Music Journals update thread?
 

Would this be cool, or not? I'm thinking of something along the lines of Pedestrian's "What's happening on MB" thread, but advising people which of the current music journals are active, a rough description of each and what their latest update is. I'd be happy to compile/update the list, and it might push people towards journals they may not have thought of looking at (some people may not even realise that the section is there, or what it is, or what they may be missing by not checking it out); would also obviously give the authors a chance of attracting more viewers.

If that's approved (and maybe stickied?) I would of course be happy to work with/collaborate with anyone whose journal was included, and who wanted to participate. People would of course be free to add their own updates.

Now I know what you're going to say, why can't people just look at the list? Sure they can, but unless you go into each journal you may miss something great like Geekoid's Hauntology article, or Mr Dave's continuing story, or maybe something new from Ki or Bob or Howard. It would save having to check each journal separately: there'd be a masterlist, as it were, where you could see where the articles you were interested in were being written. Also show you how often journals are updated, and any that haven't been recently and were popular, well maybe people could post and ask that author to update soon? Might even coax some of those who kept a journal but haven't done for some time out of retirement (Terrible Lizard, when ARE you gonna finish that "scariest albums" thread?) Hey, we all like our work to be appreciated, don't we? :)

Anyway, one of my stupid two-in-the-morning ideas, probably bomb, but anyone (obviously, mostly those who maintain a journal here) who thinks it's an idea worth pursuing, let me know.

And now, I really must take my medication before the .... red mist ... comes down ... and everything .... goes .... black........ :banghead:

Why not just use the MB feed that's already been used? It does the same purpose.

Just share your music and hope others actually care for your music.

It's for music journals, not people's actual music.

I want to make one but I am afraid I will just shun it forever.

I meant the music that you like.

In theory I think it could work pretty well. But I feel like it could just be as simple as putting a list of each entry on the OP of your journal. That's what I do with some of my threads if i'm focusing on different bands, I just link each post about the band in the first post of the thread so people don't have to search through pages and pages.

I think it's a good idea, Trollheart.

Ki's idea of having a Table of Contents of sorts is probably the best way to solve the problem of having to go through pages of posts.

But there's a lot that I like about the idea, and I think it might be good to give it a try and see how it goes. I'd be willing to collaborate on that.

Well, the problem I see with that is that the journal update threads might take the thing over, and then all of Pedestrian's "It's [insert genre/sub-genre/sub-sub-genre here] week!" posts might get pushed back or overlooked.

The idea of a ToC is a very, very good one. I know I personally (nerd alert!) keep an Excel (well, OpenOffice, same thing only free) spreadsheet of each page and its contents, so I could just upload that, post a link and update it as needed.

But a sort of "newsletter" style of thread might be nice. Nothing over the top: something like "Geekoid's latest disseration of music part 3 up now" or "Ki looks at post rock this week with bands a, b and c", or even "Trollheart goes back into the world of boybands for the final part of his series on them". Something like that? Nothing too deep or boring or involved, but a kind of "in recent news" or "what's new" sort of thing? Maybe. I don't know.

The thing is, though it might seem like it, I'm not suggesting this in order to promote my journals. My original has over sixty thousand views already and my newer one passed 1000 recently, so I'm not lacking for readers nor needing to drum up interest. But I was thinking more of the articles I read on some other journals, which I would hate people to miss due to not knowing about them, and also the older journals, some of which were great but haven't been updated in months. I know some people will not want to take up the burden of maintaining a journal again, and that's of course fine, but there may be those who want to restart but are unsure if it's worth it, if anyone would read. This could help show them people do want to read what they have to say.


The ToC I'm definitely doing though: excellent idea. There would be too many pages in mine though to link them all, so I'll just be putting the date and page number. Should work the same.

Disclaimer: I'm nearly black-out drunk right now. But I do have an opinion on the topic. I hope this isn't the Spill Your Guts Thread because that would be the wrong place for me to post anything at the moment.

This idea makes me laugh. Only an desperate egomaniac could come with such a thing. Honestly: Who the fuck cares? Just use your spreadsheets, everybody else is fine.

I have a journal. It has stars under the "rating" thing and the meticulous egomaniac in me has noticed that more people have rated it than, I think, any other journal and I still have an overall 4.8 out of 5 (which rounds to 5 stars). I still never made an excel file or anything because well... why the fuck would I care about such things to that extent?

Oh my god, how ashamed I will be later when I realize that I've made this insulting, unimportant post. Trollheart, please take my apologies now because I guarantee you that this post is only one of the things that I've done tonight that I'll regret and hide from later. Still, I think the concept you expressed here is worth nothing. And also ridiculously banal.

Forgive me and, don't fear, I will adequately punish myself later when I read this.

Blame the booze, huh? Heard that before! :D

Nah seriously, as I said in the last post (in case you didn't read it) I'm not looking to drum up business for me: my journal is already popular, I can see that. I'm happy with it.

What concerned me was that other people make pretty amazing posts (Geekoid and Mr Dave in particular, though I read pretty much all the journals, and usually find something of interest in most), but that people who don't read their journals wouldn't know about these posts, and so would miss out. More a showcase of the work of others than a "look at me! Read my journal!" sort of thing.

As for the spreadsheet, yes it sounds dorky but I need it to remind myself what I've already posted, as often I write reviews days/weeks/months in advance, but may not post them right away for many reasons, and later may forget that they haven't been posted yet, as I found out with two of the most recent entries in my journal. I also want to make sure I don't inadvertently post something twice, or even something very similar. Helps me keep a record, and for anyone interested in my journal, or anyone starting reading it, it would also give a roadmap as to where the stuff they may be interested in is, as it's searchable, being a database.

Thanks for the input, and watch out for those pink elephants on the way home.

And if anyone offers you magic beans, buy 'em! :)
https://encrypted-tbn0.google.com/im...d80j6nz4FP05Jg

Been there, done, that. It's not as bad as you think. Everyone has a story to tell just go ahead and write it.

No one care, trust me. Every time I find a song I like and think 'oh this be cool to share in my journal', this thought cross my mind:

I know what you are going to say that that sound nihilistic but it's true. :(

Might start writing an entry today.

:yeah:

By the way, do I just post the thread and wait for it to be approved, or do I have to contact a mod?

Just create the thread. All posts in any journal have to be approved, so it basically just goes through the same approval process. I'm sure you'll have no problems. I'll be watching for your debut...! :)

Yeah Trollheart is right, it will appear in the queue and if we like you enough we may just approve it ;)

Send all bribes to this address: [link removed] :D

You could compromise, and post a weekly-journal-roundup in the What's Happening on MB thread, if you're so inclined. One post a week detailing the recent journal updates.