$300 Christmas Give Away

You might also draw more people if you soften your forum descriptions a little.

For example: Six String Massacre That's right, dumbass. This board is for for guitar players.

"Dummy is not what it says, that is an auto change by this forum"

Shy and timid people like me might steer away from that. :lol:

First this should have been posted here. Unabashed site or product promotion

I went also and checked it out. Looks like there could be potential. Perhaps a little smoother on some wording to target a larger audience.

joe

The language used on the forum is part of it's character. I consider the language used on the site to be on the sites strengths mainly because it weeds out the type of people that are more worried about etiquette than valuable information. The site is intented to be a tremenduos resource for anyone interested in recording , bands, music etc. The site does not have any political views, even though I certain do.

While I understand that this is not for everyone, I'd like to create an environment that is comfortable for those who do enjoy this sort of humor.

Maybe I should have put up a warning. "No politically correct, BS. Just a recording/music forum".

Brandon

Thats not humor, thats promoting flaming and flaming is not humor. I am interested in constructive feedback not getting the crap beat out of me in a forum which is what your wording promises. Maybe that is why you only have 20 members.

I guess that rules wimpy ole me out.

First, and foremost, it weeds out people who are looking for a place to find information. They see a belligerent attitude and, immediately, equate it to things like Guitar.com. Not clever, not attractive. To understand a person's sense of humour, you have to see their face. Either that, or get a gentle introduction to the sense of humour.
The other problem with that sort of attitude is that you invite flame wars, which result in a heavy moderation load. If you don't handle such things with a heavy hand, they'll walk all over you. If you do, they'll wonder why you appear to invite that kind of post, only to slap it down. Your decision, but I don't think you have any idea what you're letting yourself in for.
At GN, we have a very low level of moderation. We don't need it, because we don't invite "hairy" posts. When things even look like they're going pear shaped, there's a mod looking after the situation - even if there's no intervention. When things DO go pear shaped, there's swift and decisive action (hell, I'm beginning to sound like Phony Bliar - that's BAAAAAD). We have a wide range of members - ranging from the "my dad kept velociraptors" set to young mid-teens and musical tastes from classical to jazz to x-metal (x being whatever you want to put there). I don't think anyone here feels afraid to ask any question - they know that they won't be flamed. the attitude that you are engendering is an invitation to flame.

Secondly, I notice that you seem to have the whole business upside down. You seem to regard the "high" strings as being the low E, A and D and the "low" strings to be the G, B and high E - this is a complete reversal of accepted practice.

P.S. If I had posted this on your site, I wouldn't have said it any where nearly so politely :)

That is a very generous offer.

Personally I don't even have time and convenience to check it out right now, supposed to have left town last night but instead stayed on the internet til 6:00 am ALL music related and it was productive, but that seems to be my life these days, important obligations get set aside in favor of my music obsessions.

I am already a member of some great musician web forums, this one and IGS, both of them quite large with alot of expertise from all over the world, so questions usually have very quick and often professional replies. They also appear to have a substantial base from which the forums are derived, and are not just forums hanging in midair. I am also on a couple of recording forums but have not been active yet, waiting to receive some recording equipment from an ebay purchase.

I don't know how other people can find the time for all of this and still have time to play.

If creating and running a forum is what you really want to do (evidently) then go for it. You'll probably learn from it.

I remember exploring various forum software products some years ago when I was interested in computers, security and software and forum software alone can be pretty fun, just making a nice attractive forum. There seemed to be quite a few people who ventured off of the main forums to create their own nice looking forums. Success is another matter and probably dependant upon alot of factors that I am not going to try to analyse.

Good luck

. You seem to regard the "high" strings as being the low E, A and D and the "low" strings to be the G, B and high E - this is a complete reversal of accepted practice.

Strange. It must be a typo. In my brain, "high strings" refer to the strings with the highest notes. Where did you see this?

Well, so far the forum has 100 members and is growing at nice even pace. We've had a few guys who have been extremely knowledgeable post some amazing information. I couldn't be happier with the way the forum is going.

I've made a few comments on the forum that by calling it "Bash This Song" people are more likely to be nice when responding. This has been the experience so far even though the site and forum are both infants. We'll see if the psychology experiment works out. So far, I'm pleased.

To assume that using PG13 words in my forum will limit the quality of posts or increase hostility on the forum, I think you are mistaken. Maybe your world is different, but I've met a guy I could trust who didn't use enough curse words to appear human. I'm not going to get in debate about cursing (unless you want to). I realize that some people view using 4 letter words as unprofessional. That's fine. I know that when I've been in various music and stereo shops about to spend a large amount of money, I get very nervous. When the salesmen let's me know he is just a dude by saying a four letter word, I get quite relieved. I've walked out on a few multithousand dollar sales because the salesman seamed like a holy roller con artist.

To be honest, I wasn't sure if a forum that simulated real life would be accepted. The jury is still out. The main influence for this was Fletcher from Mercenary Audio and the Tape Op magazine. If you speak with Fletcher you'll find one of the most crude guys on the planet. My conservative mother's head would explode if she heard the unbridled verbage shoot out of Fletcher's mouth. Then again, he's one of the most knowledgeable recording guys on the planet. Tape Op really touched me when they didn't filter out reality in their magazine. They allow curse words and seam to have no problem with popularity or getting ads. The average recording guy is usually used to dealing with bands who curse, smoke pot, and do other unaccepted things (that a majority of high school / college people do).

Seriously. Thanks to all of you for giving your feedback and opinion. I do realize that I'm filling a niche with my site that will not be suitable to anyone who takes pride in their morality. I hope that you are wrong about the flaming issue. So far, so good. We shall see.

The members of my forum seam to be happy. The broke college kid was ecstatic when he earned a subscription to EQ magazine. I hope I can make others that happy by actually giving them something for doing me a mega huge favor.

Brandon

Personally I do not believe in censorship of any kind! Differences in manner, style of expression, belief, etc. are all relative and the internet provides for a worldwide socialization process no matter how extremely different people may view things or express themselves. To maximize the best effect of this socialization process, censorship is out of the question in my view. To censor is to interfere with that process while assuming that one perspective is more important than another.

I have always thought that if I ran a forum (first, there would be absolutely no censorship) that if a disruptive argument or discourse occured that the whole issue could be placed in a side forum reserved solely for that purpose- to argue, disagree, threaten, whatever!

I don't know if this relates to what you are talking about, maybe not, but that is what came to my mind.

Now then, two questions:

1. Did my editing your post above in any way change the message?
2. Did I somehow weaken your argument?

Now to answer a couple of yours

1. I make the rules, Paul makes the rules. You agree to the rules when you sign on.
2. It's a private board, that's why we can make the rules.

We want this board to be for everybody, not just those that think off color language is okay. Granted that isn't everyone's cuppa tea, but there are boards like guitar.com, HC and the one in this post that will let you swear as you please.

One more thing, please don't try to defeat the censor. It is there for a reason.

Hello Mr. Brandon Drury,

I was curious enough to do a google search on your name and discovered that you are an "Expert Author" in this field.

I had no idea of that. I had somehow assumed that you were a kid wanting to start a kewl forum. My apologies there!

I read one of your articles at this site:

http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Brandon_Drury

I'll be checking out your forum

See my reply below the quote:
Now then, two questions:

1. Did my editing your post above in any way change the message?
2. Did I somehow weaken your argument?

Now to answer a couple of yours

1. I make the rules, Paul makes the rules. You agree to the rules when you sign on.
2. It's a private board, that's why we can make the rules.

We want this board to be for everybody, not just those that think off color language is okay. Granted that isn't everyone's cuppa tea, but there are boards like guitar.com, HC and the one in this post that will let you swear as you please.

One more thing, please don't try to defeat the censor. It is there for a reason.

Hi Nick. I realized that I had probably circumvented language censoring after I posted. seriously I was NOT directing my discussion of censorship at this website and forum. I have no objections to it and I understand and accept your perspective.

Everything I had said, including "who makes the rules" was said in a very general sense, not at all directed at this forum, and in fact while writing the whole post I was thinking more in terms of political oriented and more radical websites where there is ALOT OF HEAT, to say the least, wars are being fought. In those scenarios it is often a case that, if you can't stand the heat then you shouldn't be in the kitchen!

I am at this site for one reason and that is MUSIC. I noticed the software gizmo that censors and corrects certain words some time ago.

I did not realize that I had circumvented the software until after the fact and of course while I was writing a post to Mr. Drury I noticed yours.

Again, sorry about that. In answer to your questions 1 and 2, no, it did not diminish the post at all, may have improved it- thanks- I should hire you as my editor :-) Only problem is I am broke so I can't pay you.

Although we could get into a big philosophical discussion about censorship, I don't think it will be necessary and for all practical purposes I think the matter is resolved.
Later,

Sorry, touchy subject for me.

No problems here and I do understand what you are saying.

Sorry, touchy subject for me.

No problems here and I do understand what you are saying.

Yes, I agree, I have (I think wisely) chosen not to discuss it here. These forums are about MUSIC, thank goodness.

There is no perfect system or method for a forum, that being said, your system is very good and acceptable.

Thanks.

I spent all night last night at Brandon's forum and website, with intermittant google searches to learn about things such as silencing a noisy computer for better recording.

I found the website to have alot of practical and useful information. I think he is a dedicated individual who works hard and has a big job to manage all of that.

However, in reference to a previous post which used the term 'Expert Author" I must confess, being nearly 56 years old, I find it difficult to accept someone who is only 25 years old (according to Brandon's profile) as an 'Expert' I was quite brilliant at that age but in no way could I have considered myself an 'Expert' at anything, although I did achieve some expertise in my field by the time I was 35 years old, with ALOT of study for many many years, much work and sacrifice, and of course, experience.

I am sure Brandon did not chose that 'Expert Author' terminology. The one article I read at the link I posted was very very good. It was informative easy to read and understand. I didn't cite the specific article I read because others may have different interest. I hope they were all as good as the one I read.

I'll cite that one now, btw, It was..... 'Self Home Recording Vs Paying a Recording Studio'

I have spent over three months learning about recording on-line, to the extent that I have hardly had any time to play guitar. Bummer! I have a BR864 with 2 microphones in the process of being shipped (used, purchased on Ebay) so I will sure be glad when it gets here and I can get back to playing again!

I have the manual in .pdf so I had better get busy and read that before the stuff gets here. I can hardly wait to be be using it for songwriting/composing. Yeah, I understand that this model has a significant learning curve to make best best use , but you gotta do what you gotta do...

(my friend has an even more complicated brand new 12 track I hope to help him with and he does not use the internet so that makes it a bit more difficult)

I need to get back to reading that manual.