The Admin team is re-writing the DMusic FAQs. . . it's about time! So don't be afraid to ask your questions. . . maybe they'll even get answered. . .

and remember, the redesign is coming soon. . . get ready for a coherent DMusic!

Post below

how many licks does it take to get to the center of a tootsie roll pop

ask mr. owl

wl:
ah..1..a twooo...3..
"three" wl:

Must have an edit!!!!

thanks Vic, now i have the gawdawful lil kim song in my head

an edit?

edit function for forums and post or at least a trash like the shout box

.... and enable some basic html for inclusion of pix, etc...

like

ahem....


img src="http://myspacesux.com/itsuredoes.jpg"

editing forum posts is a tricky issue though- because people could delete their responses which would result i in non-sensical (is that word?) conversations. . . maybe there's a way to edit something within a time window,or atleast a preview function?

delete 'em all and let God sort it out
(paraphrase of VietNam era saying..Kill 'em all and let God sort 'em out)

I thought that was a paraphrase from the crusades?
Anyway.. some ideas for features that you might consider (or not)
How about making the commenting on songs feature an option that can be turned on or off (much the same way as the download can be?
Also.. as a non subscriber I have 75MB of space to upload music.. far too much (though I am grateful) - I think it might boost subscription rates if the upload for non subscribers was limited to 5 songs. I have been on other OMD sites and they usually only give two or three as freebies.
On the topic of subscription - could you please make it possible to subscribe without a pay pal account? I have talked to Van about this before and he suggested sending a cheque, but I don't trust that as I am not in the US... plus I had other issues with my bank but I'll not post those in a public article
One other thing - the artist forums. Would it be possible to remove those or at least give the artist control over them (in terms of deleting unwanted ones) or disabling the ability for any random punter to start a forum thread on your page? (these are the forums on the artist page.. not the main forum)
Anyway.. just some ideas

Sorry... am I completely off topic here? You want questions that might work on an FAQ page?

I agree a preview function would be best...we don't want people going back at a later date to change something they may regret saying. At the same time, typos and emoticons plague us all. If we could preview it for a short time, it might cut down on those, but still preserve the integrity and flow of the conversation, such as it is

haha, yeah, this specific thread was supposed to be about any questions people wanted to add to the FAQ----> but your suggestions are much appreciated! (and noted)

so for subscriptions, you'd ideally want to be able to pay securely with a credit card directly on dmusic?

maybe i'll rename this thread for "suggestions for the new redesign" since nobody has added any questions for the FAQ. . .

You want along the lines of "How do I...?" or "Where is the...?" questions, then.

whY?

I knew K3 couldn't handle that

What's an admin and why are they re-writing FAQs. Have the frequency of the asked questions gone down or something?

no, just that the FAQ section needs to be updated and reorganized. it's pretty confusing. here: http://help.dmusic.com/

No, I meant the “actually frequency” of the questions being asked. Are people not asking those questions anymore?

Uh..as a to the side note...do we know when this 'new look' is coming? I kinda wanna know

Folks, I am guessing that Tracy was ONLY specifically asking for suggestions about the FAQ section in THIS particular thread/forum.

(The Dmusic upgrade will be universal/site-wide/including just about everything as far as I know and understand. Suggestions for other areas/issues/topics shall be and/are were covered elsewhere.)

...but ask Tracy. (I'm only guessing at the intent of this particular forum.)

Here's one thing:

- make sure folks know for SURE in clear & easy lingo what is OK to upload. (Are cover's OK? What about songs with samples? What about songs sung to prerecorded Kareoke or midi/other tracks? Those kinda things and etc.)

Ok, had a think about this and wrote down some of the questions I get a lot from new users - but then I had a look at the existing help section and it covers them all perfectly well I think.
Perhaps we just need to make it stand out more as to where it is?
I do have a few though, that I don't think are dealt with in the current FAQ...
1. How do I download other people's music?
The reason I point out this one is because the method does differ based on your web browser. eg, for Mozilla Firefox, you just click the yellow arrow and it automatically downloads.. but on IE (sadly some people still use it) you need to right click and select "save target as..."
2. What is the best way to promote my music?
We all know spamming doesn't work.. in fact it is counter productive - but without knowledge of how to get noticed here it can be frustrating. Perhaps we should offer some instruction on do's and don'ts in this area. A particular pet peeve of mine is how the community shoutbox is misused as an advertising billboard.
3. How do I deal with someone who is harrassing me?
With the addition of the recent privacy settings, perhaps we need to make users aware that they have the power to remove harrassers from their online experience, and also point them in the direction of a few admins if the situation is really serious.

One other thing that I get asked all the time - but which is covered in the existing FAQ - is how to set up or create an avatar. If you wish to point people in my direction in the FAQ, I'd be happy to help anyone who isn't able to make their own

I hope this post is a great deal more useful than my last one Tracy

Stating more clearly and assertively the actual rules for uploading, as in what you can and cannot do, is a major thing - seeing as this is the bulk of the site's content (music) and what subscribers and non-subscribers are allowed to do, including links to Van's news forum on that topic.

Does the FAQ show the complete list of functions available to subscribers vs non-subscribers (as in a selling point for ppl to actually sign up)?

Also a complete list of HTML tags or something for ppl's journals, though most of us with coding experience have worked most of them out...

hmm..actually..a list of names for the needed help..
andmin specialties....coders..artist formally know as mux*
trouble shooters..ect ect..
my suggestion..being i was here a year before learning how to activate webcam..
would be a simple descriptive tutorial how to do so..if its not allready here..i havnt run across one..
havnt really searched it out though..
and the basic code for journo pict would be cool too..
the img src thing..

In short,

We gotta speak to BOTH the Internet Geekoids (who could do a better job than us if they WANTED to...)

AND also to the Internet newbie "dumb-nuts" who don't know an e-mail from an a-hole.

=========

SIMULTANEOUSLY

(asprin bottle NOW please.)

Questions for the FAQ...

I still get a bit confused as to how to upload pics to specific places i.e the small band pic, the main pic on my music page and the pic I appear to have on my biography. I didn't originally use html to put them there (because I always screw up when I try to do things like that) - there were buttons when I first joined here (4 years ago!) which made life a bit easier. Could we make the instructions a bit clearer as to what we can have, the sizes, locations of the pics, and how to go about it?

I'd like a list of who's who too at DM I.e. who the admins are and what they do. Would save time and prevent us from approaching the wrong person about something they don't deal with. And who are the mediators and what do they do?

Can we also have a clear statement on how people get promoted around here!? There's a lot of confusion about all that. Who do we approach? What's the criteria?

With regard to subscribing...I believe all the features available to subscribers are either not listed or not clearly listed/detailed. It would help having a more comprehensive guide and may encourage more people to subscribe. For instance, last time I looked it didn't mention the "delete" facility - is that a retrospective thing once you subscribe or only applicable to new comments etc? Also does DM have a facility to directly purchase a subscription by credit card or do we have to use paypal?

Could the FAQ also give more details (designed for people who aren't good at designing web pages!) about the hosting packaging. For example, I have no idea what capacity I would need or how to go about designing the page. Is there anyh Dm assistance on that?

On the subject of the re-design of the DM site...

If we are keeping our links/favourite sites on our main music page...can we have a facility to re-number the order in which they appear? I think it would help me to promote other bands here more effectively. For example when members aren't active it seems pointless to have them top of the list, whereas when someone releases a new song it would make sense to have them placed at the top.

Why isn't Dmusic Dub advertised more/better? Its CLASS!!!

OK, here's my two cents:

1. In addition to the tip jar, there should be a way to buy subscriptions for others. Good way to support artists and DMusic at the same time. Also subscription prices should be listed monthly instead of quarterly. People look at numbers and seeing "$8 per month" looks better than "$25 per quarter."

2. Forum edit = bad; forum preview = good.

3. The ability to delete shouts from your own shoutbox would also be nice.

4. As far as the FAQ/Help, it's pretty good (and thorough). It is a little outdated in that it says things such as buddy lists will let you go to where the person is. Also, the size of avatars has increased, and you can add your instant messenger name to your user page (it says you no longer can).

That's all I've got for now.