Topic: Networking Page

I think that's a really good idea, JT/Dan. Sam Cousins, if you're looking at this, could we make this part of the Wiki you've already got set up? Could you set up something quick we could link to?

Okay, I've been running this around a little in my mind. I want to back-track on this whole thing a little bit.

I'm thinking that there are already a bunch of services available to us that we're not fully taking advantage of. Here are a few things:

First: go to the Maine Arts Commission artist database and add yourself, if you're not in there already. (It's for all artists, not just musicians.) Add it to your list of things to update. Businesses looking for artists or musicians are more likely to go there long before they go to myspace or facebook.

Second thought: if you have a website, keep a page about things you're looking for, even if it's just a temporary "help wanted" page. I've got a page that appears on my website sometimes when I'm looking for something hard to find. You should also add that info into your myspace/facebook/sonicbids/whatever page.  If it's not there, people won't find it.

If I was looking to find work, I would probably type something like "sound engineer portland maine help wanted" into google, and see what comes up.  Having your own person classified page will get traffic - because classifieds are for things that people specifically search for.

We'll cover a bit of this at the web promotion seminar (Nov 5). Remember, more people will find you through google than anything else. Even if they're only finding your myspace/facebook page, most will get there through google.

Third. To jump to the wiki topic: I'm pretty certain that Wikipedia is not the answer. Its user base is too broad; while we would need something more local-specific. I don't want to discuss the politics of Wikipedia, but leave it at this: I think that if you created a bunch of band-specific pages for Portland bands, all those pages would be queued for deletion because you're not famous enough.  Wikipedia doesn't like self-promotion, and those folks will go out of their way to stamp it out.

Now, creating our own local wiki isn't a terrible idea, but it may not be the best option.  A wiki is really meant to be a semi-static reference site. You put up an article, and then tweak it as better information becomes available.

So, let's talk about this after the web-promo seminar. I want to see what other people have to say about the whole thing. I think a lot of interesting stuff will get said.

In the mean time, make a list. Three parts: what you want/need (e.g. find a guitarist for your band), what are you doing now, if anything (e.g. posting ads on craigslist), and how it works/doesn't work for you (e.g. only got two responses to the ad). Let's find out what really isn't working before we dive into something new.