All 15,000 members so swear they love the PAN but they are NOT POSTING; and the one man who looks at the MUSIC and the INDUSTRY askance, working overtime to keep the forum active. Salmon Cupid invent this big, fancy, state-of-the-art instrument and he is traveling all over the world being the NUMBER ONE ambassador for PAN and giving all kinds of lectures on THE NATURE OF A NOTE IN MUSIC and PATENT METHODOLOGY and the history of the PAN and ADVANCEMENTS IN RECORDING using the E-PAN -- and he is yet to use that MAGNIFICENT INSTRUMENT he created to produce one DECENT PIECE OF MUSIC. What are MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS for if not to MAKE MUSIC?
Come on Cecil!!! Bring some life to YOUR FORUM!!!
Replies
The forum format has been taking a hit across the board, regardless of the industry it is geared towards.
Social media is where the people are when they want to meet in online communities. The handpan equivalent of WST is handpan.org, which used to be a thriving community of online handpan enthusiasts. However, the posters there have been increasingly sparse and nowadays, it has been seemingly abandoned.
However, when you log onto social media platforms like facebook, you will see very active handpan groups with 5000+ members. These groups usually drive a lot of web traffic and there are times when I have gotten on average 700 unique visitors on my website per day from these groups.
When you look at Steelpan facebook groups, the largest one has 1500 odd members, and the next largest one has a little over 1000. In both of these groups, the posting is not very active, and only a little trafiic can driven from these groups.
It is the same youtube disparity that you discussed in another thread overlapping into the facebook sphere and essentially, this disparity in question overlaps everywhere else where human activity is concerned. It does not get any more clear than this!
Perhaps it would behoove the powers that be here to start up a WST facebook group and grow it in conjuction with X&L 4. Pan. Everyone and their mother is on facebook and the target audiences are there in droves, they just have to be reached. If any sort of crowd funding for X&L 4 Pan will be successful, A facebook group in the name of WST or hosted by WST would be absolutely crucial for raising awareness and inviting active participation across multiple online spectrums.
You have a point ,Rudy Kendall , about competition from social media.
The "ning" platform was around before social media , and doesn't easily interface with media like FaceBook.
Not to mention the fact that , to be honest , the look and feel of WST's ning platform is rather dated.
And BTW , numbers for social media membership can be misleading when compared to this forum, , since there is so much cross posting and sharing on social media..
WST has a presence on Facebook , and it may be a worthwhile effort if the management of WST could figure out a way to transfer most of the activities here to FaceBook instead
I find myself more inclined to express my thoughts and ideas , and to post on social media more often than I do here.
Glenroy, the powers that be here would have to retire James ''Pan'' Foster and put in a real face that the forum members know from WST in his place in order to lend maximum credibility to the transition, if there is going to be a transition.
A Cecil Hinkston or a Claude Gonzales would do the trick, I believe.
I remember another thread on here where some members were wondering who exactly James ''Pan'' Foster is. So this presents a problem for any credibile transition.
But don't get me wrong, the present format of WST feels comfortable to me. I am a fan of the forum platform personally and I have been posting on various forums before facebook groups and twitter came along.
And I do think the forum platform is still useful, it just needs to be used in conjuction with other social media platforms simultaneously and cohesively.
In my opinion, WST should be the biggest, most active steelpan facebook group in existence, but it is not currently. A concerted effort needs to be spearheaed by the powers that be here to develop and grow the WST community on facebook. Let's face it, there are many social media platforms, but facebook is where the target demographic for this particular niche is, nowhere else.
With this being the case, WST should definitely capitalize on the online market cap they already have where the forums/history/pan related info are concerned and parlay that into WST facebook group success.
Initially to grow the group is simple. All the current active members on the forums can join the group and invite all of their friends to join the group and take it from there. Meanwhile, there are entire demographics consisting of fresh faces and ears who have yet to be formally introduced to the pan on facebook, and if any entity has the potential of capturing these audiences, it is WST, due the fact that the pan archives are here.
The forums add even more credibility to the facebook group and vice-versa, especially for newbies who are just beginning to learn about the pan. There is a a treasure trove of pan information on these forums going back years that is extremely valuable to anyone seeking reliable, primary sources on a variety of pan related topics. If the forums are used in tandem with a facebook group, both can grow simultaneously.
Let's remember that the pan market is still wide open in many ways because there are still large segments of every society that still do not know what a steelpan is! Pan is still a niche market and there is still a lot of work to be done to raise awareness and attract new faces and ears to the pan!
Hello Rudy
Having a major presence on facebook is definitely not our focus at WST. We are only interested in facebook in terms of its technical functionality through it plug-ins, availability to major search engines and our ability to place direct links to WST media and articles.
What is of major concern is the constant changing of ownerships of what is placed on facebook servers. It is obvious that faebook would like to claim ownership to anything placed on their servers. In fact on a few occasions facebook has said as much in their user rules, only to back off after major push back by large and powerful organizations. We expect them to keep trying to achieve their goal.
Since WST creates a lot of original works, it not in our interest or that of our members to place their works directly on facbook.
In any regard their is no shortage of steelpan related groups on facebook.
I stand corrected.
I double checked and the WST facebook group has over 5000 members, which would make it the largest steelpan related group on fb. This would also make it comparable to the membership of the largest handpan fb group.
Now I am satisfied WST has the matter under full control, I can rest a bit easier now!
All Cecil studin is how d glory days dun wid steelband. He does jus sit back and reminisce on he pass on fb. COME ON Cecil, d glory days wid steelbands aint over yet man! dont be so negative! Enjoy d ting MAN!!