Project for an ILM blog/site/publication

This thread is dedicated to Scott, and Maura.

You know, we really COULD do this.

as long as it never contains articles that link to, reference or rehash ILM threads

"In a post..." wait I did that.

IN A WORLD...

ILXvengers assemble

EXCELSIOR

What we could call it

Or maybe "Quinjet Crunk" in keeping with the Avengers theme

call it 'freaky trigger'

That's og ilm.

I would be totally down for participating in this in some capacity, but I have zero delusions about being a competent writer.

I would actually love if this happened.

Do I actually have to like music to be involved?

fuck you, pay me

As much as i enjoy getting paid for writing, i'd be up for this.

Yeah I mean obviously my agent will have the final say.

What the fuck would we need this for when ILM already exists?

Sharing our ideas with people who don't post on ILM?

I'm too lazy to keep a personal blog going but it might be fun to contribute to a broader one without the complications that come with paid work.

fuck you, pay me

― centibutt hz (Whiney G. Weingarten), Saturday, September 15, 2012 2:41 AM (4 hours ago) Bookmark

yeah i mean, team blogs and doing it for the love are cool. but given that this stemmed from a conversation regarding the sad state of alt weeklies and people who deserve to make a living at writing losing their jobs -- it'd be nice if some of this energy and brainstorming went toward figuring out whether there's a way for people to get paid to make and run a quality DIY music writing outlet. the SEO clickbait approach to traffic and advertising doesn't seem to actually work all that well, and people aren't feeling too good about things like Kickstarter at the moment. i know a lot of people here have great things to write about music, what i'm interested in right now is whether we're smart enough to think of a way to do this that might at some point generate money and allow people to be paid for their time and effort.

There are really only 3 revenue models: advertising, subscription, and payola. Payola's dead even if you wanted to try it, online advertising is a strictly volume game and the music-writing marketplace is already flooded, and subscriptions... I mean, there's a theoretical subset out there that might pay a pittance for smarter/funnier/longer music writing than they can get anywhere else. But it is a very small subset, as we all know, so the likelihood of generating any substantial revenue is low, and the subscription model severely limits your exposure.

So I'm sympathetic in theory to the pay-me sentiment, but I don't know where anyone thinks money's going to come from. (Barring a wealthy music-geek benefactor, which I suppose is the 4th model.)

Or I guess we could start an ILM Foundation for Excellence in Critical Thought, and apply for NEA grants.

you might be right. i'm just saying it might be worth having a conversation about IF there's a better way before skipping straight to "all hope is lost, let's have some fun doing it for free."

I can't see an ILM fundraising working like it does with the server costs.

you might be right. i'm just saying it might be worth having a conversation about IF there's a better way before skipping straight to "all hope is lost, let's have some fun doing it for free."

no money being involved does have some principle to it. not that i think everyone/anyone should be working for free, but personally i've enjoyed some of the writing i did/do for free more than anything i got paid for, overall.

yeah that doesn't seem viable (xpost)

What would the focus be? A general blog covering everything with specialist writers covering niches ?

fan fiction, mostly

lots of polls iirc

fuck you, poll me

Will Geir get a column?

If in exchange we get the Norwegian Oil-Underwritten Art Institute for Stuff and Things to subsidize it all, then yes.

What are we discussing here, exactly? I'm up for it anyway - doing stuff beats not doing stuff imo.

as long as it never contains articles that link to, reference or rehash ILM threads

― some dude, Friday, September 14, 2012 11:37 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

it should be all articles that rehash ilm threads but never reference or link to them

I just feel that the people who I regularly think are OTM on ILM are already writing for other organs. That if someone is good on ILM, and they have the urge to write semi-professionally or professionally, this place is such a breeding ground that they end up going on to write for Publication X, Y or Z already. ILM is what it needs to be, an egalitarian discussion board where people talk through ideas about music. Why turn it into something it's not?

Well, mostly because Publications X, Y or Z either died or turned into compost. (I'm not all hyperfired up about the idea due to the funding issues noted, but it's a lovely daydream.)

Well, that dying or turning into compost thing might say something about the nature of the beast we're discussing. (And also things like The Guardian and Pitchfork and The Quietus have not died, and people from ILM still go on to write for them...) If people want to go off and start a new fun music publication, fine, more power to you and good luck. But I don't like the association of that project with ILM, because that is not what ILM is for. I don't *want* ILM to be a music publication. I want ILM to be ILM.

It needs lots of lists! With semiclad women and lots of hipster sexism and racism!

Oh wait sorry I was thinking of Village Voice Media.

this is what we do: put vote up vote down buttons on each post, but when you click on them it doesnt affect ilx it just determines what gets funneled to the ILM blog/site/publication, we pay heave ho to do the SEO, put google ads on there, and we all get free buffy dvds

i quite like 'the blizzard', the football quarterly which is mostly digital (pdf and epub formats, you can get printed copies too). i don't know that it's a massive goldmine but they've done six issues now, quality's high and goes off in all sorts of directions. i pay three pounds to get access to their archive for three months. something like that could work well.

internet mobs flood streets, rend clothing and repent to God after millions inadvertently follow link to ilxthreadreviews.tumblr.com

yeah selling a quarterly ebook type thing, with long pieces of good writers digging into interesting topics, would be cool. maybe could be the for-profit outpost of something that is updated more regularly. i dunno. (xpost)

Well, that dying or turning into compost thing might say something about the nature of the beast we're discussing. (And also things like The Guardian and Pitchfork and The Quietus have not died, and people from ILM still go on to write for them...) If people want to go off and start a new fun music publication, fine, more power to you and good luck. But I don't like the association of that project with ILM, because that is not what ILM is for. I don't *want* ILM to be a music publication. I want ILM to be ILM.

not one person has suggested turning this messageboard into a music site or making any changes to this messageboard.

ILMBlog is dumb (#1904812749 in a series)

Is LocalGarda hott or not?? CLICK 2 SEE

ILMBlog is dumb (#1904812749 in a series)

― karl...arlk...rlka...lkar..., Saturday, September 15, 2012 10:23 AM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol

I was TRYING to have a thread about an ILM related zine and you had to ruin it by objectifying me xpost

Am I allowed to be involved in this pls?

maybe I'm just getting softer with age but I don't think this is a terrible idea btw. I mean it would drive lots of new users to ilx if it had any success at all, and I don't think lots of new users coming in regularly is maybe the best thing but the project could also be interesting. however I also don't think it'd likely create enough revenue for any one person to even buy a box of Annie's Chocolate Bunny Grahams, a delicious all-natural whole grain graham snack.

You are making me so hungry right now.

for serious i do think this idea gets a lot more interesting if you use some analytical approach to ilx infos, im not sure exactly what that looks like but theres all sorts of things that pull pieces from things and assemble them like http://storify.com/danlev/hilarious-twitter-bug-swaps-profile-pictures-and-b or w/e, not that there shouldnt be original writing but all of you are free to go write blogs all the time anywhere, incorporating the ilx hivemind would give the project some sort of unique hook, even if its just figuring out what to write about and then stealing all the best arguments, but i think itd be best if it allowed you to create a format that wasnt just the same as everything else everywhere

like e.g. getting two or three people who are having an interesting argument in a topical ILM thread to pull it out into a more longform round-table thing could be kind of cool?

As much traffic as ILX gets, and as strong a suppository repository of writing talent as ILX (not just ILM) is, it would be nice to be able to leverage some sort of profitable site out of that confluence. OTOH, it's not clear how much of ILX's traffic consists of people coming for the guess papers and staying for the incisive insight and well-turned phrases. Also, I'm pretty sure it would have to have its own domain and servers...? Stet would have to speak to that.

And what would happen to ILM (the paying gig's Green Room, as it were) if its most marketable writers posted less here because they were holding their juiciest stuff in reserve for the paying gig? Is that something that happens already? I don't know if that speaks toward the concern that WCC expressed above or not.

several xposts while I was typing that and being constantly interrupted by a family member who I will not name

(i don't know how i feel about this idea - i keep thinking, wasn't there a blog run by some freelancers who met on ilm a few years ago and it fizzled out after a little while, wouldn't that just happen again)

also, i would be super surprised if this managed to turn a profit (also, all the practical worries about what to do with subscription-model money that were expressed in previous ilx funding drive discussions would apply here, no?)

if someone were to do this it should prob be abt everything not just music

it's a big mistake imo trying to get money from outside the collective. we should really go full commune and set up some music crit cult-style paradise where we can discuss taylor swift, goon-rock and sexy electronica artists all day while plowing fields, breaking out into badiou discussion groups, woody guthrie sing-alongs. we'll all call each other by our ilx dns while lag00n cooks dinner and hungry4ass tells the children about the before-ILX days.

otm

like e.g. getting two or three people who are having an interesting argument in a topical ILM thread to pull it out into a more longform round-table thing could be kind of cool?

― c sharp major, Saturday, September 15, 2012 2:45 PM (8 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah if there's any mileage in this (which...there isn't) it's not going to be in long-form pieces, ilx's raison d'être is conversation (or...whatever). the back-and-forth. this is something professional/paid music (and non-music) journalism is actually lacking, too.

I'm heartened that people are taking this (mostly) seriously.

Honestly "free" is probably the best way to go about this at least at first, unless somebody wants to launch a Kickstarter

xpost -- Doesn't Slate occasionally do things like that? I emphasize 'occasionally'

The only consistent profit model that might emerge related to music discussions would probably come from something like an online courseware thing, where different people offered workshops in genre, etc. etc. and you got some kind of value-added thing. You teach me something about samba w/ readings etc. I teach you something about [tries to think of something useful, fails]. Membership dues, but you get unlimited course access.

ILXiversity

"Excelsioring 101"

We should call this publication "OTM"

If we can somehow make travelling to World FAP a deductible business expense, so many things would fall into place.

but i think itd be best if it allowed you to create a format that wasnt just the same as everything else everywhere

― lag∞n, Saturday, September 15, 2012 10:41 AM (20 minutes ago) Bookmark

this is key -- pretty sick of sites that use the same basic format at PF and expect similar results. i have some ideas about novel formats but this probably isn't the right time to start pitching those.

branding or closely associating this too much with ILM in a 'you should read this if you're already on the board' way is not a great idea imo. i don't think there's any sustainable way for something like this to happen w/o an individual or small group taking the ball and running with it and deciding from there how much to involve the board and the posters.

Just throwing this out there: I started publishing a semi-quarterly-ish magazine called Burning Ambulance about two years ago. I recently retired the print edition after 5 issues 'cause sales were low, people were slow to turn in promised articles, I got a full-time job, etc., etc. But the website continues to exist, and is doing OK traffic-wise, this past week anyway ('cause I published a big ol' week-long list). If a bunch of you wanted to start writing for the magazine, I would re-activate it. No flat fees for articles, but everyone who contributes to a given issue gets a percentage of the sales from that issue. (I'm also gonna put the issues up on Amazon, for Kindle.)

Email me at burningambulance at gmail dot com if you're interested.

I agree with Al

Phil might be onto something, but...

We may want to aim for a site that isn't just music centric but that covers all sorts of subjects. Because music is awesome but there's way more to talk about

it would be a hilarious to have a publication that covered the same subjects in the same quantities as ILE but let the other board worry about that imo, 'music and more' attempts to rope in other subjects and be a lifestyle brand tend to kinda suck

when you go "and more" you risk having no clear direction whatsoever, it can become kind of terrifying.

i don't think anything will stop people using ilm to discuss music but i do agree there might be some good ways we could do things that wouldn't be just straight reviews or whatever.

call it 'freaky trigger'

― balls, Saturday, September 15, 2012 5:55 AM (9 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

otm

A couple of people have got at the kernels of what I was trying to say.

1) Cis and Lex got it - that the strength of ILM is that it is not a blog or one person's thinkpiece or a newspaper article, it is a conversation. It is a conversation that often has myriad different viewpoints, and that's a feature, not a bug - but it is very hard (and usually comes off forced) if you try to get that kind of dialogue and multilogue in a magazine format.

2) WmC picked up the other half of it - which is that once Nabisco got hired to do his OTM schtick for big newspapers, we no longer get his OTM-ness anywhere near as much because he is saving the OTM for the paying gig. Which is fine, and I'm glad that he is making actual M off being OTM. But firstly, the number of people who are OTM often enough to justify that by themselves (i.e. not in conversation, ILX's biggest strength) are few. But more importantly, like WmC said, if *everyone* saves their good stuff for paying gigs, ILM would lose its best posts, which I don't want to happen.

Well I'm not a writer so you can still get all my crap for free on ILM!

ILM as it is is great, it's a truism to point out it works the way it does because it's a conversation. Which is why, once again, nobody, not one person, has suggested transforming ILM into a music website, or doing anything to ILM as it currently is whatsoever.

LG, you're kinda assiduously avoiding WCC's point, which (I think) is that any paying site which draws from ILM's talent pool would necessarily change ILM, with or without a stated aim of "transformation."

ILM already has a place where people write for free and it's called ILM

otm

short of reprogramming the message board code so it functions differently, i seriously doubt any of the things being bandied about in this thread would change ilx in any substantial way, or at least not any more than it would change by itself.

for the record, i'm 100% in agreement with WCC.

for non-discussion pieces, there are plenty of other places out there (tQ being the main hangout), but there is only one ilm.

i dont think discussion is necessarily the only alternative to blog posts nor is it imho as currently shoehorned into various outlets v compelling

I think I dig lagoon's 'just highlight best ilx stuff'

beyond that it's really really easy to start a site/blog/whatever these days, it's just that nobody cares

I quite like the Economist's hosted debates, something like that might be interesting.

Although the good thing about our format here is that the thread setup is so simple it can be almost anything you like - make the first post yr blog and everything else comments, for instance.

I know they're closely connected, but I think trying to define the form before the content might be a mistake here. Work out what this thing is going to say and we can build something to house it (or say "Freaky Trigger, have you heard of it?").

Right now this feels a little bit like a fight about "should our first album be on vinyl or CD?" before working out who is in the band.

yeah that's the thing, the only reason i think it's worth talking about how to do it creatively and resourcefully is because it'd be so easy to just rush into something with nothing but enthusiasm and for it to just land with a thud. (xpost)

Right now this feels a little bit like a fight about "should our first album be on vinyl or CD?" before working out who is in the band.

Ah that's simple:

Ned Raggett Presents: Music Writers of the Future.

so easy to just rush into something with nothing but enthusiasm and for it to just land with a thud.

my life.

i dream of bowel movements like that

So, what exactly is it supposed to be?

best new albums and best new tracks + thesinglesjukebox

that could be interesting I think. I'm imagining thesinglesjukebox method of working (several ilxors reviewing the same thing) but including albums. It's pretty much the thread format but in a post form.

If you are in need of a corny, indie blogger with bad english I'm in.

The way I think that could work best behind scenes is, everyone involved brings to the table a song and an album that they love every month and a minimum of 5 ilxors review them. If there's at least 12 ilxors involved in the blog that would give us 24 new entries every month at least.

balls otm

Also I think this method of blogging brings something different to what ILM is. The everything comes, daily comments live inside ILM and the blog is only for giving a ranking and statement about the music which is something we don't really have in here.

I've wanted to organize a Singles Jukebox-like thing with some people for a LONG time, but the idea just kind of crumbles whenever I get a few people together to attempt it. :(

And who is going to be the editor of this thing? And who gets to decide who is involved and who is not? And what is the point of taking something which is egalitarian and open to all and making it the kind of selective organisation that would be needed to make something like that work? It's a horrible idea, and it goes against everything that I actually like about ILM.

one of my ideas involved something like Moka's -- namely having several perspectives on an album instead of one monolithic 'official review' -- but "best new albums and best new tracks" is exactly the kind of unimaginative let's be pitchfork without being pitchfork bullshit i was talking about upthread.

and it's kinda sad to me how many people consider opinions about new music to be the whole of music writing

Ideally I think we should have at least 3 editors in case the others are busy. I don't think it would be that difficult to coordinate. It would only take some minutes of your day to listen to a song and post your comments and ranking about them. I'd say everyone who is interested is in but we don't need to wait for everyone to review a song, as I've said before if we get a minimum of 5 ilxors per review before a specific date of delivery it's a go. It only takes a little compromise of a small percentage of anyone involved.

It takes four steps as I see it:

* Maybe a google timesheet were everyone involved posts their monthly suggestions. They will be reviewed in a first come, first served way.
* Before each Sunday the ilxors involved send as many reviews from the top to the bottom as they can.
* The timesheet gets updated with the names of the ilxors who have reviewed the songs so far.
* When the minimum quota of 5 reviews per album / song gets filled the editors publish the songs.

The best new music / best new albums thing was a way of picturing, I'd actually find it more exciting if we nominated from any genre and year we want. Only restriction would be one album / one song per month. (Or maybe two of each if there isn't really that many people involved)

Actually nominating and reviewing from any year that you want is an awesome idea, it would bring a different angle that not many zines and review blogs want to explore.

and it's kinda sad to me how many people consider opinions about new music to be the whole of music writing

otm x 100. There's so much great stuff that has had little if any good critical/historical/whatever examination -- or hasn't had any for years or decades. One thing I love about ILM is that it ranges back and forth and laterally. The major bummer about the zillion music sites/blogs/zines out there, apart from their dodgy quality, is how limited their scope is.

just a bit of fun let's be cool

guys, podcasts are where it's at now. hire someone with a stentorian voice to read ilx threads aloud, slap on some commercials for audible.com, boom done.

Ned.

I'd kickstart a decent sum to any pub that I'd want to read, since as of yesterday apparently (almost) none exist. Especially one focusing on conversational crit rather than features journalism as such. But I'm not sure if there's a workable model. There's also a bunch of great stuff on tumblers/lj/etc. but the conversations are too insular (just like much of ILM in the past however many years) for me to follow since I pay less attention than in the old days. I'd be down for a curatorial low-volume blog, longreads-style, maybe, including links to xgau and eddy in their current gigs, etc.

four reviews a day is waaay too much btw. its a firehose. i'd want maybe one or two things to skim a day, at the most.

even like weekly updates w/ 6 articles.

the endless stream of posts on the voice blog under maura even was too much for me.

hire someone with a stentorian voice to read ilx threads aloud, slap on some commercials for audible.com, boom done.

― i've hidden a white teen on Crimedoer Mountain (reddening), Saturday, September 15, 2012 2:34 PM (13 minutes ago)

Ned.

― _Rudipherous_, Saturday, September 15, 2012 2:35 PM (12 minutes ago)

A vision.

Even though I've heard Ned's voice, I still hear his posts in my head in the voice of Arnold Stang. Sorry, man.

get david attenborough to narrate it. "will a WmC get enough zings to survive the cold sandbox winter ahead? in his weakened state he could make a tasty treat for a wild Johnny Fever, tipsy mothra, or crut." etc

if this happens we have to pick the most British title possible to annoy Whiney. I leave this matter in the more capable hands of my chums across the sea

blud sausage

Ok so I figure say 5 good articles a week at 100 a pop (which is low in my opinion, but I know that it's actually probably ok by today's miserable standards) is $500 a week * 50 weeks = 25k for authors plus say 4k for a part-time editor and 1k for overheads gives us 30k/yr for something modest? If we want decent design + photos then there's say another 3k right there? Is this totally off base?

I don't know ad rates or have any other ideas for revenue models (eventual cross-promotional super-obnoxious campaigns, i guess?).

So I could imagine getting funds together to try this, but I have no idea how it could *last*, unless it acquired a fair amount of reputation and readers fairly quickly.

Some ideas in that direction:
I dunno how much one can make from amazon/itunes affiliate sales or if those even really exist anymore, but there's another revenue source?

Even w/o kickstarter one can adopt the model of money for prestige bonus items -- lunch w/ yr. favorite writer or invited to the launch party or like $100 tote bags or comps with exclusive tracks (from, say j0hn D :-) ) or the like. Like PBS or WFMU style.

If somebody really wants to run with it (low-to-nonextant on ILM ties, but polling resources from good writers/editors/musicians who hang out hear plus their contacts and their contacts' contacts) I think it may just work.

seems like a good idea, tbh, even if just for fun

guys, podcasts are where it's at now. hire someone with a stentorian voice to read ilx threads aloud, slap on some commercials for audible.com, boom done.

To expand on this, I'd actually be interested in helping out with some sort of "ILX podcast network" that was similar to the model of the FreakyTrigger podcasts. If Hardwick can go from zero to twenty-one podcasts on the Nerdist network, we could certainly make our own.

one thing i think would be cool is turning the artist track polls into full-on features with blurbs and everything. obviously that would require the consent of all the posters who vote for it to be used for that purpose, and people might hate losing the fun of the rollout threads for the sake of unveiling them in that form, but so many of those lists are great thorough examinations of catalogs that don't necessarily get that kind of respect.

Eh. I don't think it would matter if any material got repurposed from ilm/posted to ilm first (matter vis a vis "spoilers" that is -- using people's stuff requires their consent, obv.). Long rollout threads + the like are worthwhile, but a chore. Having the nice condensed stuff like ILG does with coint and plick (especially w/ added media) is a clear win.

The great thing about ILX is you can have all sorts of stuff on the same thread, but I'd hate to see some it preempted by a site dedicated to Real Writing. Or made too self-conscious by the prospect of being reposted on such a site.

i'm not sure if it's been seriously suggested by anyone else but i definitely wouldn't want ILX posts reposted anywhere else for any purpose, that's a really terrible idea imo. with the list thing i meant just taking the poll results and then writing content to go w/ it.

I was mostly responding to Sterling's don't think it would matter if any material got repurposed from ilm/posted to ilm first (matter vis a vis "spoilers" that is -- using people's stuff requires their consent, obv.) But not meaning it as I Must Protest, just misgivings.

i'm not sure if it's been seriously suggested by anyone else but i definitely wouldn't want ILX posts reposted anywhere else for any purpose,

A short history lesson in previous attempts to do this:
Excelsior the book
When ilx is on the coffee table

And the one time an ILX thread was published (in Da Capo's Best Music Writing of 2002)
The new *Da Capo Best Music Writing 2002* book is out...
NYLPM response: The Strokes Coverage

yeah i was basically referring to people taking chunks of their own posts and wholesale repurposing ideas/phrases for articles, which writers do all the time. there was some concern upthread that ppl would cut down on what they contributed here for some reason or another, or just now the concern that e.g. a more formal presentation of lists would be counter to the rolling announcement threads here. obv just using other people's for anything but excelsioring or the like is a terrible idea.

I like this idea.

I think one way it could actually work as an extension of ILM is if people were specifically prodded to expand on things they've written about fleetingly on ILM which other users would like to see them write more about, or to write about in a more thorough manner. That kind of thing is unlikely to happen on ILM proper b/c most users are too modest to impose themselves on threads in that manner, and there doesn't seem to be any reward for the effort vis a vis the instant gratification of the one line zing. But I know a lot of the time I see posts that seem to hint at a wealth of knowledge and insight, and that i'd love to see expanded.

Not saying this should be what any publication should be, but I'd love to see it form a part of the overall picture.

I primarily lurk, but I would be interested in this.

yeah that sounds good.

But also, it's good just to say what you wanna say even if it's long, even if it's not zing, don't expect standing ovations or any audible response--don't be modest either! Not a trait I associate w ILX so much anyway.

Say it loud and proud on ILX, I mean (and wherever else)

Just to throw something out there, I'd like to see ILM's "Books That Were Left Out Of The 33 1/3 Series." I know a few of us here submitted proposals to Continuum, but there's some long posts on the single-album threads that could make for some good essay-length pieces. Anthologize a couple dozen together and away you go...

I remember one issue of the zine Badaboom Gramophone was themed "Bands Left Out Of The Trouser Press Guide" - and it was a terrific guide!

If anything, the ILM anthology could be organized just like the pre-covers comps.

I still use that Badaboom guide.

The idea of being a literal voice of ILX...intrigues.

^^the secret ingredient to tapping all that sweet amanda palmer goth ca$$$$$h

in all seriousness the podcast idea could go all sorts of places, i think it's a good one. same with elvis' rejected 33.3 idea, i'd read that.

and tim's ideas too - does anybody really hold back that much from ILM as it is? i'd have thought it's more that people are often using it as a diversion from work or whatever; it doesn't mean the ideas being put forth aren't as complex, more that you wouldn't spend as much time teasing them out. some folks might enjoy the chance to do so.

Yeah it's as much that as anything else. I'm certainly not saying that ILM is dumbed down vis a vis "proper" music writing.

The point of my suggestion is more about having people say what they'd like to see others do - the appeal of that for me is that it maintains some of the communal, conversational vibe of ILM despite being for the purpose of eliciting longform pieces.

If it did fall to a podcast type thing, I work in a fancy studio in LDN and could certainly help.

everything I write here is intentionally very very stupid. I have to save my smart stuff for paying gigs

I'd certainly be interested in reading that publication.

But having not gone through this entire thread, I wonder why people are especially invested in this now and not, say, back in 2004-06. What's different now?

village voice media

does anybody really hold back that much from ILM as it is? i'd have thought it's more that people are often using it as a diversion from work or whatever; it doesn't mean the ideas being put forth aren't as complex, more that you wouldn't spend as much time teasing them out. some folks might enjoy the chance to do so.

This is basically how I feel about this idea. I think starting from that point makes total sense.

I keep thinking about this idea, don't know why. I think podcast is the most interesting idea - I don't personally listen to podcasts more than once in a blue moon unless they're all-music (RA & Ultima Thule), but a lot of people do, so I assume that it's possible for there to be some income of some sort from a podcast. OTOH for anybody to give a shit about your podcast you need to have on-mic charisma & the time & will to put together a decent-sounding, well-produced (edited) presentation. But with hurdles accounted for - not just presentations but really good ones, rigorous adherence weekly or maybe bi-monthly presentation - I think something pretty cool is possible.

A website, on the other hand, seems likely to go the way of lots of other well-intentioned music websites - if you don't keep relentlessly current, i.e put in actual labor-hours daily, your website will not get a lot of traffic. Certainly not enough to be paying anybody.

Have we discussed an app yet? This also could be a big moneymaker, I propose the app OTM which OTMs you sporadically throughout the day via your iPhone. Presently developing a similar top-secret app under the code name XL-C-OR, mum's the word on that one

it would be cool to have people submitting spoken comments on music or doing creative takes on records in that way.

Datamining for Insight -- not to be confused with Bowling for Dollars -- is fairly trendy (c.f. sabermetrics and Nate Silver). I could see some interesting stuff coming out of examinations of the artist poll results numbers.

I had a podcast idea a while back to do 'album commentary tracks' -- basically have a couple critics listen to and discuss an LP in real time, and you can either play the album simultaneously Rifftrax-style or listen to the podcast by itself -- that I almost started doing earlier this year but put the idea on ice for the time being. Would be happy to offer up that concept if people like it.

I actually really like the idea of an app. There's a lot of different possibilities for what form it could take.

Datamining for Insight -- not to be confused with Bowling for Dollars -- is fairly trendy (c.f. sabermetrics and Nate Silver). I could see some interesting stuff coming out of examinations of the artist poll results numbers.

God, if he was a regular commenter here -- which he isn't, more's the pity -- Chris Molanphy would have a field day.

This is all nice and idealistic and cooperative and so on and so forth, but who's going to actually drive this forward? Because in my experience, which is not vast, getting something like this from idea to implementation is very, very fucking difficult, and needs at least one, if not two or three, people to really motivate and push things forward. One or more of those people will probably need to work pretty much full time initially, and that's very difficult to reconcile with day jobs, other interests, families, etc etc. anyone can set-up a blog at th drop of a hat, but design, content, scheduling, logistics, etc etc is bloody difficult.

This is all nice and idealistic and cooperative and so on and so forth, but who's going to actually drive this forward?

ha, yes, well

http://deadhomersociety.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/thetelltalehead11.png

Datamining for Insight -- not to be confused with Bowling for Dollars -- is fairly trendy (c.f. sabermetrics and Nate Silver). I could see some interesting stuff coming out of examinations of the artist poll results numbers.

God, if he was a regular commenter here -- which he isn't, more's the pity -- Chris Molanphy would have a field day.

― Ned Raggett, Sunday, September 16, 2012 9:11 AM (22 minutes ago) Bookmark

i should mention, Chris and I have enjoyed the chart columns Maura had us doing for the Voice (and before that Idolator) so much that we've been discussing trying to figure out a way to continue that work somewhere else, so I would definitely make an effort to rope him into that stuff. Glenn McDonald would probably be able to do great stuff w/ stats too*

* which once again raises the question of whether VV is still going to do Pazz & Jop this year and/or if another 'Jackin' Pop' type alternative should be organized

i think there is a lot of potential in this idea. and i also think that if there is logic, discipline and structure at play, the combined energies of different writers here could amount to something that would truly stand apart in the digital world.

personally, i'll only contribute to ILM these days when something occurs to me on the spot. if the moment lapses, i'll move on. i'll very rarely stew over an idea, linger at the keyboard or mentally prepare what i'm going to write on here. so a lot of the things i come up with are kind of cursory, impulsive and well... half-formed. if i take an afternoon to really collect my thoughts for a more organised piece, i like to think the result is different. that said, i spend a great deal of time reading the insights of others and often marvel at how quickly a lot of writers here are able to develop and expand their thoughts in complex, insightful and wholly original ways. as others have already mentioned, i'd love to see some of these thoughts given even greater consideration in a different format.

as for Sick's "who's going to do the work" question -- at the moment i've got a job with weird hours that leaves me with a good amount of free time during the week to stay at home and write, so if there was a need for people who can put the time in to edit or organize or whatever, i'd probably offer my time

This is a good idea, I think. ILM has always had broadly-affiliated group blogs or websites or whatever associated with it - Freakytrigger, Stylus to an extent, Singles Jukebox, the early incarnation of House Is A Feeling etc. I don't see why it would change ILM radically because it's something that's always orbited the boards in one way or another.

fuck a website, let's buy some land in the south pacific and call it the Isle of Music

agreed. how badly could a commune of that nature really end anyway?

LOLst

the nearest thing to a music periodical successfully kickstarted seems to have been the (previously - 'da capo') best music writing series, which just managed to make $15k to go independent

Lord Of The Flixors

a group of Baltimore newspaper writers raised $24k (from a $15k goal) on Kickstarter for a local news website

there's a boston arts one as well. ( i think local and kickstarter suit each other, and will continue to, once it all dies down a bit people stop giving money to amanda palmer or being angry at people giving money to amanda palmer ... )

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ricleichtung/ad-hoc

Right, I think we need proper hands in the ring offers of labour and support, and to establish a proper project team with defined roles and responsibilities. Yeah? Get a Kickstarter set-up, get some marketing work done, someone to do a site / blog design, etc etc?

we sort of need to agree what it will be first, don't we?

That's important and an early decision, aye, but we need to know who's going to make that decision first! Otherwise we'll keep throwing ideas in here for months.

Right, I think we need proper hands in the ring offers of labour and support, and to establish a proper project team with defined roles and responsibilities. Yeah? Get a Kickstarter set-up, get some marketing work done, someone to do a site / blog design, etc etc?

― Sick Mouthy (Scik Mouthy), Sunday, September 16, 2012 10:57 AM (34 minutes ago) Bookmark

i think it might also be cool to propose or even present some content ahead of time -- see if a few writers that people generally love want to write some interesting long form pieces on spec, and either release or excerpt them before doing any fundraising, so that people have some idea of the caliber of the work that's being promised.

dare to dream ilx, then worry abt the details

you know you're jealous of my totally sweet wings made of wax over here

That's important and an early decision, aye, but we need to know who's going to make that decision first! Otherwise we'll keep throwing ideas in here for months.

U shld poll it

or you could allow people to throw out ideas for an outrageous up to and even exceeding 24 hours

lol seriously

Xposts good idea some dude.

fuck a website, let's buy some land in the south pacific and call it the Isle of Music

― nutrition aziz (some dude), Sunday, September 16, 2012 10:02 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Like Lord of the Flies but everyone's Piggy.

I stole that joke, but I wanted to share it.

what do people think of the numbers I ran upthread? If they're realistic, they're substantially more than the best music writing kickstarter. This is because A) paying people on an ongoing basis costs more than paying them once B) there's no end product to sell and C) those number include paying actual writers actual money per article rather than, i guess, tiny amounts of royalty and residuals?

we could slash the writers fees by half and turn it more into a "appreciation" on the principle of the matter than an actual paycheck. That feels icky to me though.

anyone who pays actual money to have a physical copy of a message board needs Suze Orman to stage a fucking intervention

When ilx is on the coffee table

OK guys let's scratch the idea of selling hardback copies of the Ween vs. Phish vs. Primus thread, sounds like the buyer i thought we had in the bag just pulled out

whiney, nobody's talking about a physical copy of a messageboard. nobody's saying physical anything, and nobody's saying "straight from the messageboard" anything.

yeah, you could buy Spin for that.

good "zing"

haha!

"huh huh, I know where you work" is especially creepy coming from the guy who 's entire posting history is stats from RateYorMusic_metal.xls

b4 i forget - the chucks oral history was pretty awes

Why are some of you thinking about monetizing so early on? First you need an actual audience and a group of steady writers. Money doesn't come first.

ya just do it for like six months then sell to facebook for $100m

Yeah nobody knows who you work for. You kept it super quiet.

if it took the ebook route, a preview issue of some sort could be put together - make it say half the size of whatever the full release would be, make it a free release as a bit of a taster, and see what the reaction is like.

Why are some of you thinking about monetizing so early on? First you need an actual audience and a group of steady writers. Money doesn't come first.

― Moka, Sunday, September 16, 2012 12:19 PM (14 minutes ago) Bookmark

this isn't like a band or something where you do gigs for peanuts until you can work your way up and make a profit -- you either set up a model from the beginning that might make money or at least pay for itself or that's never gonna happen.

is there any way we can get lurkers to pay for this?

ya moka we have an actual audience, theres like a million assholes who read this site everyday

that said, having some central person set up an actual business that money will go into, to be distributed to contributors living in a bunch of different countries, is pretty daunting to consider.

this isn't like a band or something where you do gigs for peanuts until you can work your way up and make a profit -- you either set up a model from the beginning that might make money or at least pay for itself or that's never gonna happen.

agreed, the "doing this for peanuts" part has been the last 6-7 years.

i think it might also be cool to propose or even present some content ahead of time -- see if a few writers that people generally love want to write some interesting long form pieces on spec, and either release or excerpt them before doing any fundraising, so that people have some idea of the caliber of the work that's being promised.

― nutrition aziz (some dude), Sunday, September 16, 2012 3:35 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This is a good idea.

that said, having some central person set up an actual business that money will go into, to be distributed to contributors living in a bunch of different countries, is pretty daunting to consider.

― nutrition aziz (some dude), Sunday, September 16, 2012 4:39 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

paypal etc would make the distribution part okay I think, it's the making of money in the first place which seems more daunting to me.

I know that someone floated the idea upthread but I felt like repeating it: how about trying to set up a non-profit?

If the click through model is the enemy wouldn't that be its natural opposite? A 501(c)3 like the New Inquiry?

http://www.irs.gov/Charities-&-Non-Profits/Charitable-Organizations/Exemption-Requirements---Section-501(c)(3)-Organizations

i'm still most interested in 77 magazine

or set up an ILTMI publication to subsidise the ILM one

I'm not really a logistics guy but I'm game to write/edit

this whole thing's kinda your fault so you better do somethin' :)

We really need to enter into this from a non-salary point, with a promise of it in the future. This might be as simple, for a start, as launching whatever the malleable any-use equiv of a Wordpress/blogger is, with advertising options. Profit sharing may be the way to go.

Haha

What've I done

What monster have I unleashed

Should we proceed on parallel tracks here?

Track A: logistics
Track B: who wants to be involved and how?

Track C: what do we call this thing

Listen and Obey: We Are Here to Help You

A part of me likes the sell-it-as-an-Amazon file idea but I don't know if it's realistic

Track B: like I said, actually being a podcast voice for this would be kinda cool; after a decade of not being on the air and podcasting now ruling the universe and all, beginning to think it's about time.

Agreed. I dig that idea, maybe a "here's a podcast version of today's coverage, guv'nor" sort of courtesy.

yeah the nedcast is definitely going to be the cornerstone of this empire

I would love to help, either by writing or also the idea of recording some stuff for a podcast appeals to me quite a lot. Basically I'm in for general involvement.

for whatever this subsequently turns out to be

Also - somebody said this up thread and I dunno who - I love the idea of not being beholden to "the new" or "the timely" or whatever's hot or "we're only writing about these guys because a major show/fest looms"

"you wanna write about 80s norweigan synth pop? DO IT"

The one thing I'll want to get is a better microphone than I currently have. Michael J. Nelson recommended a good one in an interview last year that I was considering which had the advantage of being affordable but still pretty reasonably pro, I'll have to dig that up.

Ned, a Rode NT1 would work fine for you if you can spare $170 or so.

I'll need something in the low six figures & a private jet

you didn't get yours yet?

MaresNest -- noted, that would have to wait a bit if so given holiday and other upcoming expenses.

a podcast is a good idea, i think.

How will we fund Ned's ricola budget

A self-contained podcast or a internet radio show might be a good idea.

On the written side, i like the idea of fleshing out an artist or EOY poll into a short book and publishing via Amazon. Unlikely to make vast amounts of money but might pay for server costs.

Server costs are already paid-for, kinda. We could certainly incubate it here, at least. If it got to be too big to handle that's the good kind of problem, right?

when i suggested using ILM polls i meant more to help fill out a daily website -- that kind of thing seems like a nice way to beef up the content of a site and get people clicking around but something like an ebook or quarterly magazine would probably be better served with longform criticism/journalism. (xpost)

a quarterly print digest of usernames without annotation or explanation

the finest only

it's worth thinking about why ILM "works" (when it does). to my mind the magic mechanism is the question-and-answer format, and the back and forth generated by the answers (which often provoke new questions, etc). if you plucked the "best" and "most interesting" writers here and asked them to write a bunch of stand-alone articles, you might have something good, but it wouldn't capture what's great about ILM. the particular flavor of it wouldn't be there. so i'm sort of agreeing with kate in that i think ILM is already in its optimal form, for better or for worse.

that said maybe this new thing wouldn't just have to be stand-alone articles. the singles jukebox is a good example of something that thinks outside that format. although the various mini-reviews there don't interact with each other or propel each other the way threads here do.

in any case i think the only way to have something that isn't ILM, but which captures what ILM is good at, needs to have some kind of supercharged comments culture at its core, as the very basis for what it's doing. there are very, very few websites that have reliably great comments that aren't just one-off responses but which carry on their own narratives. so maybe "comments" as such isn't the way to do it, i don't know.

How about something along the lines of Frank's Why Music Sucks zine?

E.g multiple pieces responding to a question or proposition.

And responding to one another

yes, something like that! though it's the "responding to one another" part that's tricky, even just logistically. but yeah! [disclosure: i have never actually read why music sucks :(]

yeah i don't mean to sound like i'm pushing for just long thinkpieces or something -- i think it'd be great if we had a format that captured a bit of the argumentative/persuasive spirit of ILM threads and included multiple viewpoints on a given topic. i just worry about that kind of 'everybody gets a turn' stuff ending up becoming the meat of the project, and wonder whether it's possible for that not to eventually get insular to people not participating, the same way the message board would be less fun to read for a lurker or the unconverted.

ah now that i am actually reading this thread (err..) i can see that several people have already voiced this, i.e.:

yeah if there's any mileage in this (which...there isn't) it's not going to be in long-form pieces, ilx's raison d'être is conversation (or...whatever). the back-and-forth. this is something professional/paid music (and non-music) journalism is actually lacking, too.

― lex pretend, Saturday, September 15, 2012 1:56 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

one old idea i'd had that i alluded to above, as far as a singles jukebox-y approaches to things besides singles, is to have running conversations about a given album that would take the form of a series of reviews or pieces about it, perhaps weekly. so say there's an album that 2 people have different takes on -- you'd run those two pieces a week apart, and if the first guy wanted to respond to the 2nd, there could be a 3rd week. and for some really divisive or popular record where there are 30 different people with different passionate takes, you could run a piece a week for half a year, as long as people keep signing up to write about it (although maybe they'd be required to read every previous take so that if they feel they'd have nothing new to add they'd just drop out and let the 'thread' die).

maybe daily would be better than weekly to keep the momentum high and not drag things out, i'm just thinking in terms of giving people time to really come up with substantial, original perspectives.

End result of this convo is gonnna be "we're getting google ads" isnt it

How about something along the lines of Frank's Why Music Sucks zine?

E.g multiple pieces responding to a question or proposition.

― Tim F, Sunday, September 16, 2012 5:57 PM (18 minutes ago) Bookmark

would be fun

ah and LocalGarda and kate herself have said similar

i am redundant

xpost those are really interesting ideas, about how to get longer-form pieces that are part of a conversation. i mean even just a baseline "point-counterpoint" format would be a huge step forward from the "here is an article, now comment on it" format of 99% of the sites out there. or as Tim suggested, each "issue" could comprise, say, 4 questions, each of which is answered by two or more writers, with space at the bottom for you to write your own answer in. just, you know, spitballin here.

Do it conference style - when ppl pitch topics they should pitch in panels w/ the other respondents already lined up and ready to go. "I'd like to write about 1960s Belarusian pop, giving 3 perspectives on the genre along w/ Tim F and Tracer Hand," or whatever.

also a good idea

yes well the more of that sort of prep the better, usually

i'm also sympathetic to the podcast idea - presumably a panel discussion around a question or album or proposition - because the conversational aspect of it comes way closer to ILM's core mechanic than pretty much any "print" style format i can envision. there are drawbacks to that though. first of all you have to listen to the damn thing which requires a bit more focus and time than reading a couple of articles does. second the participants all have to be in the same place at the same time, they have to be good talkers, they have to be recorded well, they have to be edited well, they need an experienced moderator/host, and there's little to no opportunity for public interaction with the debate generated except in some pitiful after-the-fact comment section underneath the soundfile that no one will ever see or use because they've listened to it straight from their podcast folder on their ipod, not on the web page. this last part may not matter - maybe none of it matters - maybe a podcast is the best idea of all! i don't know.

i kinda hate podcasts. i wouldn't mind if someone transcribed them to text but reading >>> listening

i suppose we could just have a rolling ILM thread and let people who are on the board when something's being worked on sign up/pitch to contribute to things. would be kind of funny to set up some kind of e-mail system or 'staff board' for the same people to communicate about the same things with a slightly different aim.

Maybe one way forward might be to colonise an already existing music website. Not necessarily by doing articles for that siteas such, but by creating some sort of autonomous ILM zone as a bolt-on entity. This would solve problems like hosting and building the functional infrastructure, but there would also be advertising deals already in place and you would straightaway have access to a readership from outside of these four walls (I see this as the biggest initial challenge). It might also ease the pressure of having to add fresh content every damn day. The main benefit to the host site would be an increase in both the amount and diversity of credible content but also I can think of a couple of UK sites who might jump at the chance of reaching a more diverse audience as well as extending the sort of music they cover without warping their brand too much. It would obv have to be a good match and you'd have to reach a deal on how the finance worked, but it could be an interesting project for everyone.

Vokle works quite well for this. I watch a regular cycling discussion programme on it called Tourchats. It aloows the host/producer to take in text and video questions, features a live text chatroom. Not quite as polished as some pre-recorded podcasts but the immediate feedback mechanisms make up for it.

xposts to Thand

Maybe one way forward might be to colonise an already existing music website. Not necessarily by doing articles for that siteas such, but by creating some sort of autonomous ILM zone as a bolt-on entity.

Pitchfork presents Altered Zings

On the downside, Vokle has a spectacularly pretentious sting that plays before all shows, discussion about that may end up dominating all shows.

I kinda like the podcast idea, but how could it work without including the actual music? I can't imagine a handful of us talking about stuff you can't hear simultaneously appealing to anyone who isn't us.

well i proposed the Rifftrax-ish idea of having running commentary to an album -- you could extend that to a 'mix' of songs, maybe publicly available on Spotify or something

i.e. something you can sync the podcast up to if you wish to hear what's being discussed

Surprised at how many people enjoy podcasts tbh. Requires dedication to sitting & listening somewhere; would much rather read in my own time.

live ilm FAPcast discussing track as it plays faintly on the jubebox in the corner of the pub

i'm not personally big on podcasts (really just can't bring myself to carve out much listening time for something besides music) but i understand the appeal and feel like it would be a worthwhile component to include in something like this, alongside text.

um not to shoehorn a plug in here or anything but: me & EZSnappin have been doing a music podcast for about a couple of months and I think I speak for both of us in saying that we'd be happy to contribute in whatever way to this goal, though I think the both of us agree that our podcast def has some ways to go before either of us are comfortable with it being affiliated with any type of professional endeavour. But I'm not even sure if you just want to do one podcast with a revolving cast or if you want to try to develop a few different podcast ideas simultaneously or what. Just putting that out there...

I'm sure that several of IlX's resident deejays would be happy to contribute mixes, no talking required.

Its not like we're going to stop making them anyway.

whole new site is authored and admin'd by Whiney and consists only of Whiney ranking threads from worst to least worst

I kinda like the podcast idea, but how could it work without including the actual music? I can't imagine a handful of us talking about stuff you can't hear simultaneously appealing to anyone who isn't us.

I think little inserts where people talk about things or play a track and talk about it, would have potential. You don't actually hear a lot of that, it's not easy to do but it could be good.

i kinda hate podcasts. i wouldn't mind if someone transcribed them to text but reading >>> listening

― Mordy, Sunday, September 16, 2012 10:26 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Surprised at how many people enjoy podcasts tbh. Requires dedication to sitting & listening somewhere; would much rather read in my own time.

― kinder, Sunday, September 16, 2012 10:39 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

otm and otm. they ARE popular, across most fields i've seen them in, but i can't fathom why - they're so time-consuming and attention-consuming in comparison to reading

they're for commuting and walking and lying awake, for me, times when a book would be inconvenient.

(what i don't get is video news items)

er is "attention-consuming" not p much the point

reading in your own time just means skippable when not conforming to own solipsistic interests usually

obv it depends what the content is, there's nothing worse on a podcast than someone being wheeled in to flatly read out a preprepped essay, same way that reading a conversation onscreen will feel somewhat limited

They're good for working to if you don't need your mind on what you're doing and way less disruptive than e.g. checking ilx

i could read the content of most podcasts in so much less time than it takes to listen to them

i don't really find reading a q&a on screen limited at all

i do agree we'll very probably want a format as skimmable as possible for the venture under discussion

I personally f'ckin' hate podcasts and use them about twice a year at most, but I do know shitloads of people who use them loads and loads, so I can see some point in them. But I don't think they should be the main event.

Re: server space, why not just set-up a free Wordpress-hosted blog and pay for a .com domain through that? Flexible, built-in CMS, and, bar the domain name, it's free. Stick podcast material on Youtube and embed it into pages on the Wordpress site. That way we can concentrate on content and design rather than infrastructure.

i do agree we'll very probably want a format as skimmable as possible for the venture under discussion

ah now

I think little inserts where people talk about things or play a track and talk about it, would have potential.

i just finally edited something well, exactly like this last night featuring a certain one-time ilxor, one current one, and one totally non-one, and it is pretty great iidssm :)

Stick podcast material on Youtube

this seems to misapprehend both syllables of the word "podcast"

For almost 10 years now podcasts have been in the "store", with download buttons labelled "Free", and at one point it just seemed natural and logical that eventually some podcasts would have "$0.99" in that button instead. But this has never happened. To my mind that one change would revolutionize broadcasting, and wildly in Apple's favor. The only reason I can think of for it not happening is that the only way Apple could be sure it wasn't violating copyright law would be to actually listen to every podcast - and get in contact with the producers of each podcast - to make sure all the music was cleared, and well, that would take a staff of thousands

i thought ricky gervaise had a podcast that needed paying for? did that not happen?

also, i am excited about that thing you have just edited :)

Never Not Funny and The Benson Interruption are two pay-by-episode podcasts, as were latter series of Gervais' "abuse a pleasant man" show. I imagine there are plenty of others, and many, many series do "bonus" episodes that require purchase.

xpost

Here's my 2c worth.

1. IMO content should never be mined directly from ILX threads. ILX remains a more precious flower than The Project and making ILX threads more self-conscious would be a horrible thing.

2. ILX threads should TOTALLY serve as petri dishes for Project Pieces though, whether it's ilxors encouraging resident savants to do a Project Piece after a particularly booming post, or ilxors involved in a fertile back-and-forth saying 'b, what would you think about you, c and I taking this to a workshop thread?'

3. Feel like the meat of the thing could be a mix of meaty, depthy solo joints by ilxors, point-counterpoint things harnessing ~the unique strengths of ILX~, and the jukebox model (which should def include old sides as well as new)

4. There could be a private sub-board of workshop threads where solo pieces are critiqued/edited or team pieces are hashed out?

5. I would very much want to volunteer w/r/t film music and classical music; in film music's case, there are currently zero venues in print or online where well-articulated non-fluffy non-fannish writing appears on the regular.

6. DJ Mixes - great idea

Would totally volunteer to take part in this, but this is where my self-consciousness kicks in and I say but there are people on ilm that are way better at knowing stuff than I do.

All excellent ideas xp

If I just let my imagination run wild, I could picture something like this:

- Quarterly "ebook" publication sold for like $3.99 or something on Amazon, etc. Under 100 pages in length.
- Long form essays only (min. of 10 pages each).
- People nominate ideas on an ILM thread (can submit their own ideas as well as lobby for specific posters to write on a particular subject) and then the board votes on them.
- Once the writers & subjects have been selected, there is another nomination & voting round to determine who will edit each piece. Though the finished piece will be primarily the writer's work, this will provide some of the back-and-forth that ILM is known for, because both writer & editor have to agree on the finished product.
- Some firmish deadlines for when things have to be submitted in draft form, revised, finalized, etc.

as happy as i am to throw ideas around i'm about as convinced that ~this thing could work~ as i was at the start of the thread, ie not at all. who exactly would the audience be? who is buying this, whatever it is?

Would love to read some 33 1/3 type essays.

who is buying this, whatever it is?
in the beginning it would probably be ilxors themselves buying this. but after a while if it would become known outside of our circles the percentage of external buyers shuld grow. the books from the 33 1/3 series i read where mostly disappointing (except the loveless one). i think this thing where we could all participate in a way - and if it would be by just proposing albums or whatever to write about - would be more interesting for me as a reader. and i could maybe even write a ten page essay on the sun bear concerts or whatever. o. nate's suggestions sound quite reasonable to me.

the books <b>were</b> disappointing, sorry.

guys I have a link to a torrent of all the ilm publication content, PM me for details

for sampling purposes only, please support the authors

Volunteering myself for ILX podcast organization. Perhaps the admins should set up a "I Love Branding" board?

5. I would very much want to volunteer w/r/t film music and classical music; in film music's case, there are currently zero venues in print or online where well-articulated non-fluffy non-fannish writing appears on the regular.

this is a cool idea, there's definitely so many underserved niches of music coverage that different people here could get an opportunity to dig into

Forgot to mention, the two podcasts I think got close to what an ILX podcast would be like are Soto and Wood's terrific Roxy Music series and FreakyTrigger's A Bite of Stars, a Slug of Time, and Thou.

If we could get even near that kind of quality, I'd be a listener.

Perhaps the admins should set up a "I Love Branding" board?

I Love Monetising

You will all probably think this is a dumb idea but I love the idea of a site that's very 1996. That's all frames and HTML and kind of bizarre to navigate and takes someone 2 hours to build. Could be moderated by a handful of ilxors or not idk.

Anyway the idea is the pages can be anything you fucking want, cuz everyone can do HTML in word or Dreamweaver 2.0 and it won't take any super genius wizard to make a page cuz you just dump a file in a folder and the author gets complete control of how the thing will look on the screen. And it can be a block of text or something totally experimental.

It'll free people up to be as creative as they want to be and it won't be all branded and swish and boring and there'll hardly be any admin and it'll be waaaaay more interesting + fun to read imo like ilxor is and who knows maybe it'll eventually lead to something that you can "monetize" or w/e or maybe it'll just live on the internet as some bizarre 96 throwback site made in 2012 that contains nothing but thom yorke slashfic

i mentioned this on the laurie speigal thread but i totally get nostalgic for when the internet was like this

http://retiary.org/ls/

frames seemed so futuristic at the time.

y'see the unruly navigation and user unfriendliness is what will make you buy the LOL MUSIC ILX ANNUAL for £50 at the end of the year

i would be into something like that, so long as it's done in a way that's user-friendly and ultimately more of a deliberate, stylish visual statement than a total 'lol angelfire' retro joke.

Does VV own the copyright to the "Pazz & Jop" name? What a coup if an ILX pub/site became the home of the definitive year-end poll, under whatever name.

Good point. You deserve to be allowed to vote for thinking of that.

Zappa reissues in the top 10!

Ha, I would never vote in such a thing. Not qualified.

I was hearing about an interesting discussion system from the olden days of internet. It involves a set of invited participants and a moderator. The mod sets the topic, and the participants each write (in private) a piece on the topic. At a preset time, the responses are all revealed. Then there's a time for comment where (again in private), participants (and anyone else) can write responses.

In the end, they are all revealed, and that's it. It apparently worked pretty well for discussing contentious legal topics. I wonder if that would generate an worthwhile discussion on our sorts of topics.

I was thinking about something very similar for the writing group I've been procrastinating over, but I don't understand the need for privacy at stage two - to me that seems like the time to open it up to discussion.

If we're keen on podcasting, that might be a way to do it? Four essays on whatever, which our charismatics spark off?

I think the justification for privacy at stage two is they're really concerned with avoiding human's natural tendency for consensus building. By keeping the responses private until the reveal you avoid that and see just how broad a range of opinion you can really generate