What messageboards do you frequent?
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….because it’s obviously not this.
Just kidding. 😀
Curious if there are any particular messageboards you frequent, or have frequented in the past?
Right now, FSM is refurbishing. Well, soon, anyway. Curious how that whole thing will turn out.
As you already know I am also primarily a lurker and not a poster and so I am not a member of any other… I always thought but its just a time issue a bit if you really want to add something valuable. So I lurk on FSM, jwfan forums and a German one called Soundtrack Board (which has the same problem of too few members apparently) and occasionally MainTitles.
Right now, FSM is refurbishing. Well, soon, anyway. Curious how that whole thing will turn out.
I predict there will be lots of “the old one was far better” posts by then 😉
I predict there will be lots of “the old one was far better” posts by then
Probably, but it will hopefully pass. I wish I could contribute to the FSM Kickstarter, but I’m strapped for money, as always.
Over the years, it’s mostly been FSM and Scorereviews/Maintitles for me, the latter now sadly dead. Occasionally JWFAN. I’ve peeked into Intrada (also dead) and Filmtracks over the years, but never been a regular. I still can’t make heads or tails of Filmtracks’ interface. Also a couple of Elfman messageboards – Music for a Darkened People (semi-alive) and The Elfman Zone (dead). The creator of The Elfman Zone also had a Goldenthal board once, but long since gone.
I don’t like discussing on social media, like Twitter, Facebook, Blusky etc., so never appeared much there.
Right, the Intrada one I visited as well back then, primarily for announcments and Doug’s corner I think. The whole filmstracks site is a bit strange to use but it seems pretty old and probably features some same problems as the FSM one regarding updates.
I use social media but don’t really discuss there either 😉
I’m an FSM geek, but I’m beginning to feel quite at home here with the low traffic. Small fish in a small pond. I don’t really like having more than one messageboard to look at. My friend Dr Chatterjee told me that to be happy you have to reduce your choices.
Not a lot anymore, I admit. I don’t do much social media either (though I have active accounts and regularly stop by Facebook, Instragram, X/Twitter, but more for information and reading, less with active participation.
I was active in the ROON forum when I tested Roon for three months and put it through its paces, and found the forum to be very active, with good discussions about classical and even film music as well. (I “met” Neil S. Bulk there, so he’s over at the Roon forum as well.)
But since I have decided that — while I really like Roon — it’s much too expensive for what it does for me, I have not prolonged my subscription, so I’m not all that involved there anymore. Same with a HiFi Forum in Germany.
I used to be active 25-30 years ago in newsgroups such as rec.music.movies and rec.music.classical, but those are all history.I also have to admit there are few current film composers I have really “latched on” to, the way I did with Jerry Goldsmith, James Horner, Ennio Morricone, so there are fewer “current” things to discuss for me. I still like Howard Shore and am always interested what he does…
Also, my time is limited, and usually I just prefer listening to music instead of writing about it… silly me. 🙂 (Though I still enjoy the exchange with the people. BTW, was nice seeing you in Lukas’ Zoom chat, Graham. Though I don’t at all subscribe to the “fewer choices are better” theory.)
So not a lot of other forums.
Did anyone contribute to the FSM kickstarter? My funds are a little limited currently so I thought about the CD tier at the last moment only. But now missed it due to forgetting the time difference (not available as late backing option). But glad it made it! Hopefully Lukas does not get too dissipated his energy with the extra user feature wishes I partly find a little too outside of the scope of a new website and forum.
No, I did’t participate in the FSM Kickstarter.
One, because I don’t have available funds. Two, because I’ve just gone on an extended sabbatical from FSM, so it feels forced.
I’m not totally comfortable with the fact that Lukas asked for, what, $30k, but said he REALLY wanted $50k to get things sorted. Of course, it all turned out well, with more than $60k, but I like to have the goals defined from the get-go.
Be that as it may, I’m happy for FSM, and looking forward to seeing how it will turn out. I know that Lukas is a good guy, so there’s no funny business going on.
Extended sabbatical? Well after all you have your own forum now 😉
I’m not totally comfortable with the fact that Lukas asked for, what, $30k, but said he REALLY wanted $50k to get things sorted.
Stretch goals are not really uncommon. But I somehow understand it. There was quite a flood of kickstarters the last time and also the Goldsmith book fiasco (and the Nosteratu one had its quibbles, too). He didn’t want to push it with a huge ammount even if everyone considerds him a “good guy” as you said. A lot FSM members are apparently a bit older (well, than us ;-)) and not entirely comfortable with some digital things like Kickstarters as it sounds in some forum posts I read here and there.
Huge amount for the new site but the majority is surely the migration part of the existing data to be usable with anything new. Interesting to read that the new site will apparently be also WordPress. Even the forum will apparently be using a plugin he already mentioned (another one than ours). Will be interessting to learn if really all will be one installation powering all. I probably would suggest to make the forum and main site separate technically.
Extended sabbatical? Well after all you have your own forum now 😉
I don’t want it to be “my” forum. It’s just a forum.
You make good points about the FSM shenanigans. I don’t understand how a new website and forum can cost $64.000, but then again I’m not into the commercial aspect of this. You know this better than I do. $64.000 is the average annual income of a Norwegian, more or less (not mine, it’s much less, but the average).
Yes, it is a lot of money for a website even with a forum. I never had made any in that price area. Maybe over the years with ongoing support but not at once.
But the plain website or its design itself is surely not the reason for this. The main problem is porting all the old data from a “stone age” system that probably even was custom made back then (general CMS like WordPRess did not exist when the site was made). That all needs to be understoond and the everything needs to be converted so it is usable somewhere else. Having user accounts still work and such. And of course if all should be better searchable all that needs to be tagged/sorted etc. Probably a lot manual work needed. Let’s say a web agency works on that wth several people for some weeks it’s nothing. Some FSM comments expect this to be too simple and you cannot have AI do such things if it is not trained for it. Despite that you should not “believe” AI without checking the result.
Also you need to prepared on problems on the way. Sometimes things turn out to be more complicated in areas you didn’t expect them.
And releasing a new CD and a book probably also costs some copyright fees for design, texts and music. Not to speak that he probably like to make a bit of benefit for his own work on all that as well.
“What does a website cost?” is the same question as “What does a car cost?”. You can pick up some used beat up old pickup truck for $800.-, or buy a super exclusive Bentley limited edition for $2,000,000.-
I think indeed the most complex and costly element here is likely the transfer of the old forum content and port it over to the new forum. Not even sure if they’ll be able properly align the (most likely new logins and) new accounts with the old postings.
As far as I know the legal aspects of running a web site and a forum should not be underestimaded. At least in Germany. At least it might require some research or even legal consultancy.
In Germany there are some greedy lawyers just scanning the web for websites which usually by accident miss the one or the other newest required paragraph in their imprint and send warning letters with high fine requests. At least this was a thing 10-15 years ago.
I think indeed the most complex and costly element here is likely the transfer of the old forum content and port it over to the new forum. Not even sure if they’ll be able properly align the (most likely new logins and) new accounts with the old postings.
And not to forget, the forum is the largest part but there is also that CD database and the online magazine of some years. All adds up.
As far as I know the legal aspects of running a web site and a forum should not be underestimaded. At least in Germany. At least it might require some research or even legal consultancy.
That’s a bit over estimated and not that complicated. The legal info or imprint (“IMpressum”) is really not rocket science to get right. In German every website requires that with only very few exceptions. The US does not have that at all.
More complicated may be the privacy statement regarding GDRP (or DSGVO over here) as you need some technical knowledge but that is also managable. Bottom rule, don’t use/embed external especially US services like Google Analytics as there are alternatives. You don’t exactly need a lawyer for that. And besides that just follow the rules like intellectual property (which for granted is not always that simple, the US copyright is a bit different than the European one btw) it’s all doable.
So, this message greets us at FSM today:
The countdown has started, the new messageboard will probably go online tomorrow. I’ve left the forum, but I’m still curious to see how it will turn out in the end. Anyone else curious?
Well, I was among the Beta-testers for the forum, so I know a bit how it will turn out, though I’m looking forward to see how it will work and look when it is out in the wild.
Since my interest in film music is about 90% John Williams (I’m trying my damndest with Goldsmith), I spent most of my time on JWFan. There are a few cats on there I find mildly-to-completely insufferable, so I have scaled back considerably. Maybe I’m one of them. Probably.
I do feel like I came in a little late to the party (story of my life) and most of the JW centric discussions happened 10-15 years ago. To be fair, he doesn’t write as much these days.
I like FSM, but I just don’t find a ton of film music super engaging. I’m a classical guy at heart, and a lot just doesn’t measure up, or at least doesn’t stand well on its own. Still, film music was my first love in the world of art music. I have a soft spot for it, and I like hearing other people’s enthusiasm. It helps me try new stuff.
FSM is currently closed for maintenance. So we probably soon will see the relaunch. It will be fun because of course opinions will be divided between those who like and those who think it was better before 😉
What? What happened? You must not leave FSM, Thor. It’s not an option and probably prohibited by law. You’ve been around for too long. Your FSM membership’s legal status has been set to “permanent”. So you see, there is no way out.
Anyway, it just won’t be the same without you. I can understand Sabbaticals, though. I once took one that lasted fiver years. But never say never.
It’s not an option and probably prohibited by law. You’ve been around for too long. Your FSM membership’s legal status has been set to “permanent”.
Indeed, I am only a lurker on FSM but Thor is a house hold name there. But I can understand being active on more than one forum is time consuming. Not to speak of the tinnitus…
So you see, there is no way out.
Maybe the migration to the new software will solve it. Perhaps he even has a deal with Lukas that he accidentally gets lost 😉
What? What happened?
Nothing new happened. I have the 10% listening energy remaining that I channel into this board and site, and whatever assignments I’m able to get out in the real world. But as you say, never say never. Maybe I’ll return to FSM in full in a few years, if I’m able to cope with this tinnitus thing.
Very curious about the new board, and how they manage to transfer all the existing threads.
I’m a classical guy at heart,
I think you’ll find likeminded guys here, Schilkeman, like fellow classical music buffs Nick and Sigbjørn (the latter posts once in a blue moon).
As far as I can see, they really transferred the board; it looks like the existing threads are all there. The Beta-Tester Board has been dismantled, it’s looking good so far. They had all the threads in both boards for a while, with a beta-testing board that didn’t show in the old board. I hope everything will go smoothly.
It’s certainly a board with more options than the old one.You should be able to see that on your profile page. I cannot access either board (old or new) since today, so I can’t check.
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