Where ARE all the chatters?

...I immediately comment on my own disccussion to cite the discussion about David Walch's waterfront plans currently active over there...

http://www.thedwarf.com.au/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=33707&sid=1fe2408a7...

Those last three points are clearly important if people are to feel safe commenting on this site.

I agree first several make it difficult to participate spontaneously and freely as I would in a conversation. I cant just make a comment here without feeling enormous pressure and exposure towards having it as polished as an academic essay.

Discussions should be free conversations where people can really express how they think and feel. Those thoughts and feelings should dictate the structure and language.

Contemporary arts in Tasmania deserves a stronger place in our culture than simple an off-shoot of rock'n'roll, performance or pop culture.

I look forwards to CAST continuing to develop and promote STOCK until it enjoys a high prominence in the minds and culture of the contemporary arts community, and for the community to develop a stronger voice through that.

well..
could be that it's affiliated to a particular organisation - whereas the dwarf is its own entity,
could be that it's perceived as a bit serious - or could be that it doesn't have those fun little options like being able to easily embed images into the board..
could be that CAST needs to go down the slaggy old road of self-promotion and tell people that they can access a discussion board about art.
(ie - a myspace, facebook site etc..)
could also be that no-one knows that its here. I don't think the posters really helped, pretty as they were.
Maybe some filthy old WE WANT YOU to talk about art.. ones would do better.

"Contemporary arts in Tasmania deserves a stronger place in our culture than simple an off-shoot of rock'n'roll, performance or pop culture."

sure, but you know, it needs to get off its lazy arse and earn it.

here's some research showing that in general in online communities:

• 1% of members contribute a lot
• 9% of members contribute a little
• 90% of people 'lurk' in the background and are passive

The participation rates we have here is very much in line with that, just our community is small.

I'm all for more fun features though, lets have a discussion on that!

Hallo.

You know I didn't begin this thread as a criticism of how or how not Stock might be hitting target statistics of online activity.

I am simply aware of VERY lively discussion of a nature that has great relevence to Stock and it's readership occuring elsewhere and wanted to broach a collective musing on how that activity might start to consider Stock as a relevant venue for it's liveliness - or rather, query why it doesn't now.

Fun is good. I love fun, but I don't really believe a lack of fun is the primary problem (although I do think that the ability to link in images into posts is a great idea).

I know I poked away at the Stock editorial crew in the earliest days to 'loosen up' this section of the site and I now feel like poking you all again to urge you to loosen up a little more. Let that pyjama string dangle! Here are my three points I've been chewing on:

Point the first: A lot of valuable discussion at the other forum I cited begins with a post that promotes an art (or other) event. A heading with title, date, time etc. The body of the post contains a little more info. This kicks of a lot of 'never heard of them/ what do they do?' and 'I used to hate their work but I saw this awesome thing they did in Glenorchy two years ago and that turned me around' which all in turn seems to lead to critiques of the event in question after people have actually been to see it and the artists work in general. True, these critiques are sometimes a little discursive but they are LIVELY. Folks actually do excersise their argument and criticism skills and the artist gets some free promo AND some considered feedback on their stuff. All this benefit to be reaped simply from allowing self-promotion. I will also add that if folk are allowed to promote their projects they WILL use this site rather than remain lurkers.

Point the second: As Mr Mjoakes indicated, people are feeling pressure to frame any content they contribute as a worked, edited, crafted piece of writing. Casual chitty chat needs to be encouraged in any way possible - why not encourage folks to just go for it and reign it in when it goes too far rather than tying them to the fence in the first place, eh? Why not implement an auto-function so that when someone comments on my post I receive an email that tells me this? I can't wait, browser spread wide open, continually hitting refresh while I wait for someone to fall into the conversation - but tell me they have and I'll come back and respond and, magically, a 2 or more user conversation occurs. I promise you that some of the thoughts casually chewed over via an easy board discussion WILL get turned into more considered articles. I am confident of this. But a deliberate relaxation of this forum and the addition of notifications are only part of the solution. Which brings me to...

Point the third: Yes, Mrs Tricky! That promotion needs a follow up. A stock-site facebook group costs nothing and requires only the teensiest maintance, perhaps an announcement when new articles are available.

Sorry admin - but I can't move on to a discussion about fun just yet. Your post makes it sound as though the editorial team are content with the way things are going here but I must stress I am still hanging in here for Stocks potential (Stocks GREAT potential) rather than for anything I'm actually getting from it at the moment.

Although having said, that I am now going to stop posting and go read the Professors article on when Bill met Kevin and re-read the one on Gunther von Hagens by Tasmania's greatest living painter of meat.

They both appear to be rippers.

Hi Sally

not generally a chatter on line (far to busy for that!!!) I neverthelss recognise your points are very apt if we want stock to be a dynamic and relevent site. Your post gives us material to take to our meeting on Friday. Mat, can we implement Sally's idea of a contributor receiving an email when comments are replied to? I think this is a great idea.

Go to any board meeting, conference, social event, office, studio etc. and you will no doubt hear in-jokes,aimless ramblings, (side-)business, shameless self-promotion, and personally-directed attacks. You could probably call some of those superfluous agenda items spam, and well, the blogging is a bit harder to find in face to face conversation (perhaps someone has a secret computer under the table?). What I think I'm trying to say is that many of the items on the banned list, as annoying or as distracting as they may be, seem to be inherent aspects of human interaction.

I agree that the rules may not need to be spelled out. It is a big list and most of it's pretty obvious - no one appreciates spam or personally-directed attacks and most of us know that shameless self-promotion often backfires.

I also agree with Sally about the blogging. Perhaps we need more 'blogging'(whatever that is) to encourage participation.

We must remember however, that Stock is really young. The Dwarf has been around for a long time and has a large dedicated following. Hopefully Stock will develop into such a site.

I hope this wasn't too much of a ramble. Sorry.

Don't worry Lucy - I seem to have the rambling covered.

Just wanted to pipe-up to say that I'm really glad this discussion is taking place. I haven't joined-in to date because personally I'm a bit awkward/uncertain about the whole moderator/contributor divide. (How much do people want to hear from administrators?)

Anyhoo, while I'm here I thought it could be useful to mention that editorial control over discussions on stock dropped to virtual non-existence some time ago. While the above 'guidelines' are visable - because they are now part of this conversation - I think the terms have been quite rightly challenged.

There is nothing to stop these ideas now being explored within discussion forums and the comments on articles! (:

oh please leave me a bit of rambling!