Re: IFM on the brink of starvation
Alright, extra €€ sent (and monthly refill still in effect)
My take on this: I'm not in favor of member-only goodies, we already tried it in the past with downloadable shows and I don't think it helped that much. People spend time creating those, they want as much people as possible to listen to them.
Rather, it sort of works like open source: those who can contribute to the project (be it with music/time/code/design/money) do so and everybody benefits from the end product.
The quality and quantity of stuff available on IFM is pretty amazing right now, I don't have the numbers but from what we're hearing things are going well in terms of listeners. The problem might be that these new listeners enjoy the music but perhaps they don't really feel like they're part of a community like we did back in the CBS days. Hence they might be less inclined to support/donate.
Look at the number of comments on IFM news and blog posts, there isn't a lot of discussion happening. Maybe that's just me, but I feel like there's a growing divide between those who are doing the stuff behind the scene and everybody else listening to the streams. It used to feel like a much tighter community. If we want people to contribute, we've got to bring them on board on a more personal level. That's what the CBS forum used to do - not trying to reopen the whole forum debate, beating a dead horse etc. - but things on the community front can perhaps be improved by making changes on the website (but that kind of stuff requires even more time & work).
But again, that's just the way I see things. I've not been as active here these last few months, so maybe that's where the sense of disconnect comes from.