So, I’ve been thinking about ways to make our blog more interesting to the community at large, rather than just a list of “we fixed this one bug!” posts.
One thing that we could have is more guides to stuff (“Adding a classical album, part 1”).
Another is to show off quirky bits of our data (“Did you know there’s ten albums featuring a vacuum cleaner??”).
And for more community-related things, I thought about something like “Ask a community member to post about their 5 favourite releases they’ve edited in MusicBrainz recently”, with a different user every month.
But I’d love to hear about what you community people would actually like to see us write about! Any ideas?
In relation to guides, I’d like “dumbed-down” guide synopses/explanations with links to the full guide. It’s really heavy weather reading all of this stuff and trying to get your head around it. For example, little snippets of information like “editing” relates to editing the database, not a previous entry or “auto-editing” isn’t automatic, it’s just shorthand for it hasn’t gone through the long-winded process (or whatever, sorry if I’m getting that wrong, I’m tired). Little digestible snippets/reinforcements of what you’ve read in the wiki/instructions/guides.
Gossip.
Lots of gossip.
Who is doing what with whom and which artist/company/institution has opened themselves up for criticism or ridicule in their dealings with Metabrainz.
However most gossip is antithetical to inclusivity, having a respectful, friendly community, and the commercial need to leave open the possibility of future beneficial friendly business relations.
Even the fake birth certificate tale can be interpreted at MB functioning as the arbiter of truth!
So perhaps gossip as such must be forsworn?
Fortunately some of the events which might have been turned into gossip can instead be turned into narratives that highlight and celebrate the creativity, maturity, foresight and intelligence found in the Metabrainz project, by showing the solutions created by the team and community to obstacles and problems.
I would personally love for more community members (personal/private, open source projects/non-profits, and commercial entities) to write stories about what interesting project they’re using *Brainz data for, or just how they’re using *Brainz data in general.
We have a bunch of supporters, but we have little information on how most of them use our data specifically. (I get that some of them may consider the exact details of their usage as a trade secret, but I think it would also be great to foster some kind of cooperation spirit between the ones willing, so maybe they can help each other get more use out of our data.)
Maybe the Mahler completionists could be allowed to present their pitch that the Mahler cleanup should expand directly into a “Mahler Drive” in which all known Mahler releases are captured by Musicbrainz?
A database version of “Capture the Flag” complete with counting coups and glory. That would end in a victory eagle dance by the participants with the onlooking community ululating.
Any ideas?
