Music Subforum

[Pochipochi]

I would like to bring up something for consideration and thank you well in advance for reading through this post.

I've been debating bringing up a music subforum and I figured it's probably been asked about before. I assume if it has, in the past, the general thought is "would people use it and is it necessary?" These are questions that can quickly shut the idea down and I'd like to offer some defense, because I think at heart our first thought is that it seems like it would be the least discussed of all hypothetical Arlong Park media subforums and major forums (unless we count Knitting, which has a declining fanbase.) At first I was wondering if it would be a good subforum myself (I'm a music scholar by non-existent career and degree), because the thought has been on my mind for the past week. But seeing how easily we can get people to come to the General Music Thread when discussions are brought up made me realize there is a budding potential. There are several users who even cite music as their primary interest, such as myself. I thought about it some, but what do you guys think? Is there actual lasting value and room for it to come out?

Part of my thinking that maybe it could work is that we have a few threads that could be moved into it already, the idea that once it's there people will think of things to talk about too. We already have threads such as "Forced Listening", "General Music", even person threads such as "Zephos's Rock Journey", other obvious ideas like "What Are You Listening to". I know we could add in many other types as well, much broader than immediately apparent. There might be a lot of one-off topics, but I can also see the forum getting some serious life. Here are some hypothetical threads because I have a lot of time on my hands:

-"Talk New Music"
A type of thread that begs for a sticky. Just a general where we can discuss everything about the most recent of contemporary music, such as major music blogs, discoveries, big artists new and old for the year, which albums we have most been enjoying in 2012 and onwards.

• "Music videos"
  Self-explanatory, some people really love music videos. I'm not big into them actually, but I bet this could work, though there is potential to turn into never ending lists without discussion (which I am always a fan of encouraging).

• "I'm looking for more music like this thing I just heard let me show you"-
  Depending on frequency, this could collapse into a single thread, or one could allow multiple types of this be made.

• "HEAVY METAL THREAD!!!!"

• "Who loves classic rock!?"
  Threads like this are self explanatory and could result in quite a breadth of discussions, far more so than something as too general as "General Music" does currently. Making big threads for styles of music and generations are always relevant, especially when albums are reissued, or one is curious about what others think of a seminal work.

-And then of course any myriad number of threads devoted to one band, which could see days of discussion, minutes, hours, who knows what. Some stuff takes off well and can be fruitful. I guarantee you if this forum is made, a Beatles thread will follow and that alone can create lots of disagreements or talk.

-"Japanese bands"/"Indian bands"/"South african blues artists"
Self explanatory for the above few styles of threads.

-"What was your favorite album/Top 10 this year?"
Very popular discussions when the year is almost over, this is probably the biggest question on anyone's mind who is into contemporary music. Sharing top ten lists can be a great method of re-evaluation and discovery.

~

Now these are all some very obvious answers for what could go into the forum, but I think I've demonstrated that even the obvious ones could probably fill it up pretty well.

Now with a music forum would also come consideration for its own set of rules. A common element of music on the internet is sharing and depending on this site's policy on legalities such as this, it may be good to establish early on whether or not sharing albums on upload sites is okay during discussions.

But anyways, there's my idea. What do you guys think? The big question is, would this actually work out?

[Monkey King]

lets do this thing

[Sakonosolo]

Sounds good to me.

[Wagomu]

Oh man am I down.

[Silence]

There ARE a heck of a lot of music threads around. Why not, says I?

[Herodadotus]

I can definitely get behind this idea.

[m00n]

Count me in!

[Robby]

It's been discussed before, and while I'm personally okay with the idea, the general consensus was that the music threads that already exist just don't get enough traffic to warrant their own subsection.

Even the general music thread when it was stickied went months without receiving a single post, its only on page 23 after 2 years.

The next music thread I can see, the prog rock thread, is 9 pages back and hasn't been touched since September, and Favorite Guitarists since August. The fourth music thread, Mp3 Request Thread hasn't been touched since May 2011, Billy Joel March 2011.

If more traffic starts going to those threads, or there starts to be an abundance of them circulating the front couple pages, (and no, that's not an invite to start creating 20 random threads to spam the front page) then it might happen. But for now? They just don't warrant their own section.

[Wagomu]

Part of me thinks that it's at least worth a test. Having a subforum allows for a few things that might bring in regular traffic. For one, it separates the topic from the rest of the forum, which does a lot. Right now, music is sort of split between general discussion and media, which not only creates some confusion, but also means that they compete with really fast-moving and trendy topics. Also, it seems like there is some internal confusion within the threads, due to their very general natures. Having a subforum makes for a more comfortable climate to discuss and explore the wide world of music and might attract the people who normally miss those topics to them by separating them from more popular threads.

Perhaps this isn't too strong of a case, but I think, given what I just said and the fact that some of this forums more prominent and talkative members are all up for it, we could make this work.

[Robby]

Convince the admins. Gotta show that at least one thread can be active and stay prominent first.

Most I can do is resticky the general music thread.

[Pochipochi]

@RobbyBevard:

was that the music threads that already exist just don't get enough traffic to warrant their own subsection.

The thing is that I don't think those threads are a good indicator at all and I don't think it's fair to use those as a gauge of interest. It's not a fair assessment honestly and here's why:

There aren't music threads not because nobody wants to discuss them, but because they're not given a reason to assume they will be looked at. If music is my absolute favorite thing, why do I personally not go into them? Well, it's hard to know what kind of audience you'd get for any of your posts. People go into Media and look for a completely different brand of thread. They look for movies and TV shows, not music, and any possible music thread has to compete with a forum that is 100% devoted to a dfferent subject matter.

It is an entirely uphill battle that's not worth fighting for. And then when there is something interesting brought up in General Music, we seem jump at it because it's something, but at the same time it's such an insanely broad area that it doesn't have the staying power. But when Zephos brought up, fuck I don't know, whatever he did last time that brought in all kinds of people from across the forum including the music crowd, it was a great discussion for a few days. You were there Robby, actually! Not to say that I think this is all on you, I get that you're just relaying information and confirming a consensus I assumed was made a while ago

But that's why I made the thread, see, to try and convince otherwise.

Wagomu is right when he says it'd be a way more comfortable climate. We have quite a few members who not only would be willing to populate it, but would do so entirely naturally.

Does it have staying power??? We'd see and that's the real thing about it. But I'm totally with Wagomu here. I think the big thing is that the music subforum would have to attract some more general participants. Like, casual listeners who just wanna shoot shit sometimes too (it's what the What Are You Listening To thread seems to be) and the environment might work out alright.

But as is, when there's several different forums that music falls into (General Discussion? Media…?) it's already confusing to even know where you'd make a thread, and then it would usually just get sidetracked because, and I'm repeating this because it's a big point, the traffic tends to jump into these forums for threads that are already there, competing with threads soon to be made of related topicality to the pre-existing threads. No music thread can really compete with that when it's just diluted so thin and so generally.

--- Update From New Post Merge ---

I dunno, it's not like we're all certain it'd be HUGEST SURPRISE hit but a lot of prominent posters wanna give it a fair shot because we like the subject a lot.

[Herodadotus]

@Wagomu:

Part of me thinks that it's at least worth a test. Having a subforum allows for a few things that might bring in regular traffic. For one, it separates the topic from the rest of the forum, which does a lot. Right now, music is sort of split between general discussion and media, which not only creates some confusion, but also means that they compete with really fast-moving and trendy topics. Also, it seems like there is some internal confusion within the threads, due to their very general natures. Having a subforum makes for a more comfortable climate to discuss and explore the wide world of music and might attract the people who normally miss those topics to them by separating them from more popular threads.

Perhaps this isn't too strong of a case, but I think, given what I just said and the fact that some of this forums more prominent and talkative members are all up for it, we could make this work.

I know I don't frequent the music threads for the sole purpose that they don't make sense in the Media or General Discussion areas. I go to those areas for info and discussion for things outside of music, and when I see music stuff in what I view non-music subjects, I tend to not really pay attention to the threads, and my life is focused on music.

[Kitsune Inferno]

The problem is that music is such a broad subject that one thread for it is bound to be a bit difficult to keep alive, because everyone is going to want to be discussing different things so it's impossible to really enjoy a discussion at length.

What if we had a single General TV Show thread? It'd be hard to have any staying power because one person likes Community and another likes Game of Thrones and another likes Lost or The Wire or whatever, so it would be difficult to have anyone other than the die-hard TV fans participate in discussions because one single topic won't stick around for too long.

With a subforum, it can be broken down into separate topics by genre or whatnot, so it's much easier to discuss, I would think.

[Robby]

Like I said. I'm personally okay with the idea. I've even pitched it before.

Convince the admins.

[Pochipochi]

Do the admins not read this?

Because that's what this whole thread is about. I thought if I posted it here they'd see it.

[Robby]

Brennen, Urogue and Nessa have all been busier with life as of late, (of the new baby and cross-continent variety) and the others pretty much never deal with actual forum stuff, just technical.

So you have to work to catch them currently.

[Pochipochi]

I know Vanessa is pretty busy, but I figured the rest always are too, so I dunno

I thought maybe they'd catch this eventually, but I didn't want to be a pest and PM. I'll do it I guess!

[Robby]

Nope. Pester em. That's the only way to get stuff done. It was hard to convince them to do a western animation section, and that had like 200 active topics ready to move at the time.

I sent out a general staff mail on the subject.

[Silence]

@Kitsune:

The problem is that music is such a broad subject that one thread for it is bound to be a bit difficult to keep alive, because everyone is going to want to be discussing different things so it's impossible to really enjoy a discussion at length.

What if we had a single General TV Show thread? It'd be hard to have any staying power because one person likes Community and another likes Game of Thrones and another likes Lost or The Wire or whatever, so it would be difficult to have anyone other than the die-hard TV fans participate in discussions because one single topic won't stick around for too long.

With a subforum, it can be broken down into separate topics by genre or whatnot, so it's much easier to discuss, I would think.

I accidentally deleted a much bigger post than this here, so thank you for making the point for me KI!

Basically a General Music Thread is like a General TV Show Thread, or a General Movie Thread, or a General Manga Thread.
Completely dead in the water. But it's not like it doesn't have potential, as the many different Music Threads have shown.
Threads could (easily) be dedicated to new albums as they come out, bands, or genres. Toss the Forced Listening and What Are You Currently Listening To? threads in there and you have a potluck.
There's a variety of different posters in all of these threads already, giving music lovers a subforum of their own would really bring them out of the woodwork. And not just them, but regular folks who are just curious!

I'm confident that with Wagomu, Zephos, and Holy behind this, this kind of thing is at least worth a shot!

[Vanessa]

Looks pretty well thought out so I see no problem with giving this a chance. If anything a music subforum would end up pretty active by the sheer quantity of it; as much as Western Animation at least.

I'll get started in a bit, and will begin looking through for any topics that would merit being moved into that section.

Also Holy, if there's anything specific you'd want added on while I'm working on this just message me k.

[Silence]

Nessa da Best-a

[Pochipochi]

@Vanessa:

Looks pretty well thought out so I see no problem with giving this a chance. If anything a music subforum would end up pretty active by the sheer quantity of it; as much as Western Animation at least.

I'll get started in a bit, and will begin looking through for any topics that would merit being moved into that section.

Also Holy, if there's anything specific you'd want added on while I'm working on this just message me k.

Like I said personally, it's very nice of you and I thank you quite a lot!

If the music forum fails, I will let you personally be the one to execute me

But I'm pretty confident we can make this work.

So come on guys we've got a forum to populate soon

[Kitsune Inferno]

Pioneering adventures!

[Wooden_Giraffe]

You should make a song cover thread. i want to hear all of your beautiful voices.

[GypsyCarts]

This idea is too good.

[Don Quichotte De Flamingo]

A sub-forum for music.
Aren`t there better suited forums out there to talk about music?
I see that you may want to share this and that about your favourite band or whatever, but that sub-forum will just be a collecting place for 1-5 used threads.

I guess a manga/anime forum has to keep up with the latest trends and has to develop more and more non manga/anime related sub forums.
But why not having a movie/series and politics sub-forum in the media section while we`re at it?
Those are at least equally discussed here and so should be considered for that too.

[Jazzy Jinx]

@Don:

A sub-forum for music.
Aren`t there better suited forums out there to talk about music?
I see that you may want to share this and that about your favourite band or whatever, but that sub-forum will just be a collecting place for 1-5 used threads.

I guess a manga/anime forum has to keep up with the latest trends and has to develop more and more non manga/anime related sub forums.
But why not having a movie/series and politics sub-forum in the media section while we`re at it?
Those are at least equally discussed here and so should be considered for that too.

The music sub-forum already exists and has more than your mentioned five threads; it's even currently stirring up quite a bit of activity.

Media, on a whole, already covers t.v. and such. So much so that it overwhelms any discussion pertaining to music. Not to mention that in most minds, "media" is synonymous with "television" or something trending right now. Music isn't the first thing that pops to mind. And that's the reason the music sub-forum was brought forth as a suggestion, to create that clear distinction between television and music.

I believe that it deserves to exist and that it'll be at least fairly active. There are quite a few people here whom have very strong attachments to music whether as a form of identity or as a genuine passion. And for those more casual users they finally have a place to create more casual threads without the fear of it being merged or locked immediately. All in all, I see no reason to think it won't do well.

–-

And as for Holy, Wagomu and Zephos... Might I say that I admire and respect your passion and congratulate you all on the new sub-forum. Not to be riding dicks or anything but, I know you guys are the ones to keep this thing alive.~

[Don Quichotte De Flamingo]

Well in the beginning each new sub-foum is used, but most threads by now are just the collected pile of threads of the past..in a few weeks we know more how it developed.

So much so that it overwhelms any discussion pertaining to music.

How can it overwhelm a discussion about music in their seperated threads?
Lol, i hope you dont want to tell me that its such an hard task to may look on the second page for the thread you wanna reply in.

Music isn't the first thing that pops to mind. And that's the reason the music sub-forum was brought forth as a suggestion, to create that clear distinction between television and music.

That`s why i suggested a movie/series and politics subforum for a clear distinction.
I mean in the past 7 years we had hundreds of posts about music, movies and politics all scattered over the place, because like you said for most people it was not clear enough what belongs to media^^

There are quite a few people here whom have very strong attachments to music whether as a form of identity or as a genuine passion.

You dont try to tell me that music might be the singular most popular hobby for each and every person in one way or another, or do you? Of course everyone has something to say about it, but on a manga/anime board i guess you dont have to provide for every popular hobby a sub-forum..so why having one for music and not for movie/series or politics?
Thats all iam asking…of course people will use the sub-forum, but so they used regular threads without a problem. I personally just dont see the point.
When its an manga/anime board it would be more logical to have a Naruto,Bleach etc subforum instead of music,video games etc sub-forums which could be discussed like everywhere else...thats not a reason why i have to join here.
And sure i may want to talk to the people here about music and other stuff but thats why we have a general section which doesnt need much destinction...
But when people see it as handy to have sub-forums, so why not having even more of them like i suggested.

[Jazzy Jinx]

I think it's because you either don't understand this community (Arlong Park) or you're just blatantly ignoring it.

How can it overwhelm a discussion about music in their seperated threads?
Lol, i hope you dont want to tell me that its such an hard task to may look on the second page for the thread you wanna reply in.

This has already been gone over before earlier in this thread but there's several reasons why it can overwhelm music topics. One of them being the reason I provided you before; the term "media" being synonymous with movies and television. Music topics in that particular forum don't have much staying power even if the topic material may interest several individuals. The reason simply being that new movies and television shows come out all the time, "media" is a pretty relegated term and the music threads that existed up until today were either too specific or too limited to discuss in a pool of popular, differing threads.

It's the concern that someone (I'm sorry, I forgot who it was) expressed before that even though they personally are passionate about music, it's stuck in a place with tons of other interesting threads and not being allowed to collect attention.

That`s why i suggested a movie/series and politics subforum for a clear distinction.
I mean in the past 7 years we had hundreds of posts about music, movies and politics all scattered over the place, because like you said for most people it was not clear enough what belongs to media^^

I think the distinction here is that "media" is a clear enough term to insinuate discussion on movies, television and politics (due to the absence of said sub-forums and deductive reasoning) but not so distinct as to insinuate music, even though music falls under the media category. Like I said before, a lot of people here (on Arlong Park~) identify themselves strongly with music or are passionate about it and are seeking careers in music. Now, more than likely, there are some among us seeking careers in those other categories, but none so greatly as music on this particular site.

And since music is such a fervent self-identity for the users, music threads can end up in General discussion just as it could in Media.

You dont try to tell me that music might be the singular most popular hobby for each and every person in one way or another, or do you? Of course everyone has something to say about it, but on a manga/anime board i guess you dont have to provide for every popular hobby a sub-forum..so why having one for music and not for movie/series or politics?

Oh, and I forgot to mention this but…

And I hate to say this because I'm a dumbass about it myself but... Do you really, honestly believe that our members here are capable of sustaining a mature and intelligent conversation on politics without it degrading into dumb jokes or overtly offensive responses? Now I'm a dumbass on this too, I'll definitely say something stupid in a debate and get overly offended for no reason and I also know that some people are capable of carrying on mature conversation but…

I just plain don't think that, with as diverse as our community is in terms of personalities and with as sincere and important certain beliefs are to people, that those conversations can be carried out without anyone being offended or without extreme moderation. And I know the discussions exist anyway and they're certainly not taboo but I often times see these topics get the most amount of mod intervention.

Creating a sub-forum for politics would just open the floodgates to spawn off several topics that will be ridiculed (along with their OP's).

Thats all iam asking…of course people will use the sub-forum, but so they used regular threads without a problem. I personally just dont see the point.
When its an manga/anime board it would be more logical to have a Naruto,Bleach etc subforum instead of music,video games etc sub-forums which could be discussed like everywhere else...thats not a reason why i have to join here.

Of course it's not the reason you joined here but even if you would think that Naruto or Bleach would be more popular areas of discussion… they get trashed around here really often. On the other hand, music is a booming subject for several. So why would a community need to conform to a pre-established notion that all they're capable of discussing needs to have some basis in the board's original subject?

I haven't posted in any One Piece threads in years now. I believe communities should grow and adapt to the needs of the userbase rather than to the ideas of conformity.

And sure i may want to talk to the people here about music and other stuff but thats why we have a general section which doesnt need much destinction…
But when people see it as handy to have sub-forums, so why not having even more of them like i suggested.

But now you can discuss it to a specific level without fear of being ignored (since everyone that enters is aware that the main topic is music), it dying quickly or it being merged with a general thread.

And if a sub-forum has merit in the community, then it has potential to exist. I don't see why you think there's a restriction in place, sans all my counterpoints. If you want them to exist, make your case.~

[Don Quichotte De Flamingo]

Well, when you say the dumbass comunity here couldn`t handle a politics subforum neither start to discuss music properly without a subforum provided for it, iam actually not able to make a case against it :)

Also like you said most people aren`t here for the original main subject, so to keep them here, it obviously has to be given more room for side discussions.

[Jazzy Jinx]

I didn't necessarily mean it like that, I meant more that dumb comments would be made, not that the users themselves are dumb. My concern is more on the "mean" aspect rather than the intelligent one. =P

Anyways, it's already done, so…

[brennen.exe]

Looks like Nessa's got this already. My opinion is the same as last time, so if you all [the regs] think you'll be active enough, and/or those who really do appreciate music– zephos, wagomu, holy, etc-- keep the quality up, then go for it. Just keep in mind that a sub-forum doesn't need pages and pages of threads; keep them relevant and purposeful, please.

[BartArt]

Sweet! I vow to be active and useful in this subforum if it happens.

EDIT: Oh ma gawd, it has already happened. Well I'm off to the new world~

[HAM-STAR]

Personally I think we should either just have a music thread, or a general "media" thread about music or tv shows or video games or stuff like that.
BUT I'M A NEWCOMER WHO CARES ABOUT ME??

[gemadog7]

@HAM-STAR:

Personally I think we should either just have a music thread, or a general "media" thread about music or tv shows or video games or stuff like that.
BUT I'M A NEWCOMER WHO CARES ABOUT ME??

There's already a sub forum with music, tv shows and video games.

[HAM-STAR]

Yes, but… I...!
I suck.