Young Composers Roadmap - August 2006 Onwards

Young Composers Roadmap - August 2006 Onwards

Soon, Young Composers will undergo a series of major changes, the most significant being that we plan to switch forum software from Invision Power Board to vBulletin. Alongside this change sit the other two planned major changes: the introduction of music management software, and the introduction of social networking software.

In order to help give members a feel that they are involved in this ongoing process, as well as to keep everyone up to date on where progress stands, a roadmap with a list of changes or new features planned for the site will be maintained below. As and when new features on the roadmap are implemented, the appropriate entry/entries in the list will turn green. If a feature is put on hold or we are experiencing difficulties in implementing it, the entry will instead turn orange. If a feature gets scrapped altogether, the entry will turn red.

[P] prefixed to an entry indicates that this feature is being considered as a possibility only.

Without further ado, here is the roadmap:

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Overall Status

Forum software conversion complete. Now planning introduction of social networking software (plus friendly URLs for forum).

Planned Changes

• New forum software (vBulletin)
  • AJAX (realtime) shoutbox
  • Custom profile field for Skype name
  • "Orphaned thread" system which highlights music posted in the forum that does not appear to have received much attention
  • Friendly URLs

• Music management system (software package not yet fully decided upon. Note that in order to upload digital audio files such as MP3s to this system, you may required to pay a small subscription fee which will act to offset the added cost your music's presence will bring about)
  • Ability to upload MP3s and other files in digital audio format
  • Friendly URLs for presentable and easily-accessible user pages (e.g. youngcomposers.com/music/users/Mike)
  • Ability to add comments etc. to posted music

• Social networking software (custom designed)
  
  • Maintain a MySpace-like personal page with information about you, links to your music etc.
  • Buddy system
  • Create bulletins when you post new music to attract attention to it
  • One-to-one realtime IM contact with another member
  • [P] Blog system

• Other
  • Site-wide authentication - one account signup will grant member access to the whole site

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Probably the one feature that will take the longest to roll out is site-wide authentication, meaning in laymen's terms that once you log into one piece of software, you should remain logged in to every other piece of software as you browse around the site. This may not actually even be entirely possible in the end, but rest assured that we will work hard at achieving it.

There will also be new specific bugs forums added which members may use to report any issues they encounter; an inevitability taking into account the magnitude of the planned changes.

New entries will likely be added to the roadmap as and when we get a clearer idea of exactly what there is to achieve.

Hope you like what you see, and of course don't hesitate to ask for any extra features you think are missing to be added to the roadmap. Please remember to be patient regarding progress though! Things like this, especially when done properly, take a lot of time and effort. Finally, any members possessing expertise applicable to the plans are encouraged to offer their services, as having an extra hand around never hurts. Specifically, we are looking for anyone with digital image manipulation skills (e.g. the ability to adjust the hue/saturation of GIF files in Photoshop, and specifically the ability to batch process or batch edit files).

I must say I'm excited . But I'm not paying a dime for that music service thing....

I should have been clearer: hopefully everyone will have the ability to upload MIDIs, Sibelius/Finale files etc. to the new music management system, but digital audio files like MP3s may only be uploadable to subscribers.

Our system should be superior to Soundclick or any other free provider out there because it will be more presentable, what with the friendly URLs, links to your pages elsewhere on the site, etc. The fee should only be relatively small amount, by the way. And who knows, we may end up not needing to charge anything anyway.

Oh wow oh wow oh wow oh wow......!!

Lol. I'm only kidding Mike. I'm fine with it, because I just lost my $20 Naxos subscription, so I'll need something to fill it!

And I think now i want to justify some of my previous statements in reguards to the forum changes: Now, after I have a detailed list of what exactly we're changing, I can safely say the turkey is properly stuffed (maybe now with a lil more pepper or something ). Although I think none of these changes are necessary in anyway, I think they are all changes for the great better.

So, I guess I, and we, really, owe a thanks to you and the other Mike .

Small change: I've edited my previous post in which I gave a specific estimate of what an example subscription fee might cost, and replaced that phrase with simply "a relatively small amount", which should hold true no matter what happens. The reason for the change is that Michael doesn't want to make any promises or give the wrong impression at this stage, which is understandable.

I should have been clearer: hopefully everyone will have the ability to upload MIDIs, Sibelius/Finale files etc. to the new music management system, but digital audio files like MP3s may only be uploadable to subscribers.

*breaths sigh of relief*
Other then the ablility to upload Mp3s to the site, what other "privleges" does a subscription buy, if any?
Or, are there going to be other features or areas of the site that require the member to pay?

Other then the ablility to upload Mp3s to the site, what other "privleges" does a subscription buy, if any?

We'll definitely throw some extra incentives in with the package. Possibly things like extra storage space, a fancy title beneath your name, access to subscribers forums, etc.

Or, are there going to be other features or areas of the site that require the member to pay?

No, I believe this would be the only new feature for which you would be required to pay, as it's the only one that is foreseeably going to cause us to incur significant extra costs.

PAY to upload music .MP3

man where is this community heading...

PAY to upload music .MP3

man where is this community heading...

The space/bandwidth required would be too great for the forum to make up for any other means of gaining money. Hardly anyone donates, it seems. While it may seem harsh, it's for the best. Pay to upload a bunch of MP3s, and you'll make sure that the bandwidth required is covered. Otherwise, it's possible that the forum could acquire a sizeable debt.