The Issue with Attachments

Well, we know that Miles, the site owner, who pays for the server out of pocket, is unhappy with the amount of bandwidth being taken up by sheet music. In all other parts of the forums, attachments are managed by FTPs and sites devoted to providing free bandwidth for file transfers.

When Miles addresses his concerns about the amount of bandwidth he has to pay for, people in here start accusing him of being 'disrespectful' and get all butthurt. This place isn't free. He has a right to be annoyed.

I think the biggest problem GFF at large has with the concerthall is how it is its own separate little community within a community, i.e. there is no link between the Concerthall and greater GFF aside from the shared webspace. They really feel that the concerthall forum should really have its own website and server, and be run by a separate owner and staff. In fact, when the forums were still paid for by bobo, Minion had tried to sever the concerthall from GFF at large and turn it into a unique community free of the larger boards.

When people here are using a large percentage of the communities resources and they don't invest any money, it can really create a bad vibe. You know, people who aren't contributing to the community in any way, are the biggest bitches when their resources are no longer available. Can you understand the frustration here? I mean I try to defend the concerthall community as necessary, but it becomes increasingly difficult in light of this sort of behavior.

The obvious solutions are 1) All of you cheap bastards donate money to help pay for the server costs (it costs $40 just for one urtext, so that shouldn't be such a big deal 2) Find ways to host the sheet music offsite and be smart enough to figure out how to access FTPs. Geez louise, it isn't THAT hard to do. 3) Split off and start a separate community. You'll have to pony up cash but this might be a great arrangement.

thoughts.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Dbin

Maybe I'm not remembering this correctly, but wasn't there once an announcement about not posting anything that hadn't been specifically requested? Of course sometimes the only way to find new music to play/listen to is to get something you didn't even know existed, but I found that worked well enough when the sheet music community was smaller and there weren't so many attachments all over the place.

There's been a spate recently of people who contribute a LOT - but I mean megabyte after megabyte of unrequested sheet music, musicology texts, and even some things that are pretty worthless (in most circumstances) as posted - violin sonata parts without the piano accompaniment, for example.

While the flood of stuff has been good for those of us in the Concert Hall looking for anything new, the trade-off has been that it all takes up space, and we've hit the sharp edge of that now.

Additionally, Face, if you're still planning on resigning your moderator status, I'm sorry to hear it and I'd like to say thank you for the patience and fairness you've shown in dealing with all the Concert Hall problems.

Listen, JRE started this thread because we're trying to come up with a SOLUTION here. When something is decided, there will be an announcement. Btw, parts are not useless. A violin part for a Sonata is great for a violin part. String players don't care about the piano part while trying to read through heaps of sheet music. That is for the pianist to worry about.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by Dbin

I said 'pretty worthless in most circumstances', not 'totally worthless altogether', and like you say, we're looking for a solution so I'm unsure why you're trying to school me on performance practice. Since I happen to have an MA in music performance the attempt isn't needed or appreciated.

LOL U HAVE TO DGREEZ INTERNET IS SERIUS BUZINESS ETC. Lighten up a bit, champ.

Quote:

You're part of the problem I had with the attempts to stimulate discussion that were going on before the recent crash, since you'd post in a discussion thread but also add something like 'Keep uninformed and idiotic opinions out of this thread'. I'd imagine there were more than a few cases where people didn't bother posting anything at all since they didn't want you immediately jumping down their throats in an overserious and overcritical manner (like you did just now, as it happens).

People said some pretty stupid and ignorant things, and additionally, people started posting a lot more when they were provoked into using their brains.

Truthfully, I speak tongue in cheek a lot but I do get tired of the negative attitude of a lot of musicians, both composers and performers, MAs or not. You don't believe me, go read that computer assisted composition thread. I spent most of my time reading responses being permanently in **facepalm** mode. If you have a real personal issue, you can just PM me about it but this really isn't the place to discuss this sort of thing.

So ya, I still think that moving the concerthall to a separate server that is in no way affiliated with GFF, is a potentially valid solution. I haven't heard many responses on this front, but if anything, Dbin's response is a really accurate reflection of how the general attitude demeanour of concerthall posters drastically differs from that of the rest of the community. I'm not saying this is the answer, but I'm just putting the idea forward to see how people both from the Concerthall and GFF as a larger community feel about this.

Edit: Hey Miles, what about moving sheet music attachments into Private FTPs or maybe integrating the Sheet Music into your VGM db project in some way? I mean if you are going to start removing sheet music attachments, perhaps you should give people a week to acquire everything they want before it is removed?

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by Mersenne

Split from GFF:

+ 95% CH's don't venture outside CH or give a care for the rest of GFF.
+ Relieves huge burden on GFF admin and servers.
+ Easier to manage a smaller community. Streamlined admin and decision making process. Less consultation required for any changes.
+ In the long run more reliable downloads than FTP or file sharing sites/programs.
+ Allows room for growth and more freedom of options.
+ General enthusiasm and support?

- Requires a person or persons to pay for and manage a server.
- GFF staff and Blah (especially Blah) provides amazing (very amazing) technical support. Will be incredibly hard to find someone of equal calibre.
- A separate Concert Hall will take a good month to establish and possibly much longer to recreate the same setup and features as current GFF.


I'm all for a split, but the question arises... who PAYS?


Also, since money is an issue (it always is), why haven't we brought up a discussion on possible donation schemes?

Great post. Since almost nobody from Concerthall has donated any money, it is safe to assume that they don't have money to pay for a separate server. Still, you bring up some interesting issues and I really wish more concerthall people would actually get involved in this discussion since it affects them. You know, they'll all show up to bitch if all of the sudden, their precious attachments start to disappear.

Is there any way we can have a few people manage the sheet music and make torrents for it or something? $30 a month is a lot less than running a server? Is it really a lot to ask Concerthall people to donate money if they want their sheet music. Like I mentioned earlier, it costs $40 for a Barenreiter Urtext of the Prokofiev Piano Sonatas. Like I bet people download way more music than just a collection of sonata.

Deni: People have actually suggested the concerthall move onto its own separate server, and that is a potentially legitimate solution. I really don't think Mersenne is whining. Rather he is considering the pros and cons of that possible course of action. You should be happy concerthall people are actually saying something.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Originally Posted by Miles

I really don't mind going the delete attachments in there after 3-6 months method I mentioned in my post. It wouldn't be that hard to do and the unused old attachments wouldn't be taking up space anymore. I don't want to be the bad guy and say you can't share music sheets anymore. I don't mind it at all. The only thing I don't like is all the space it's taking up and it's really my fault for not saying anything before it grew to the size it did.

It would make more sense to have some people in the concerthall in charge of managing the attachments. They could host all the old music on an FTP and have only the current material available on the boards say dating maybe a month or two back. This makes the most sense in my mind.

Miles, what do you think as far as the negative sentiment towards the concerthall from certain prominent members? Do you think there is a larger problem or is it just idle complaining.

I was speaking idiomatically.