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To that end, in a series of PM's I wrote to Fuzz management this morning [hoping they would hear my voice among many clamoring for their attention - and no doubt my own newly-discovered "Rosetta Stone" is pretty old stuff to most of them as IT pros], I tried to flesh out some of these admittedly "abstract," airy-fairy, concepts, to see if I could give them more practical life. And, on reflection this foggy and quiet Sunday morning, I thought some of these points might hit the right note with others in the growing Fuzz community who have a similar "base-line" knowledge about new technologies like me [namely, zero to none] and could generate those Sunday kinda of thoughts that we all need to lift us up from time to time from the mundane that is, necessarily, a part of our everyday, busy lives. In essence, here's what I said to the Fuzz folks:
Have you seen my new approach to utilization of my Profile page to make it more dynamic and useful for both my Fuzz Friends and casual Fuzz visitors? Click here. We need more people to do this. This is important, as I explain below.
My new approach to Profile development requires the application of something called, "BBcoding", but it is not that difficult to learn. I am one of the most computer-challenged and, literally, I learned how to apply BBcoding in about 5 minutes! [My public blogs explain my own step-by-step learning experience for others to follow.]
For me as a novice in exploiting the full potential of the internet, the really important point to internalize about BBcoding is not the neat trick of being able to utilize the ingenious device to link directly a single page [the writer's] with every other web-page in the world numbering in the billions [although this is a mind-boggling thing indeed], but the fact that the BBcoding converts the very process of linking to another page into a descriptive act in your own words! - see my above simultaneous linking/descriptive act underlined in blue as an example.
If you think about it, as I did when I had my own Eureka moment as a computer lay person a few days ago, this simple act which is now within the capability of every individual is a profound development in the history of ideas for mankind. While those who are already web-savvy no doubt saw this potential many moons ago, I suspect most of us, and particularly musicians exploring their own artistic limits in other arenas, have never appreciated this aspect of the web and its potential.
If we can get more people at Fuzz to change their profile pages to provide this kind of information [simultaneously linking and describing why you are doing it], particularly the young people who really are into this kind of computer-interactivity, and to spread the word, that's when I think the "Music Uprising" we are all striving mightily for will take-off.
I am convinced that the cascading application of personalized BBcoding [llinking/describing/indexing] which is really easy to do on this platform [!!!] will make Fuzz, a powerful combination of [xxx - my reference to some specific companies deleted] mashed together in the music domain. The significant competitive edge that Fuzz has is that MySpace, the only other semi-dedicated music social community in existence that's worthy of note [with about 3 million bands signed up that no-one can really keep track of or discover] is stuck with its legacy platform that would require a major, non-trivial redesign to do what Fuzz can already do today on a clean and flexible platform. [I tried it over there at MySpace and it's impossible.] No other social music community has a platform like Fuzz to make everybody, truly, a powerfully-equipped member of the veritable A & R-my.
I am on a personal crusade to help others who are similarly computer-challenged like me to use "BBcoding", and to my delight it is beginning to take hold, slowly but surely. Any words in support of this effort on the public pages by well-known and knowledgeable music industry veterans as well as IT pros like your good-selves would give this personal crusade of mine a boost and really effect the Music Uprising we are seeking. Kind regards, TCC
Just some Sunday kinda thoughts for the growing Fuzz universe. I think this may be one of the most important things that I ever do. [That's corny, but, hey, it's Sunday and I'm on a wild ride.]
I just learned rudimenatry BBcoding and am internalizing its capabilities and trying to get others who are similarly situated to get comfortable with it, as a first step like me.
I think, as you point out, it is a balancing process, and that the folks who designed this site have decided to take the process of site evolution and participation step by step so the whole thing does not become a crazy-quilt of formats and possibly off-putting web-chaos that a completely open platform can become if the site developers do not stage the process somewhat. I recall reading about this in one of the Goat's or Phatduckk's early blogs and I'm OK with the notion [which implies order but not delimiting censorship].
My sense of the site dynamics is that, as you have with your own profile, Fuzz does point us to an artist's official website at the same time that it purports to add functions to help a growing community of artists and fans on this platform.
For now, I find that BBcoding helps me (1) to centralize some of my ideas at one place and link these by an operative thought process to other parts of the site or externally and (2) to use the same device when blogging or commenting at random at other places on the site. I feel that just these two things leverage my ability to organize and distribute Content considerably [according to my personalized sense of it].
I will be waiting for the Fuzz tech team to make this and other "shamanesque" stuff more available in due course. And, just maybe, in the meantime, I might dip my toes in the deeper HTML waters, if some Fuzz Friend holds my hand while I do this. [CamO already taught me how to embed pictures using what was, I think, HTML]
While I am learning more about the world of possibilities beyond BBcoding and how to apply such knowledge in more sophisticated ways, I still would like to urge others to use the baseline BBcode "link and point" feature that this platform seems to accept without turning the basic site set-up into something that was not intended by the Fuzz tech team.
My main objective, for now, is not to get so much into creative web-design, but rather to establish a rudimentary [DIY] content discovery, linking, and personalized indexing methodology that anyone on this site can quickly learn and utilize [as I did] to enhance internal and external connectivity and content-sharing with others in the expanding Fuzz community.
Right now, I see this "linking and pointing" device as extremely useful in two contexts. (1) First, when blogging or replying to other folk's blogs, you can direct those reading your commentary, with one click and a "short-hand" pointer in your own words, anywhere you want (in the first instance within the site and/or anywhere else in the ww web)[Click here for an example of where I do this.]; and (2) Second, you can centralize in one place [for now the Profile page] a personalized index of Content in whatever way you find useful, with the same easy linking and pointing capability.
I think in due course, the Fuzz folks will make this a more automatic and intuitive process.