- Did theme overhaul of entire website with initial search of basic theme formats
- Added a few more blue tones to the website
- Changed the font of the site
- Lined up the capital letters of the logo to make it look smoother and line up better
- Shrunk the logo and slogan to be less intrusive over the rest of the site
- In the video demonstrations and score sheet listing pages, i did a blue gray blue gray alteration for each post in order to break up the content aesthetically so users don't get lost in a sea of gray or blue.
- Added and moved content in login, new user, and archive boxes on the right side of the content page in order to prevent the words from bleeding over
- Capitalized User Profile Titles and How to Make a video titles in order to better distinguish between the heading and the actual user information and links.
- Moved links that are available to everybody below the logo and slogan
- Placed Username and all registered user links in the upper left hand corner when the user logs in. Placed below logo but above the general links.
- Made the whole content window centralized regardless of window size and as a result set the content area to fixed width rather then fluid.
- Attempting to an image of notes in the background of the content which would be slightly low opacity so as to not over dominate the text. Considering adding it to the outside content area background. Not successful so far.
- Getting contributors was difficult for one reason, people just didn't have the time to do this in the time frame given them.
- Sent email after email to old high school professor and got no response, discovered she wasn't even in school and had a sub so that's fallen through for now.
- Worked with Sam to try and get cron job to delete video files on my server after they have been processed....no success thus far.
- Working with Sam on trying to allow the search feature to search within users profiles to find the users who play the instruments they need...no success at this point.
- Downloaded advanced profile module to try and help with the feature stated directly above and are currently trying to figure out how it works.
- I reduced the number of survey questions down to 8
- Personally added one video to the website and plan on adding one more.
- Got 1 person to contribute to a forum post, score sheet post, and two video posts
- Plan on having a stack of business cards on the table at Capstone night as well as a few post cards.
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Monday, March 29, 2010
Changes Between 2nd and 3rd Milestone
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- Added a spam module to reduce the amount of automatic spamming and other Spamming in Uploads, Forums, and other user posting areas.
- Added tutorial links for iMovie, Windows Movie Maker, digital videos, camera tutorials, and a tutorial on video equipment.
- Added a way to relate/tag a score sheet when uploading a video and/or tag a video when uploading a score sheet on the upload forms.
- Specified on video upload to keep the videos under 10 minutes each as specified by Youtube.
- Installed captcha and recaptcha to help prevent non-human users from contributing content to the website in addition spam.
- Updated postcard, business card, and poster to account for bleeding and format issues as well as updating a possible capstone date on poster.
- Wrote up a statement of request for users to upload teaching content.
- Posted to all known music folders on first class as well as emailing the head of the music department and had her forward to all music professors.
- Added more requests to the pool, NMDnet, and my personal blog for this class
- Personally met with old high school teacher and she agreed to make videos for me and distribute promotional items to her students upon my confirmation of content being added to the site.
- Pep band professor liked the concept of my website and wanted to meet with me about it….has not had time to set anything up with me yet.
- Added BETA to the title/slogan area in order to let those know that this site is under testing.
- Added a description field for the image upload as well as in the score sheet link
Saturday, March 27, 2010
Help Request
I am working on building a website for my senior capstone and I need your help. PLEASE READ.
It is a free website that offers young musicians and professionals to have a place to post their original/non-copyrighted scores of music through educational/instructional videos as well as written score sheets. This site is geared towards having users teaching and helping users learn all things related to the musical instrument. The goal of this site is to have you, the user, provide the content. It is important users on this site come to the aid others, give a sense of a supportive community, so they can learn the art and joy of music. Anyone is allowed to view the videos, score sheets, and add comments. However, you must have a user account in order to upload content.
I am looking for users, who right now, have prior knowledge of music and are able to contribute these instrument educational videos.These videos do not have to be long. Keep the videos to less then 10 minutes. I would like my users to teach how to play an instrument that they feel they are strongest in. You can demonstrate the instrument of your choosing. It can cover the basics of playing that instrument, or it can be more challenging lessons for those users who want to push their talents further. As long as it is relevant to the instrument. You could even show them how to read the music for that instrument, how to keep time, or even how to write music for that instrument. As you can see, the possibilities of what to show users is endless. Also if you don't have a lot of time just adding 1 video would be extremely helpful and then you can contribute at your own pace. If you need more information I would be happy to help.
Musicians Unite
It is a free website that offers young musicians and professionals to have a place to post their original/non-copyrighted scores of music through educational/instructional videos as well as written score sheets. This site is geared towards having users teaching and helping users learn all things related to the musical instrument. The goal of this site is to have you, the user, provide the content. It is important users on this site come to the aid others, give a sense of a supportive community, so they can learn the art and joy of music. Anyone is allowed to view the videos, score sheets, and add comments. However, you must have a user account in order to upload content.
I am looking for users, who right now, have prior knowledge of music and are able to contribute these instrument educational videos.These videos do not have to be long. Keep the videos to less then 10 minutes. I would like my users to teach how to play an instrument that they feel they are strongest in. You can demonstrate the instrument of your choosing. It can cover the basics of playing that instrument, or it can be more challenging lessons for those users who want to push their talents further. As long as it is relevant to the instrument. You could even show them how to read the music for that instrument, how to keep time, or even how to write music for that instrument. As you can see, the possibilities of what to show users is endless. Also if you don't have a lot of time just adding 1 video would be extremely helpful and then you can contribute at your own pace. If you need more information I would be happy to help.
Musicians Unite
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Things accomplished since Milestone 1 & Future Plans
- Did extensive research and debugging on video processing problem over the course of 3 weeks with the help of Sam Hunting (can back up statement)
- Have video capable of both upload to YouTube as well as showing up on website finally
- Created a new website slogan
- Created a viewable menu for each type of content where the user can sort the video or score sheet by post date, title, or user. This allows them to browse just the video or just the score sheets without having to search and know what you are looking for.
- Created a general page where it describes to the user the basic way you can create a video.
- Changed the 2 upload link titles to match the primary links
- Moved the search and forums out of the user navigation to the primary link bar and made both available to anonymous users.
- Did a partial alpha test by getting classmates to create an account and fill out what they wanted on their profile as well as test the image upload. Could not get an accurate video upload test, as it was not working at the time.
- Increased the upload limit from 8mb to 256mb. Can increase up to 2GB if necessary.
- Created a concise business card to place and give to people randomly as well as strategically.
- Created a promotional post card. Plan to place in music business’ with a free sign on them
- Edited last question on survey, have not put on website yet but plan on adding it as a link on website.
- Plan on getting those students with music experience to create videos in a week and a half and upload them to my site.
- Plan on getting in touch with music department and getting professors to create videos as well as well as account and help give me feed back.
- Over break plan on getting in touch with old high school/middle school and see who would be interested in participating there
- Ghant Chart
- Have video capable of both upload to YouTube as well as showing up on website finally
- Created a new website slogan
- Created a viewable menu for each type of content where the user can sort the video or score sheet by post date, title, or user. This allows them to browse just the video or just the score sheets without having to search and know what you are looking for.
- Created a general page where it describes to the user the basic way you can create a video.
- Changed the 2 upload link titles to match the primary links
- Moved the search and forums out of the user navigation to the primary link bar and made both available to anonymous users.
- Did a partial alpha test by getting classmates to create an account and fill out what they wanted on their profile as well as test the image upload. Could not get an accurate video upload test, as it was not working at the time.
- Increased the upload limit from 8mb to 256mb. Can increase up to 2GB if necessary.
- Created a concise business card to place and give to people randomly as well as strategically.
- Created a promotional post card. Plan to place in music business’ with a free sign on them
- Edited last question on survey, have not put on website yet but plan on adding it as a link on website.
- Plan on getting those students with music experience to create videos in a week and a half and upload them to my site.
- Plan on getting in touch with music department and getting professors to create videos as well as well as account and help give me feed back.
- Over break plan on getting in touch with old high school/middle school and see who would be interested in participating there
- Ghant Chart
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Progress over Christmas Break & Before First Milestone Review
Progress
- Got rid of style box around content area
- Took a while to properly adjust the positioning of my website to prevent content and text cut off on the edges on smaller laptop/desktop screens
- Adjusted color scheme from green and blue to 3 different shades of blue and some grey bluish-gray text
- Moved dark blue bar to just be underneath the navigation and the primary links. Logo now has content color background helping to open up the closed in content feeling
- Got site live and not just locally on computer
- Added a site description for those who are new to the site on the homepage
- Created navigation bar for a user friendly interface
o Forum
o Image Upload
o My account
o Video Upload
o Search (moved from right sidebar, advanced search feature added, can search for content or by user) (fully functional)
o Logout
- Added a logout option for user
- Created forum link for users to freely and easily communicate with each other (fully functional)
o 5 forum subjects created
§ General Discussion
§ Instrument Lesson Search
§ Looking for lessons in person, in my area
§ Need to learn how to read music
§ Need to learn how to write/arrange music
- Got rid of recent comments option since users can see comments on individual items as they browse
- Added archive viewing ability to see what was uploaded in past months
- Got both image and video upload forms finally show up for users on the website
- Image upload form uploads to the site properly
- Content promotes to the front page
- Created a youtube channel for Musicians Unite
- Got videos to upload to youtube on the UniteMusicians channel
- Worked on trying to get those uploaded youtube videos to appear on my website
- Discovered a Glossary feature in the views module that has the potential to organize the videos by the first letter in the title of the video, don’t have working yet.
- Created link called tracker: if a user clicks on another users profile, they can see the content that user has contributed to the site
- Added additional information fields that users can have to share information about themselves with other users (Experience level, real name, gender, contact number)
- Posted bug and help requests on multiple forums to get help on the video processing problem
- Worked on promotion ideas…See other blog: http://hockeyismyjoy.blogspot.com/2010/01/blog-post.html
Sunday, January 24, 2010
A. Identify Your Audience
1. My capstone’s ideal target audience is musicians looking to teach others the ways of playing an instrument, reading, and writing music. On the flip side, I am focusing on users who wish to learn all there is to know about reading music, writing music, and playing an instrument. A peer-to-peer social network where users help each other.
2. The users that are closest to my target audience would have to be the members of the UMaine Pep Band. All the on campus musicians and groups are what I am looking for. I also have access to my old high school band.
3. Kristy Yeaton, Christopher Cotreau, and Aaron Sanders might be people that I would collaborate with because they are all doing something related to music and we could help each other out getting users and content. This would also serve well in advertising for each other’s projects with our own Capstones.
B.Identify your promotion strategies
1.I will post a link with description in all folders found related to instrument music on First Class.
i.Pep Band
ii.Symphonic Band
iii.Marching Band
iv.Music Student Teaching
v.Trumpet
vi.Flute
vii.Music Minors
viii.University Orchestra
ix.Brass Class
x.Maine Music Organization
xi.Musician Coalition
xii.Announcements & Alerts
xiii.New Media Society
xiv.Debating posting to Signing groups to get more people
2.Other Online link Posts:
i.Facebook Profile and music groups
ii.Have my mom, who is a teacher; forward my email to my old middle/high schools band director and her students in Millinocket. See if she can also forward my link/description to the East Millinocket/Medway bands.
iii.Good idea to post requests to the pool for reviews and participation
iv.Post to the NMD Website
3.Offline
i.Place posters in 1944 hall, New Media Department, Old High School
ii.Considering making postcards and giving them to classmates to hand out to people they know would be interested
iii.Considering putting a demo of the site on YouTube
C.Choose sampling mechanism
1.Hand-picked seems to be the best mechanism for me. Random is too risky for a user-content heavy startup project like mine. Mass-invited might work for me as well to get as many people as possible, but I feel that the chances of getting the right music oriented people is not in my favor
D.Choose feedback format
1.I am not quite sure what is the most appropriate action to take for my website. I would think qualitative might be the best for my site since the user is controlling the content and would need more freedom to express how they feel about the website. Categories are needed for my site since there will be a variety of instruments people might want to discuss.
E.Choose feedback aggregator
1.SurveyMonkey.com would be the best site for me to use to compile feedback and data. I should consider using bar graphs because I am sure there will be statistics that I will be easier to read in graph form; Microsoft Excel is what I own so I would probably use that to create these graphs.
1. My capstone’s ideal target audience is musicians looking to teach others the ways of playing an instrument, reading, and writing music. On the flip side, I am focusing on users who wish to learn all there is to know about reading music, writing music, and playing an instrument. A peer-to-peer social network where users help each other.
2. The users that are closest to my target audience would have to be the members of the UMaine Pep Band. All the on campus musicians and groups are what I am looking for. I also have access to my old high school band.
3. Kristy Yeaton, Christopher Cotreau, and Aaron Sanders might be people that I would collaborate with because they are all doing something related to music and we could help each other out getting users and content. This would also serve well in advertising for each other’s projects with our own Capstones.
B.Identify your promotion strategies
1.I will post a link with description in all folders found related to instrument music on First Class.
i.Pep Band
ii.Symphonic Band
iii.Marching Band
iv.Music Student Teaching
v.Trumpet
vi.Flute
vii.Music Minors
viii.University Orchestra
ix.Brass Class
x.Maine Music Organization
xi.Musician Coalition
xii.Announcements & Alerts
xiii.New Media Society
xiv.Debating posting to Signing groups to get more people
2.Other Online link Posts:
i.Facebook Profile and music groups
ii.Have my mom, who is a teacher; forward my email to my old middle/high schools band director and her students in Millinocket. See if she can also forward my link/description to the East Millinocket/Medway bands.
iii.Good idea to post requests to the pool for reviews and participation
iv.Post to the NMD Website
3.Offline
i.Place posters in 1944 hall, New Media Department, Old High School
ii.Considering making postcards and giving them to classmates to hand out to people they know would be interested
iii.Considering putting a demo of the site on YouTube
C.Choose sampling mechanism
1.Hand-picked seems to be the best mechanism for me. Random is too risky for a user-content heavy startup project like mine. Mass-invited might work for me as well to get as many people as possible, but I feel that the chances of getting the right music oriented people is not in my favor
D.Choose feedback format
1.I am not quite sure what is the most appropriate action to take for my website. I would think qualitative might be the best for my site since the user is controlling the content and would need more freedom to express how they feel about the website. Categories are needed for my site since there will be a variety of instruments people might want to discuss.
E.Choose feedback aggregator
1.SurveyMonkey.com would be the best site for me to use to compile feedback and data. I should consider using bar graphs because I am sure there will be statistics that I will be easier to read in graph form; Microsoft Excel is what I own so I would probably use that to create these graphs.
Monday, January 18, 2010
Graham Readings/Sustaining Capstone
After reading the many pieces of advice that Graham offered us, 18 Ways to Kill a Startup stood out to me as the best advice for keeping a project or business from crashing upon startup. Having multiple founders to startup is a great suggestion. I know, personally, I sometimes procrastinate slightly more then I should because of being so busy. I can vouch for the fact that if you have others working with you which helps create motivation to get it done. The advice about having a specific user in mine, trying hard enough, and choosing the wrong program is directly correlated with my project and require serious thought and work on in order to make my capstone a success. Graham covers all areas that might break a start up company. I find it really helpful that he not only tells you what not to do, but he also lets you know how you can avoid that from happening. I don’t feel the need to go in depth on the readings since we all read them. However, I do feel these tips are absolutely necessary for one to be successful in the business world. I don’t believe I would personally start my own business, but I would definitely make sure that I was a part of it.
If I were to make my capstone project self-sustaining upon graduation, several things would have to occur. I would definitely need some sort of funding to sustain the yearly cost of maintaining a domain name and hosting provider costs. I would probably need to look for a couple of collaborators to help me or completely take over the programming management of the site over the long term. I do not believe that starting a company would be in my capstone’s best interest. Getting an internship might be a possibility for my project. In getting this internship, I could propose this project to the companies’ board and have them take over the project. If there already is a community dedicated to music in some sort of way, I could have my project join their community and collectively sustain each other. Going to grad school might be beneficial for the fact of taking some business management courses and other things of that nature to further my knowledge in being able to sustain my capstone beyond graduation. As far as the content of my website, the users will be sustaining the content themselves.
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