in essence, yes. We used to have genre people boards... but a word of caution (don’t worry there are solutions)....
Every board... spreads your activity thinner
Every board.... is one more place to sift through to find the place you want to find.
So it will need thought, planning, trial and error, patience, great navigation, community support, volunteers, good communication amongst us, a strategy that for our community unites community outreach and promotion with on-board features and activities AND member support, especially+Especially for their music.
Then it begins to work.
Artists need to know, this is not the “end of the line”. Ie posting on the community should be the end of things, but hopefully the beginning of things. Then our community become part of their workflow, not a dead end add on. I have a lot of ideas on this and a lot of relevant experience. If we can get this right, there is A LOT of reasons to be excited and enthusiastic about this.
I know you guys are focused on this aspect of a board re-org and how decent support for music we love can make the most of this.... well part of this is the sustainability of the community (which I and the staff have to work out in the back ground). Simply put, real budget will make a big difference to.... everything. We are looking to ADD (not replace) things and explore ways the site can both get funding while increasing opportunity, features, stability, speed etc for our members. It just has to be sustainable. Affordable. Fair.
I say all this because, your opinions, thoughts and ideas are always very welcome and will always be fairly considered. I think the same will be true for ideas the staff bring forward. We are all just trying to find the best, most useful, and yes enjoyable way ahead. I don’t want you thinking it is going to be “just a business” to the staff. I’ve ran Songstuff for 20 years for free because I am passionate about music and supporting and educating writers/artists/producers. Importantly, I realised a number of years ago that being completely free to all... was not the best plan. Apart from anything, it has NEVER been free to me, and my pockets have been a choke hold on what Songstuff could truly achieve for a long time. Same goes for member commitment to free. Free becomes... assumed, taken for granted, easily dropped. Meanwhile people want value for money they spend. The site needs budget. We have skills, knowledge, resources, and upcoming products that are worth something. There is plenty of room for us to bring in a good operating budget to pull this all together.
My point is, don’t be scared about such discussions and activities going on. If anything, want them to be successful, because when we get the stars to align.... it’s going to change things for the MUCH better.
Your areas of interest are going to be your focus, but it’s good to know there is a bigger plan, and how your efforts will fit in. I hope this is not only exciting to you, but hopefully encouraging and confidence giving... because the larger picture being put in place mean the efforts we go to to now, building progtronic, rebuilding the musical presence and activity on Songstuff etc... is worthwhile. It’s not about to be suddenly dropped. Hard work is not suddenly lost.
Remember MP3.com? Awesome indie site. Sold and turned into a mainstream site overnight. A million hours of indie hard work on a free community and site.... gone. Literally overnight.
Same is true for a bunch of OMDs and sites that just disappeared. Because completely free is not sustainable. Unless I was a very benevolent multimillionaire. I might be benevolent, but my pockets are as far from a millionaire’s as anyone I know.
Which means, the community needs a realistic, and well understood, back bone. Staff. Volunteers. Members.
We all want to make this REALLY work. I get that from all you guys. Might be a larger scope going on around this discussion, but I think it is useful for you to know, even at this stage... it fits in to.... something workable. While not directly board re-org related, knowing we plan for the long haul.... I hope makes a difference?
I will continue these subjects elsewhere for anyone interested, so as not to sideline too much... here’s hoping you feel it to be good news, hopeful news.
We can always talk!