guitar playing was something I did. I didn’t stop to think if I was good or not. I just played. I didn’t expand my playing according to any grand plan at this point. It was an organic growth on a song by song basis. Other than learn the major, minor and pentatonic scales and playing them in different positions I think everything I did was just digging in to the interesting bits and learning as I went. The first real style I did any real deep dive on was delta blues and the music of Robert Johnston. I’d played loads of finger style pieces before, but the fluidity of delta blues was wonderful. From there I segued into the part playing of Jimi Hendrix. It started with Purple Haze but very quickly Little Wing grabbed my attention, and that kicked me into my first real Hendrix obsession. Sure I had learned to play Hey Joe, but the the loose fluidity of Hendrix caught my attention like few others. I still love playing Voodoo Chile (slight return) as a warm up, and an arrangement for acoustic if I am in the mood. My fingerstyle playing developed through diving into Bert Jansch, Davey Graham and players like Adrian Legg’s Technopicker opening my eyes to what could be done. Martin Taylor (jazz fingerstyle) and Martin Simpson (folk and blues) we’re both ongoing influences as was Fairport Convention’s Richard Thompson. These days I love guitarists like Jon Gomm, Chet Atkins, Tommy Emanuel, Eric Johnston, Erik Mongrain and the Spanish duo, Rodrigo y Gabriela. I should also give a mention to a friend that as a 13 year old used to come to see my first real band rehearse, and I have had the privilege of playing with in several bands, Iain Forbes. His dedication and raw ability is a force to be reckoned with. His own band Audiorayz is now regularly on TV in the U.K., but he also releases fingerstyle solo albums. His skill at points encouraged me to apply myself to my guitar and stop taking it for granted. I have to admit, I really haven’t kept up with modern electric guitarists. The guitarist I studied most would be Dave Gilmour, but I could hardly call him modern. Pretty timeless maybe. I don’t know what my guitar style is. Although I do play other people’s songs, I have always devoted by far the majority of my time, almost all, to playing my own songs. I play other people’s songs to learn or for fun, but few hold my attention for long. A few personal favourites. I’d far prefer to work on something original. So most of my guitar development has been working on my own music.

It’s not a problem. I need to communicate to members and visitors what we are doing and why. It’s all good stuff, but it needs explained and put into context. You were quite rightly exploring what we are doing and questioning it.

It was started last year, If I remember correctly, but more or less parked while we put other infrastructure in place. The topic we are replying to is only the second time it has been promoted, the first being before we put that infrastructure in place. In other words it is still very much in it’s early days. I don’t expect to see much return until it has been going 6 months to 1 year of regular activity. You are right about the forums. They are quiet. Very, in comparison to how busy they were. That is something affecting many forums, though I am sure at least some of it is uniquely Songstuff. Here’s the thing… features attract people to places. Those features don’t just happen. Someone has to put them in place. Someone has to connect here to all the somewheres. Otherwise no one would have come here, and there would be zero chance of new people finding it. You said you don’t see the point. That you can’t see how a playlist of established brands will bring people to Songstuff. It isn’t a single hop for a start. Just as a trip to the moon wasn’t “Day 1: Jump in spaceship and fly to the moon. Day 2: Enjoying being on the moon”. Internet, or real world for that matter, doesn’t all revolve around using off the shelf solutions to achieve off the shelf goals. Ok, some does, but a lot require a creative process to take place. For assets to be designed, developed and built and then nursed into being effective and hopefully flourishing. If we build a playlist (yes there are other possible assets but just go with me that playlists, like mixtapes, are a popular way to consume music), that 1. Features only unknowns… would you rate that as easier or harder to build a following, than a playlist that 2. features only the very top, most in demand acts? True the second is likely to have more competition, but the fact there is demand for that music automatically means it is more likely to succeed. For number 1 to succeed you first have to create demand. Not impossible, but our initial mission is to create a popular playlist and to add only the best indie music to it. If we add sub par music to it, what happens? Listener experience tanks and people stop following the playlist. By doing one sub par artist to the list, we jeopardise the entire asset to everyone (at the extreme end). In terms of the principle of the point of having established stars… think about it… The real world of venues, band tours, support acts etc, is founded on the same principle. Let me explain. You are in a band. There’s an unknown venue, no one knows it or how to find ut. No band has ever played there. No one has ever had a drink there. That’s one choice. The other choice is a venue that loads of big bands have played. It has a capacity of 1000 clients. Last night a massive band making similar genre music to you played. Tomorrow night another similarly massive band playing complimentary genre music is playing. Tonight another big act is playing and woah…. You are a named support act. You get to play your music to 1000 fans of the kind of music you make. This venue has a reputation of discovering the next best music, a pedigree of many many successful bands that came through. Now you have a chance to be there. Alongside massive bands. All of which means the place will be full. Now that venue fills because it has a reputation, built upon a history of big bands playing there. Fans go there to see unknown bands because the venue has a reputation for promoting brilliant music. You may prefer the quiet intimacy of the first venue, but growing a listener base there is very hard…. No one goes there, the venue has No reputation for music etc. I am sure you can understand, had previous people not played the second venue, and now big artists, it would very likely attract less customers. More nights with unsold tickets. Indeed one of the things that makes artists want to play the second venue is because of the quality of music there it is a feather in your cap to have played there. Other reasons include simply 1000 people listening to your music… yet that is only possible because that venue played loads of other bands and build its reputation. If you can see that playing venue 2 is attractive because you get exposure, and you understand that exposure is only possible because of the reputation of a load of artists who are not you playing there before you, then you get how this works. If we agree that getting on a playlist with a big following is understandably desirable…. and we agree that it only has a big following because of it having lots of previous great music and regular promotion of those events and a history of doing this successfully and we agree that whether those previous acts were signed or not, or were with a major label or not has little bearing on listeners deciding to go watch a band there… Then surely it’s not a big stretch to understand if we build popular playlists, and then put good indies on those playlists, that those indies would then benefit? That if we build several playlists, if one playlist does really well other playlists are likely to benefit? How does it benefit Songstuff? Well we will be working to get indies on and off Songstuff onto the playlist. Part of that is raising awareness in the indie music community of opportunities through Songstuff and awareness of what we offer. We will be trying to recruit and incentivise. If we build popular playlists and actively seek an increasing amount of indies to be included, the opportunity becomes more attractive, directly as a result of the audience reach and the possibility of getting on it. We don’t plan on just dangling a playlist carrot. We will be building social media reach at the same time. We will build mailing list reach, both to artists and fans. There’s more to it than that, but the point is we need an audience and that doesn’t magic out thin air. As you pointed out, Songstuff is lacking in active artists posting, so who do we put on our initial playlists? Sure we could wait until we had sourced enough quality indie artists, but why wait? Plus, let’s face it, larger artists have larger followings, which means potentially more exposure for acts who get on playlists. The overall balance will change, but I still expect perhaps 20% to still be mainstream artists… after all playlists are not dead items. They evolve. As for empowerment, we haven’t launched or promoted any route onto our playlists, because that part isn’t ready yet. I can link you to the evolving info pages and the submission page on SSUK for consideration for playlisting, being featured and interviewed etc… but it isn’t all ready yet. There are 3 of us working away on this amongst other things. We could have waited, but building playlists takes a while. Building an audience a long while. We generally have Songstuff members on them. Are they active? Most, no longer. Maybe they come back because of it. But we can hardly build playlists from currently active members. Even if all songs were radio ready it would still be short playlists with a limited pool of artists. As for not being radio ready, that’s the point. While not all artists plan on radio ready songs, most would love evolving their tracks towards good quality radio ready. If we can attract more artists here who are producing radio ready tracks, that experience would help people and it might even inspire them, give them some belief. Nothing we do can be all things to all artists, but if we just accept that Songstuff is declining and aren’t willing to even try to turn things around, I will close the site tomorrow. While it takes your time and some effort, it eats a lot of my money and a lot of my time and to be frank… I don’t pay that money out thinking I’m just digging a hole and tossing my money in (because simply watching a site decline and die, as an inevitable thing, is just that). I work as an expression of hope. Songstuff has been that since day 1. Others might think it foolhardy or a waste of time and money… but generally speaking I’d rather try and fail, than it to try at all. We all make our own choices. Not that one is better than the other, just one choice suits some people better than the other. Others don’t care which lol Out of interest, the Flaming Lips started as an indie band for 7 years. Although mainly with Warner they still do releases as projects on an independent.

Do you think we might not? It is of course very possible. Developing playlists is not something that is a full-time pursuit, or something we do exclusively while the forums decline. We do a helluva lot to keep our forums running. I say that because it means everything we do means that we are dividing our time, trying to support, develop, add features of our community… while still having some kind of life and work on our own music. Plus we do all the hidden stuff like server admin and off site promotion. The point is, no matter what way we go, we make choices. We try and support something, it takes away from something else. You yourself suggested a great way to promote the site is to promote the artists… and other than promotion within and on Songstuff, and on our social media portals, which I am very happy to do. I completely agree. Playlists seems like a good way to promote artists… though I am happy to consider alternatives. Every time we plan tasks we try to see how we can double up overlapping efforts so we get the maximum return on any effort. We look at how we as staff can do something once and then get more returns… so for example, putting together a long list of interview questions which we plan to use for artists to self-interview themselves and then send us the video. Certainly achieving any of it is hard work and not straight forward. But then, once upon a time the idea of building a site like Songstuff would have seemed impossible and, going by comments, a daunting idea for most people. Yet, here it is. Just like I had a concept and plan with a load of options back then, I have a concept, plan and bunch of ideas now. It’s far from perfect. Much of this is simply trying to help writers, artists and producers, in whatever way we can. Education, opportunity, interaction and engagement, exposure, tools… fun? Playlists aI think are a trending opportunity for artists. Whatever comes after, if we want to catch that wave, I am sure it will be easier to make the most of by building on whatever platform we build with current trends, otherwise we always drift along the bottom… which is perfectly ok… but as a community, missing all such opportunities and trends does little to help keep our community attractive. Will all the various initiatives work? Who knows? But if we don’t try…

That is the plan, promoting Songstuff artists. However there are several factors. Different artists have different goals and different needs. In meeting those needs I have the following goals: Songstuff Goals We want to aid in discovery placing the best indie music in front of potential fans. We want to extend the artist’s reach, by helping them to reach a fresh, new audience. We want to create something that is truly an asset to the indie community somewhere that that artists aim to be included on and have a sense of achievement when they do. We want indie artists to be viewed and treated like any other artist. We want to create something that helps artists to progress and helps fulfil their sense of purpose We want to build something that helps Indies to gain exposure and to grow their fan base We want to create opportunity for artists We want a platform that allows artists to feature videos, and other products too. We do not want to be contained within a typical indie artist bubble. That does almost nothing to help indie artists, other than a minimal stroke of the ego. Artists simply don’t value it. To be valued by artists we need a large listener base. We need to NOT do it like everyone else. SSUK and Independent Music Stage Goals We want to build credible playlists with a large reach to an audience of engaged, enthusiastic listeners who want to share the music they find. We want to mix established artists and breaking artists so that fans discover new and exciting music finding new artists whose music they can fall in love with. We want to feature artists on our playlists in interviews and eventually webcam performances and livestreams We need to be focused on listener experience. Background Some background should help. Songstuff is for songwriters and artists. For years we ran playlists that featured Songstuff artists only. Some artists supported it when they were added to the playlist. They didn’t largely support it if they weren’t on it, or when they were still on it in the weeks after being added. I have to say this is a very typical experience of indie artists. If they encounter artists as a listener, they usually treat them like any listener would. If they encounter artists as an artist, an equal, they go into a quid pro quo mode. They like and follow artists in return for the artist liking and following them. Often not even bothering to listen to the song. Songstuff seems to get treated by artists like that too. Playlist Audiences Playlists need listeners. Other artists largely (not all) suck as listeners or fans. Just like moving beyond friends and family, artists need to find their fans from within the ranks of the general listening public. That is why SSUK is a fan facing site. It is a music site for fans. As any playlist goes, they need an audience, people who listen. For artists wanting to be discovered, they need to be added to playlists with an audience, an engaged audience, who will listen and share songs they discover with other listeners. A false audience of like-exchangers is of limited use. A playlist that relies on the artists themselves to grow it will end up becoming an unresponsive false asset. I see many artists themselves with the same issue. They release songs that go nowhere. Not because their music isn’t good, but because their following is largely built on other artists. Chicken and Egg There is a chicken and egg scenario. If we had massive followings for our playlists and channels, artists would be more interested in supporting it. If we rely on artists to grow the playlist audience, it is painfully slow, unreliable and even if you get followers they are rarely listeners. Of course they can still contribute to building a playlist following… but they are the additional benefit, not the target audience. Relying on artists to play songs is problematic. While some are very supportive, a larger percentage only seem interested in themselves. My point is, relying on artists to grow the audience for a playlist is a big problem. By all means include them as part of your strategy, just don’t make it your entire strategy of even a large part of it. We want to build a genuine audience. Listeners. To do that we need to cater to the needs and wants of listeners, in order to create an asset that is worthwhile for the artists. The Artists Largely listeners don’t care that you are an indie band. Not anymore. They just want good music. To build a playlist that people will see as credible, it needs good quality music. There is plenty of great indie music out there, recorded and produced to a professional standard. Some of those artists are on Songstuff. Most are not. Many artists on Songstuff are on the route to being pro quality. That is a journey we, collectively, can help them with. Once they have a polished, radio ready track, we need platforms to promote their music on. Songstuff has good reach with an artist audience. It’s listener base is largely artists. We can and will help with getting Songstuff artist music on playlists and blogs run by others… but it makes sense that if we can build audiences of listeners, it would be a huge asset to Songstuff members. Building Playlist Audiences If Songstuff artists want to help, they can share playlists, and play the playlists. If they don’t want to, honestly, it isn’t a huge surprise. Bringing in indie artists not on Songstuff there is the hope they bring their audience and that hopefully a good chunk of their audience are listeners, but that is only true for larger indie artists. The best source of an audience is similar genre mainstream artists. Mainstream artists have huge followings, almost all are listeners. A proper audience. That’s a huge part of what they bring to the playlist. An engaged and enthusiastic audience of listeners. If your song is of a similar genre and placed alongside massive artists, then your song has a potentially significant boost in exposure, to people who are likely to like your music. By including mainstream and larger indie artists and promoting our playlists to listeners we stand the best chance of growing our listener base. To get artists to support this will take good communication and a process of education. Many will never get behind it. Then again, even with Songstuff only artists, artist support was minimal and transactional. The majority of our efforts to build a listener base is off Songstuff. It markets to a different audience and much if it you will not see.

I would also say, Songstuff artists feature least on our YouTube channels because a lower percentage of Songstuffers seem to create videos. It’s a great pity because they make some excellent music.

@FinnArild used to be a member of staff. @Just1L was on the site a few weeks ago, as was @SteveA (Steve Altonian). Some used to be regulars others occasional visits. Steve Mueske was also regularly playlisted until he pulled his catalogue. I would be very happy to have more submissions. I am sure they will come as we move forward.

There are other Songstuff artists on our playlists, I just can't remember on this one. The "Synthergy" playlist I know has a few. Richard Tracey (Jigsaw Sequence) and me (Deep Red Sea) being a couple I can think of. I think Fused is also a member of Songstuff but not active. I think another couple of artists on that playlist are. That song by Deep Red Sea is also on the "Alt-ish" playlist. Ben Poole, Finn Arild Aasheim on "Rock It!" and Hurshy Kalsi, Red Porch Kid Music on Turn Up The AC. Iain Forbes on "Steeped in Country", Steve Altonian, Kaige Evans and Just1L on "Hot Rock"

Reading the first couple of lines back with a colder inner voice I can see why it might be taken as angry! Sorry for that.

I wasn't angry at all. I didn't mean it to come over as me being angry. Life's too short for that. Funny how sometimes the written language can come over with unintended emotion? I didn't say you asked a stupid question either, although I did have the impression you perhaps hadn't read my post (I write long posts and understand that people do tune out). Yet you didn't ask the question that you did in your reply, at least not in the same way. My original post had points in it (quoted) that answered what I thought you were asking and commenting on. I thought you were being critical, but I wasn't angry, I just thought you were unaware of what we were trying to do. There are indies on the playlist, but I need to go back and look to see who is a member of Songstuff or not. I know a couple of our playlists only have one or two. I just removed one from Alt-ish earlier because the video is now marked as private and no longer available.

Did you read the explanation I gave in the post? I specifically explained these are not indie-only playlists, and it isn't the first time: Listeners want to hear good music. Yes we need to have artists creating good quality music, but we need a listener base, otherwise it doesn't help indie artists. So, the playlist will have Songstuff artists, indie artists who are not members of Songstuff and mainstream artists. How many playlists do you think we would fill, right now, if we restricted ourselves to only Songstuff artists who submit songs? How many listeners do you think we would attract if we only had Songstuff artists? (incidentally we do have one playlist that is only Songstuff artists) How many NEW listeners do you think we would introduce to each artist if we didn't have bigger, more popular artists on theb playlist(indie or mainstream)? We don't add mainstream artists because they need your support. We add them because when their fans turn up, and they will, they get introduced to some great indie artists. We ask for your support just now in building a listener base, playing, liking, sharing, commenting.... because THAT is the asset that benefits our artists. A listener base for our members.

Hey So you want busier forums? Awesome, so do we! The good thing is, this is something we can all help with… Be active Post questions and new topics Post comments and replies Start a Songstuff blog about your music, or about something specific like your music production or songwriting, or your favourite music gear or the music you love to listen to Post photos of your studio or your dream studio, or your instruments, your band photo, your artwork etc. Share Songstuff based articles, topics, polls, images to Social Media Your blog Other forums Invite others to join and be active musicians songwriters producers bands Welcome new members Say hello Encourage activity Reply constructively Use “@name” to include specific people in conversation, such as @Mahesh If you see us post on social media… or you see in a post on our forums that we plan to share content on social media Follow our accounts Share Like Comment Use suggested hashtags (if any are suggested) Encourage people to critique Encourage them to improve their critique Encourage constructive critique Support our playlists Share Like Comment Support SSUK and The Independent Music Stage Share Like Comment Get Creative With Supporting Our Community Get Involved

It exists for a number of reasons… but they are not set in stone. That said, to move away from such publicly visible forums has a hidden cost, and it can be quite high. This is an old forum. It’s been around more than 2 decades. I should write up a post about the history of this place some time. Anyway, back in the beginning there was only public forums. Public pages are crawled by search engines. Every link to another page (on this site or off) is considered to be a vote for that page. The same is true for links on other sites to our pages. Search engines like Google assess how important every page on the internet is (that Google can see) and it weights how important these votes are. It then uses this to help determine the authority of that page on it’s primary topics. If a link uses those topic key words in the text linking to the other site, Google also upvotes the importance of the page to that topic…. Amongst other things. Currently links also vote for your pages, for example artist profiles on SoundCloud, Reverbnation etc. making searches more likely to pop up your accounts when someone searches. Anyway, Google then ends up with a mass of weighted, cross-linked content. It then uses this data to provide search results when someone types in a search term. All these public pages on our forums act as both nets to catch people interested in specific topics, and votes for the sites linked to. Each forum page often links to other content on Songstuff…. Helping to determine the authority of each page being linked to… which Google uses when determining whether a search result is on page 1 position 1 or page 100 position 20. That has a huge effect on the amount of traffic Google sends to your website. So if we make a load of pages that are public suddenly private, the forum, all it’s topics and replies are suddenly removed from search popularity calculations, causing our site to suddenly drop down search results meaning even less traffic. That said, there a few things we can do to mitigate the issue: We can move gradually We can stop new posts in areas, and start new boards… but that makes very very messy navigation. We can try to reduce the impact by compensating, creating loads of links on other sites that point to Songstuff Indeed, sharing our articles and blogs and forum posts is a really, really good way to help bring in more people to our community… (more on that later in a topic of my own.) There are certainly a number of advantages to public vs private. Generally private communities are paid-for communities. There are loads of advantages to that too (especially for me as currently I pay for it so no one else has to. Trouble is, the limited nature of my pocket has acted as a choke on community growth several times in the past. I could drone on, but don’t want to hijack the blog post. Things are never as straightforward or as binary a choice as we might think.