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Re: Say Hello
Posted:
Jun 5, 2005 8:55 PM
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Word out to other musicians, and to the good folk running this site. After those kind words, now I'll get crabby. 
I'd like to give feedback about the site, but I don't know where to put it. It is not a very friendly site. I am quite confused by it. It is especially unfriendly to musicians.
Let's take the example of the home page:
- What do I see first? "New Artwork", "Featured Collections". This is well done, very eye catching. Where's the music? I hunted and hunted. There is 1 article of 8 on the home page about music. There are 0 of 10 news items. Oh!! There is "Recent video/music/writing" .. well, why isn't it parallel to "New Artwork" and "Featured collections"? I think I know. a) It is easier to make a web site that has something visual; b) There is only room for 2 visual blocks side by side. Why not let artists associate an image (e.g., album cover) with a song, and show the image along with a link to the song?
- Unlike every other site on the Internet (that uses either a top bar or a sidebar), this site has a humongous 4 x 3 grid of options. Apparently the most important thing you want me to know (after the site logo) is that I can log off, because that's what my eye catches first.
- Why is the Artists menu "Media Arts", "Literary Arts", "Performing Arts" etc.? What is 'media arts'? These are such stuffy adjectives! How about "film-makers", "writers", "musicians"? Look, I know those are SUB-categories in the categories you're listing in the Artists menu, but the categories are so vague I don't know what the heck they're about! You have to use words normal people know, or this will be a site only for stuffy people!
etc. etc.
Go look at some sites that present consumables in categories: www.amazon.com, www.ebay.com, www.half.com. I'm not saying this is a site about buying things, but look at them anyway. They work, and people are used to them! All of these 3 have totally understandable, normal words running down a left sidebar. What does this tell us?
Also, go look at some sites trying to present music: www.cdbaby.com, garageband.com. cdbaby.com: okay, they chose to put the human-understandable list of categories on the right, but it's still there ("Choose a STYLE: "Blues", "Classical", "Country", etc.)
garageband.com frankly I find somewhat confusing too, kind of crappy home page. However, the artist's page isn't so bad. Description down the middle, songs and albums down the right. Very SPECIFIC things right away. The artist's web page here is .. well, not bad, but a little wifty.
I have tons more feedback like this. Look, I appreciate such a site, but I want someone to find my CDs and buy them, and hire me for a gig, and contact me to do a commissioned work. We need a down-to-earth website for these kinds of things!
My $2.
Dan
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