Sorry the posts are a bit sporadic at the moment – I’ve been away for a couple of days, and there’s also some behind-the-scenes stuff going on that’ll hopefully result in a few things this week.
In the meantime, thanks to Stray for letting me know about a new forum dedicated to freeform. Since the FINRG homepage went into hybernation the harder/deeper freeform scene has lacked an English-language forum, so this could really be worth supporting. I’ll be signing up, and we might even get a few new recruits to TYFTH, who knows..
I often think about starting up a forum here too, especially with some recent comment sections/ustream sets turning into epic conversations between a few people…any thoughts?
forum on here would be a winner mate
Defenetly for TYFTH forum.
Yeah, TYFTH Forum would be awesome. Comment section really isn’t that suitable for real discussion.
Though, IMO the best idea would be to move that new forum under TYFTH, as freeform is, in the end, small scene genre, so I don’t really see need for two different forums.
About FINRG forums.., well although there was some life on that forum back in the days, I’ve always seen it just as a label homepage only. TYFTH already feels more like ‘portal’, since it’s a real blog.
Yes, definitely a good idea! It would really help the scene/community, no doubt.
And I also have to agree with Jiipez; having two freeform forums would be very redundant, so maybe joining forces is possible?
If you do make a “TYFTF” I suggest you use punBB or some other light software… I’d rather hang out here than on some free one-click deployment forum host anyway.
A TYFTH forum would be very cool. I’d use it.
eirik> Choice of forum software is of course, at least mostly, a matter of opinion – e.g. I prefer using SMF
However, I totally agree that using a ‘free forum host’ service is not a durable solution at all. It’s the reason I am a bit hesitant about registering to that new forum.
One more aspect: stray’s new forum really don’t have a name. It’s just called “Freeform”, it’s the same as if someone would create a forum named ‘cars’ or ‘fashion’. Again, under TYFTH, it’d be TYFTH Forum or “TYFTF” (how come I had the same idea in my mind? :D)
As for me, I prefer phpBB2. :p
But yes, I agree with not using a free forum host, if we’re really up to making a TYFTH forum.
Thank you chaps, plenty to think about here!
Jiipez/BerN
Yup, I completely understand what you’re saying about two freeform forums…but equally I’m not too sure about how a collaboration would work. I’m really happy with the TYFTH ‘identity’ and the kind of freeform fan who seems to hang out here, but neither I or the site are well-known enough to be absorbing a UK-centric forum…it turns out that even Stray knew me from the FINRG connection, not TYFTH.
Anyway, I’ve spent the evening mailing people/trying to understand the process behind getting a forum off the ground (including the free/non-free side of things, fear not), so we’ll see what happens. It definitely feels about time for the crew here to be able to interact more easily…
Don’t hold back if you’ve got any other opinions/ideas, they’ve been a big help so far 🙂
Well, I have to admit that I made my first comment before I did any ‘deeper’ investigation of stray’s forum. After I read that he made the forum after he heard NEC is closing down, I kinda understood that this is more UK-style thing. Some people may want to kill me for the next one, but if you ask me, I’d remove the whole UK Freeform term and instead just use UK Hardcore (even though it really isn’t hardcore haha).
Getting forum software up and running isn’t that hard actually. Idk what kind of web hosting service you have (‘whois’ hints me something about Dreamhost.com?), but if it has support for mySQL and php everything should be okay.
Actually, Jiipez, I agree with that. The way I see it, UK Freeform is a totally different genre from what TYFTH as been publicizing since the start. I honestly couldn’t care less about the UK Freeform sound, with the odd exception that come from that circle very sporadically; also UK producers like Lost Soul and Matt England don’t count because they lean to the Finnish sound much more than to the ‘general UK sound’.
But anyway, I’m pretty computer illiterate, but I could ask for help from a few guys of a forum I usually go. It also started from ‘nowhere’, so they should help. phpBB2 is still being used there, because version 3 was hated by everyone.
But anything simple to browse will do it for me, honestly. As long as it doesn’t have 1563543 colors, nor black background, my eyes can handle. :3
About TYFTH’s identity… Since it was never its purpose to focus on the UK sound, the forum should maintain this identity. Like Plasma is saying, we have a very specific type of freeform fan around here, we should support these fans. At worst, we’ll all have a better place to hang out and communicate; at best, we’ll attract more fans and attention to this “sub-scene”, if ya know what I mean.
Also, I’d like to point that this has nothing to do with nationality discrimination, but more about the general sound that comes from the said regions. For example, Aryx is from Slovenia and is still producing Finnish-sounding freeform.
Oh well, I just said what I thought here and you’ll probably disagree with me, but this is how I’ve seen this scene since the start.
The thing that mainly concerns me is what if TYFTH forum will be ‘too small to operate’, if you know what I mean. I’ve seen way too many forums that in the beginning had regular posters and much activity in general, but after certain amount time it turns out there’s like one or two new posts per week, and usually the only active thread happens to be “Post funny youtube videos” or something other nonsense. Just look FINRG forums – freeform really isn’t dead but the forum is. New posts there are usually self-promotion and other news: “Free release from…”
I’m not saying this will automatically happen to the possible TYFTH forum, but let’s assume stray’s forum will get popular: the fans of both UK-style AND finnish style will probably inhabit stray’s forum instead of TYFTH. Well although many of them might register to TYFTH, they’ll be more active on stray’s forum, since it covers their musical preferences better. So what’s left for TYFTH is a handful of Finnish sound purists. But is that handful enough to keep the forum alive?
Then to the actual forum: as I think it won’t have that huge userbase, I suggest NOT creating “General Discussion” boards or similar. I mean Plasma doesn’t blog about “general things”, like how was the weather today etc. Same way, if the forum is for discussion about music, mainly Freeform, why should we have board for talking about the conflicts between North and South Korea, or “What you did today?”.
Yes, that was pretty critical view, but my opinion still stands: TYFTH Forum would be awesome. 😀
I guess that deadness you mention is bound to happen in all small communities. There’ll always be phases when no one feels like posting. Even if in FINRG’s case it’s a bit more extreme…
However, I’m all up for a ‘Social Board’ type of thing. I mean, I’m not sure about all of the other members, but I really want to know you better Jiipez~~
Joking aside, I defend a Social board for all the random stuff, a Freeform board for releases, production tips/help and obviously proper commenting of these blog posts – for that would be better to make a single topic, we don’t want to flood the forum with topics taken from here – and an Introduction board, so every new member gets so say hi. There’s not much point in making many boards if no one’s gonna post in them. So 3 is a good starting point I say.
Maybe me and Jiipez are already thinking this too much, though. xD
personally i think just have 2 seperate ones, i think this site and its users cater for a slightly different bunch than alot on that other forum, think alot on thr other forum are into the cheesyer stuff, maybe im reading a book by its cover there though and could be totally wrong, anyhooo i would pop in to the other site still but id use this site as a regular visit deffo.
There’s nothing to lose and only gain. Of course, a TYFTH (FINRG related) Freeform forum wouldn’t have to many users, to start with. Probably just the few of us, but that’s not bad at all, because freeform, respect of FINRG, is an insider sytle anyway.
The expectation, to have a shit load of active users is unrealistic anyway… It’ll probably never be that way at all, but some people will find their way into that forum, once time passes.
I for my wouldn’t be to happy with an UK Freeform/FINRG hybrid forum, because I rarely listen to UK Freeform. It’s just to different from FINRG, imho. I don’t know how you guys feel, but I always thought that TYFTH was about 95% FINRG. That’s what I love about this blog. So we probably love the same thing, don’t we?
Gaia> Yeah I agree, lets just go ahead and see how it turns out 😛 I must add though, I don’t think anybody here was expecting shitload of users 😀
Bern> Well if the General/Social/Random/Whatever board really is essential, so be it. That said, ‘Introduction board’ is something I don’t want to see. Nothing personal on that, I just don’t get the point. I mean, lets say a new user registers, then he makes a new thread on that board with some little info, then what? Everyone comes and reply with “Hi! Nice to meet you!”? All this could be simply in one thread on that ‘Social board’.
Instead, introduction board for musical projects would make much more sense. In the end, it’s all up to Plasma how the board will be structured. (funny though how it looks like we commenters already have made the decision that there will be a forum 😀 )
Sorry for my delayed input on this one….
I’ve been meaning to ask Jon about a tyfth forum for some time now. Although it would probably have a few users to begin with (us lot) in sure it would build
Over time as the site looks after a growing (but still niche) genre. If anything it would allow us all to communicate better about everything from tunes to upcoming nights etc. Roll on TYFTH the forum!!!!
Great stuff guys, I couldn’t have asked for a better response 🙂
Right, it’s official then – the ‘behind the scenes stuff’ now includes making the TYFTH forum happen! As a few people have mentioned, I think it makes sense to make this a stand-alone project, rather than absorbing (or more likely being absorbed by) another forum. In the past the number of visitors/contributors was nowhere near enough to even think about doing this, but now we have a small but very knowledgeable group of DJs, producers and fans who share a similar vision of the music…that sounds like the start of a forum community to me! We might be a ‘sub-genre of a sub-genre’, but as Gaia says, there’s nothing to lose by giving it a try.
I’ll put some thought into the categories on the forum, but I’m on the side of BerN re. the General/Social/Whatever Board. I know from talking with people here and elsewhere that we’ve got some really interesting people hanging out on TYFTH, and I reckon there’s a lot of potential for some nice discussion outside the music itself.
Jiipez is right though, limiting it to about three boards (whatever they may be) makes sense, at least initially, while things like the Tips for Beginners post, Top Tens etc might work better as forum posts than on the blog. Any other opinions about what other boards/content you’d want to see there are very welcome…after all, if the people commenting here don’t like it, I might well be sitting in there by myself 😉
Thanks for all the advice/suggestions for forum software too – I’m looking into that right now, and even my total idiocy in such matters shouldn’t be too much of a problem, as we have a real professional (and fellow Horser) on board to help.
Anyway, today’s humidity is playing havoc with my Mac, so I’ll have to stop there for now. Stay tuned, as they say 🙂
Well, uh, guess I’ll take my words partly back. Like, in this case of TYFTH the general discussion may indeed work better. I just automatically had the idea of what the general discussion usually looks like, at least on some big boards. For example on klubitus.org forum there really is thread called “Post when you are on airport”. Ugh, I’m a such negative person, ain’t I, hahaha. 😀
@Jiipez – I see what you mean about the Intro board, but well… a forum with only 2 boards would probably look weird.
But I guess an Intro thread on the Social Board is just as suitable, then. And it’s not like Plasma can’t create/add more stuff to the forum if we later see fit, anyway.
But good thing a TYFTH forum is now confirmed!
Anyway, another important thing I’d like to see in this forum would be a laid-back moderation. Since we are such a small community to begin with, we should know everyone by name and whatnot. If discussions and fights do rise, I think it’s best for them to be settled by the people involved. Mod action should be kept to a minimum and only when there’s no other option. This will makes us a pretty “free” community.
Swearing allowed, obviously.
Regarding piracy topics, I think it’s best those go prohibited… not because I’m against piracy, but because we’ll have producers registered whose music is probably being pirated already and TYFTH is all about supporting the scene, not destroying it(even if I can argue that piracy does help spreading the music). In the end, knowing what to post/link boils down to sheer common sense.
Going off-topic shouldn’t also be condemnable, specially in Social board. In the Freeform board I can agree, but “going off-topic” is a constant in social activities, anyway~
I’m aware this laid-back moderation style is not very common, but it really annoys me when small communities start having numerous posts deleted and irritating “off-topic warnings”.
This is all just a suggestion; my idealized perfect forum. I can live with a more “common” type of forum, though, if no one agrees with this.
Agreeing with BerN, regarding the piracy topic.
There aren’t to many Freeform producers around and many of their tracks are free anyway. So it’s recommended that piracy should be totally prohibited. No question about that.
It’s a quite transparent scene we have and spending some money for digital downloads or physical copies is the least we can do for the producers. Everything else would be counterproductive.
There could actually be a “New/Upcoming Releases” section. Maybe with a reference to online shops. I made the experience, that quite a few people would buy stuff, but they don’t know how where.
Anyway, doing a bit of support here and there is probably a good idea, because it helps the producers to continue.
Swearing allowed?? FUCK YEAH
Wow, well delayed response from me :P. Better give my 2 cents about it all, as I am the guy in question :P.
1st of all, I want to say thanks to Plasma Dancer for the shout out.
The forum is a bit more UK centric at the moment, and the reason being that is that more guys from the UK side of things joined than the Finnish side (and I use the regions in the same way you guys do, Aryx was one of the 1st members to join and I’d consider him Finnish style as well). My intent from the outset was to make it a place for ALL freeform fans, regardless of what side of the music they listened too. Yes, the thing that made me make the forum in the 1st place was the fall of the NEC site, but that’s because I could never join the Finrg site as new members was/is closed, and I used the NEc forum as my #1 forum to talk about Freeform. Having said all that, I would love to see my forum as a good mix of people with different freeform tastes, because it’s the variety that makes this music so great.
On that note, I would like to give a shout out to Dyzphazia, who has been helping me get some members from the Finnish side of things across to the forum, and in the last week I’ve had guys like Substanced & J-MX join.
Having said all that, I would love to see more guys like you guys join the forum representing the Finnish style. As I said, it’s a forum for ALL styles of Freeform, and I’d love to see more of a mix of people. Hopefully I didn’t post this too late (as it’s a fair break between this post and the last one), and you guys get a chance to read it. I will be checking up on this topic now so if you guys want to say anything, ask anything or give me any feedback I’d love to hear it.
Cheers – Stray
Stray
The apology should be from my side! Massive delay with my own reply, sorry about that…
Now that things have calmed down a bit here (musically and otherwise) I’ll definitely be showing my face around there in the near future, and I expect the TYFTH crew will do the same.
The plan is still to set something up here as well, but it’s certainly not intended to be ‘competition’ for your forum, or take members away…at this stage it’ll be a tiny community who are really into one specific type of freeform, doing their own thing. For broader stuff, and to mix with the rest of the people in the scene, your forum will definitely be the place to go. As much I think the UK sound will dominate any forum like that (through weight of numbers, if nothing else), the idea of a place that caters to everyone is great, and I hope it works out 🙂
Thanks Plasma, look forward to seeing you there. And I don’t view your forum as competition either, people can join as many forums as they like, the more the merrier :). Whatever it takes to spread the music is all good in my eyes. Also feel free to promote your forum when it’s up through mine, and I’d be happy to join when you start it 🙂
Also Plasma, if you want any advice on setting up your forum feel free to ask me, whilst my technical skills aren’t great (hence my using of a user friendly free forum), what little I CAN help with I’m more than happy to do.
Quick update in case anyone is looking this far back in the blog :P. I’ve made a new site, a free host is too limiting so we now have a paid host & a domain, check out http://www.freeformforum.net and as I said before I’d love to have more fans of the Fin style there 🙂
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