So, the boards have been kind of dead lately. In another thread, Azzy asked if there were any plans to increase activity around here. I don't think we really have anything in the works (though I could be wrong, maybe someone's planning a surprise?), but I thought it might be good to have a thread for suggestions.

So: Does anyone have any suggestions? Maybe some ideas for contests? Advertising? Something completely different?

the boards have been REALLY slow lately.  I have to much to worry about IRL right now so I've been mostly lurking instead of posting.

Ideas to increase activity?
-Karaoke Contests
-Album Elimination
-People should just post more

I like the album elimination contest idea. Those are always fun.

But, perhaps instead of a karaoke contest, we could record a karaoke album, like we have for Danny's birthday, again. Could be fun.

I was also thinking (though this doesn't have to happen) that we could create a downloads section, or something of the sort.

I dunno, let's toss some ideas around, and see what happens. We can take a vote on some stuff if ideas look promising.

I don't know whether this could happen (and you'll see why).
Maybe a beat+wings CD, more like instrumental, not singing, since you've already done those.
But I said I didn't know if it could happen because you really need the equipment e.t.c


Also, would anyone be willing to make a banner, signature size, to try and bring in some members?
(I would but my drawing skills are worse than a 3 month old)

Why don't we create a Last FM page, specifically for BeforU fans?  That way we can also get people interested in similiar music to join the forum!

Or maybe just a beat+WINGS one and try and get people to visit.
There's a bemanistyle one, So I don;t see why we can't.

Using our Last.FM accounts to promote beat+WINGS is a nice idea.

These are some really great ideas.

-Karaoke Contest/Album -- I love karaoke so this sounds awesome to me. XD I'm not totally sure how well this would work, though. A contest might create hurt feelings since it's more competitive, and singing is a personal thing for some people. On the other hand, I don't know how well an album would work either -- turnout for Danny's last birthday album was a lot less than the amount of people that volunteered. T_T Personally though, I love either idea.

-Album elimination -- Oh yeah, I miss these. And we still have a bunch of albums to do.

-Downloads section -- I think a downloads section would definitely help to increase activity. I could see it being a problem though -- if I remember right, the incarnation of Beautiful For U that was hosted on UTS.net got pulled down because somehow, non-members were accessing the downloads section and printing pages from it and weird things like that, and it led to concerns that we'd get in legal trouble? If we could find a way to do it off of the site, like a torrent tracker or something, THAT would be awesome.

-Instrumental/non-karaoke CD -- This would be cool, too. I don't know how many forum people are into creating instrumental music, but if there is enough interest that could be really awesome.

-BeForU/beat+WINGS last.fm page -- I love this idea! And it's simple enough that it could probably be done right away. If there are no objections to this idea, I could probably create something within the next week -- unless Cait or Azzy would rather do it, I don't want to steal your idea if you'd rather do it yourselves.


This would be an excellent opportunity to utilize some of the artwork posted for the logo contest. A lot of the pictures posted there are perfect for signature banners, and the ones that aren't can probably be resized. I would think since all of the pictures were posted for the purposes of possibly becoming a logo, that none of the artists would mind having their signatures used for advertising purposes. (Although if you do mind, let me know and I'll delete this part. >>; )

Anyway, these are just my thoughts on what's been posted thus far. Let the discussion continue!

I'll create a beat+WINGS one, and maybe link it in the BeForU and members pages. Either you (Ang) or Cait can create the BeForU one, like you've suggested.

Later edit: Okay, I've created it and I've sent messages to some of you that I know have Last.fm, Kanna, Ang e.t.c
If you have Last.fm, here's the link: http://www.last.fm/group/beat%252BWINGS

Also, Ang, do you mind if I try and use you logo from the first post in the logo contest for the banner on Last.fm, because they have to be quite small.

How small do they have to be? I don't mind at all if you use the logo I created, but it might be good to resize one of the contest-winning entries.

They have to be 160 x 160, so there's not gonna be a lot of detail if we resize them.
Also Ang, since you joined first I gave you permissions to edit the details etc. Partially because I think it needs more.

Joined ^_^ I'm new to last.fm so I have no idea what I'm doing 

I just joined, thanks for using my idea!  Maybe we can spiffy the page up a bit!   

Just joined to the group.

Also what do you think about using Twitter to promote the site ?? News or relevant topics would be linked to that site.

I joined, I forget I even had a last.fm account till I read this thread.