How did you find Young Composers?

I don't quite recall how I found YC. I think I was looking for information on studying with a composer, and a related thread appeared. This place looked promising, so I decided to sign up.

I go to these workshops in the summer called Pikes Peak Young Composers workshops. They also have a competition during the year, which I always enter. In googling "Young Composers," this site is always comes before it, so I would click on it by accident. Honestly, it took me months to actually decide to sign up - I was scared off by the wikipedia looking format.

I was specifically looking for a music composition forum where people would exchange ideas and comments on their compositions and decided to google "music composition forum" and I found it. At first I thought it was an old site which I think had the same name (young composers) where you could listen at young people's music, but it wasn't. I found the forum interesting and signed up. And now here I am!

Alexandros

At first I thought it was an old site which I think had the same name (young composers) where you could listen at young people's music, but it wasn't.

You may have stumbled upon YC in its previous iteration, any time between 1997 and 2005. Content from back then is archived, if you wish to view it.

Hello Mike!

Indeed I have! I didn't cross my mind that it could be the same site updated. Browsing the archives, I immediately recognised the name of a composer and his composition that I really liked. It must had been 2000-2001 when I found the site... Thanks for letting me know!

Alexandros

I googled for something about something about composers, and young composers popped up. I joined in, but I rarely visited the site or posted until late 2007. In the beginning I wasn't even remotely interested in the site because I thought it looked a lot less organised and serious than I expected, but unfortunately (and to my disbelief) I couldn't find any other website which was more organised than YC. So the reason I am still here is because there is nothing better out there

I must ask: in what sense did you find the site to be disorganised and non-serious? Forum categorisation? Design? Community structure? Not being defensive, just looking for any ideas which might help us improve.

Oh yeah. It was mostly the mascot and the font of the logo, which don't seem quite serious, as well as design, mostly. It seemed kind of forgotten and not cared too much about. But I mean, the site is much more functional than it appeared to me in the first place, it's just that it took me a while to get to know this. And while appearance might not add to the functionality of the site/forum, it is definitely a plus when it comes to a) attracting new people, b) making them stay to see what's more to discover in that website. I thought the design looked quite old and not eye-candy at all (colours, buttons, menus, layout etc).

Even if your site is the best in the world, the guests/mere visitors of this site won't know that in the first place. Plus, a better-looking website shows that the people who run the site have bothered more about the website. People say "don't judge a book by its cover", but of course that's only true about books you've already read When you see a book in a bookstore, all the information you get about the book is coming from the cover, so a good cover will make more people take a quick read at the book and see if it's worth reading. A good cover doesn't guarantee a good book, but the chances are higher.

But that's just me I will be glad if I know I helped, and I generally expect to see many changes in terms of layout and appearance with the whole social-networking-music-expensive-thing that's coming up in the next few months, which is why I've started mentioning my dislike of the layout recently, in the hopes that it'll make a difference :X

I wanted a composers forum. So I went to google, searched composers forum. I found The American Composers, but I really couldn't get into that site. Then I found a different one, but it was full of really good composers, who were making lots of $$$, and I felt like I would be flamed if I posted there. Then I found this. I was turned off by first the name, then the horrible color scheme (the only one that is good is the yellow one, but it is slow). But fortunately, I was able to see past that, and get into the real beauty of the site.