What has happened here?

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 04:46 PM

OK Peter, sorry for reacting the way I did. I think I understand you a bit better now.

The problem I have is that I see the same old things crop up over and over again and believe that there are always the same causes of friction.

My own position in terms of what I would like to see here is a balanced mixture of music and off topic stuff but I appreciate that there are many different views as to what should and shouldn't be here and of course what constitutes a balance. I also believe that we should always remember that the only guaranteed common ground we all have is music and for that reason give it some specail consideration.

It remains my view that the real troubles start here when a number of a certain type of non-music thread are running at the same time and although I do appreciate the "free to say what we like without feeling inhibited" arguement, I really do believe giving a little thought before starting a thread would prove to be a healthier approach for all of us. I also believe that a number of people do show this restraint.

Jon

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: GUEST,CLETUS
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 04:54 PM

Mizter Peter, Ime ritin ta letcha know the Waylon Heron dun servived hiz ordeel. Heez out with thet stupid possum and hiz new frend Artie the Armadilla an havin a gud time.

Iffen the rest uv ya doan know the Waylon Heron wuzza flyin down ta visit heer laz week befor the winter set in up there in Canneda an he got hissef hijackt by a beaver whut then tryed ta crash him inta Vinnie's Pizza Palace in downtown Ashtabula. Wif grate bravry an currage an remembrin whut Paw showt him, he flared off a heron fart and an blasted the beaver offen him an inta Lake Erie jes south of Long Point.

We jes wanted ta letcha know heez all rite.

CLETUS

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Amos
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 04:58 PM

Jon:

Thoughtful posts are infinitely preferable to kneejerk ones no matter WHAT the topic. Let me point out that there have been far more threads started on the subject of spirituals in the last ten days than there have been on the subject of war. And if you read the threads about the WTC event you will find that they range in persuasion from abhorring the thought of war, to trying to think of other solutions than war, to tring to understand the dynamics that have led us to its edge and where those dynamics might lead. Let me add that the notion of war was not brought up at all in this forum until a foreign community chose to kill a large number of citizens of this and other countries. It's not like we have obsessive warmongers among us!

Count the music versus non-music threads in any one-week period and you will probably find -- at least I did the last time I did this -- that music reigns by about 60-40.

A

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: GUEST,Matt_R
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 05:10 PM

Actually, the reworking of Pink Floyd's classic "Wish You Were Here" was by Limp Bizkit and Johnny Rzeznik, the lead singer from Goo Goo Dolls.

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Jeri
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 05:11 PM

Well, if anyone was arguing against a point of view I held, or something I actually said, I'd probably still drop it.

Cletus, I hate to be pedantic (right, sure), but I don't believe herons are capable of farting.

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Amos
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 05:13 PM

Let's get specific, now. In the last 7-10 days, the following distribution of categories of threads appeared on the Mudcat:

Music related threads: 70 Politics related threads: 22 Personal threads: 5 Miscellaneous (technical, etc) threads: 8

Sample: 105 threads Percentage of musical threads: >70%

So obviously you are not complaining about the distribution of THREADS. You object to the number of POSTS in the different threads.

Here's an easy answer. If your attention is being hit by too many people posting to threads you don't care about, read only those threads you care about.

There are more musical threads than any other kind by a significant margin, so stop whinging.

A

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 05:21 PM

Amos, I'm not sure where you are coming from here or what you are suggesting. I am not under the impression that we are a group of war mongers. I have even acknowledged that 9/11 was exceptional - beleive me it shook me so badly I couldn't even attempt to get any remotely coherant thoughts on the subject together. I do, as others have done still question the need for the number of threads though.

Are you perahps missunderstanding my comment to Peter T which was a genuine OBSERVATION (in response to "I also cannot see how anyone can separate, especially in blues and folk music, "serious" music from "serious" concerns about life and death") as to what had happened in other folk groups I read and thinking that mean't I was suggesting no such discussion should take place here?

Re the number of threads on Sprituals I see it as part of a constructive music related project?

Seeing as you brought it up: Re balance of threads, I believe the thread count gives a distorted picture if you are looking to assess the music/non music post situation. I only tried a count of posts once. A majority for music in a thread count was easily overturned.

Jon

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: GUEST,CLETUS
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 05:24 PM

I dunno Miz Jeri, but I think thet beaver thet went flamin inta Lake Erie mite not agree wifya.

One thing I am purty neer shur uv iz thet a ded horse still perduces an awful lotta gas cuz I dun read thizeer thred.

CLETUS

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Jeri
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 05:26 PM

Thanks for caring, for taking the time to understand what I'd written, and for trying to understand what I was going through when I posted that, Amos. You are truly compassionate.

Matt R., thanks for the info. One remarkable thing about the program was they didn't announce performers. If you didn't know who they were, you really had no way of knowing. They did a great job on that song.

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: GUEST
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 05:33 PM

Oops, it was just Fred Durst, Bizkit's lead singer, not the whole band.

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 05:41 PM

Amos, another thought, go back and read again from the start.

One problem seems to be getting very clouded yet again:

Forget yours, mine, or anyone elses opinion of what a balance is.

Do you agree or disagree that others have problems with the volume of non-music here?

Do you agree or disagree that the "serious musical people" seem to be dissappearing?

Do you see cause for concern if any group of people are diminishing in number?

Jon

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Pseudolus
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 05:43 PM

As the originator of the "pub" analogy may I just say that it was not meant to be a perfect likeness. Frankly to poke holes in the analogy is to have missed my point altogether. The point was that you are not forced into or out of any conversation. You don't have to go at all on any given day.....

The one thing that hasn't changed here is the constant discussions about what "belongs" here and what doesn't. That is the most difficult for me to take. It borderlines on telling people what to think. It amazes me that people go on and on about the lack of music threads and few of them will start a music thread themselves. I would never sit down with a group of friends and tell them that I don't like their choice of conversation topics, and that they should change it.

Don't get me wrong. I agree that it would be nice to have more music topics. It's the music that brought me here. But if I don't like a non-music topic, why do I care that others are participating in it......I don't. The answer to more music topics is to start them, not to complain about the ones that aren't.

Frank

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Amos
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 07:26 PM

1. Jon, a post count is not quite relevant -- the ambiance of the Forum is defined by the titles scrolling down the thread list. Conversations about music vice conversation about other things, with the predminat majority being conversations about music.

2. When I said stop whinging it was more in response to Frank, not you. Sorry.

3. I have no doubt you like ,ost of us were blown apart last week. My head is still reassembling itself!

4. My remarks about the spectrumn of views regarding the war that began on Spetember 11th were really addressed to my dear friend Peter T who bemoaned too many calls to war.

Sorry if I sounded terse.

Best regards,

Amos

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 07:48 PM

NP Amos, maybe we are all still a little blown up by things (not that I don't blow up anyway). I was thinking of a tune by Jeri just now: Farewell To Reason but things aren't that bad, there's still hope...

Jon

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Jeri
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 07:53 PM

Amos, the number of posts ARE relevant when one uses the "New Messages Since Last Visit" feature. When, out of the first 30 post of the day, one finds 27 are about politics, yeah - it seems like alot. It got worse later in the day. (This feature comes in handy to find duplicate messages, BTW)

Amos, the Frank who was more or less agreeing with you...?

I was mainly bitching about Wed/Thu, where there were a whole bunch of new threads started. This is getting to be the sort of thread I'd bitch about, so I guess I'll go find something that won't piss me off. They're showing Highlander II on TV. Mind you, it's crap, the way they had the nerve to re-write the histori...damn!

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: catspaw49
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 08:06 PM

Well TBS has "Ghosts of Mississippi" and a local has "Groundhog Day".......

The other day, about when this one started, we were all pretty fried with the past week and frankly, the postings had, up to that point been numerous, but well thought out or at least emotionally relevant. All of a sudden we started seeing thread after thread that could just as easily been posted to an existing thread. Partly this was frustration and partly owing to a newbie who wasn't used to the way Mudcat worked. With eevery new thread, everyone felt compelled to respond and the thing became a horrible mishmash to the point that it was impossible short of a trace (which I rarely do, to keep track of what was said where.

It's evening out again a bit and I think we too will return to some form of normalcy soon. And yes, we have lost people and it bothers me, but talking about this stuff ad infinitum gets old too.

Spaw

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Pseudolus
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 08:58 PM

Amos, was I whining? I musta missed it.....

Frank

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Art Thieme
Date: 22 Sep 01 - 11:55 PM

On the Mississippi River, when I was doing gigs there it was said by some that blue herons are in fact reincarnated steamboat captains. They fly in front of the boats to guide 'em to the deep water and away from the snags, sawyers and shallows.

And Jeri, they truly do fart. The sound of that is very much like the normal sound they make with their vocal apparatuses---not very pleasant at all.

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Amos
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 01:03 AM

Aw, hell, I was just being bad tempered. I apologize and withdraw my sardonic remarks.

Ya gotta know that finding us on the brink of war has me in a bad temper.

I hate war, deeply and absolutely, in case I have given anyone the impression I was promoting the idea. But I keep being forced to the notion that we have had it forcefully declared agin us, and it isn't really something we can skirt, as far as I see.

We've never tried bombing people with cookies and it might work, but it isn't one of those things that will find a lot of concensus behind it !!! :>)

A

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: wysiwyg
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 01:08 AM

Cookie bombing is anti-Mudcat. One per person. We'd have to serve them with milk, one at a time.

The Office of Unholy Rants will be open in the morning (after 12 PM Mudcat Time) for people who already have my phone number and feel like getting it on. Panties unwadded, knickers untwisted, very cheap!

~S~

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: John Hardly
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 01:32 AM

Amos,

you just gotta have the gentlest bad temper I've seen in a long time.

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Blackcatter
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 01:44 AM

What I found interesting was that in a list of non-music threads that was posted above - 6 of the 10 were started by one person.

pax yall

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: The Shambles
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 05:52 AM

On the Mississippi River, when I was doing gigs there it was said by some that blue herons are in fact reincarnated steamboat captains. They fly in front of the boats to guide 'em to the deep water and away from the snags, sawyers and shallows

I don't know the statistics of boats going aground on the Mississippi River but as herons are birds that nest in trees and feed in the shallows, following them in the mistaken belief that they will lead you to the deep water, may account for any occurences?

It is far more likely that captains steer away, when hearing herons farting, out of the mist and coming from the shallows. This acting like a lighthouse's audible warning.

More probably that herons are reincarnated flatulent lighthouse keepers and coastguards...............

What do you feed your herons on, over there?

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Jeri
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 08:29 AM

I'll have to take Art's word on heron farts. Apparently they're the inland albatross. They feed on high-mercury fish. I can watch them when I'm at work and go out for a break - great majestic birds who stand and feed in the shallows amid the brick and metal trash that's been thrown into the river.

Blackcatter, yeah - Catspaw mentioned that. New guy who just didn't understand, and I believe I saw Spaw gently explained to him. He got lots of responses though. In any case, that seems to be in the past.

Amos, we're all a bit crabby. I'm better when I express the crabbiness with a sense of humor, but the humor is coming very reluctantly these days.

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: kendall
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 09:10 AM

While I must agree that there are too many threads on the same subject, I also will say that if the time ever comes that BS REPLACES music topics here, then I too will be gone. Until then, I will continue to ignore the threads that dont interest me.

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Amos
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 10:26 AM

Well Kendall, I am sure it will be reciprocal.

A

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Firecat
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 10:39 AM

Most of the time, I only flick up threads that either I'm interested in or that I might be able to help with. Sure, I enjoy BS threads cos a fair bit of the time, they're funny or interesting. Sometimes, however I do look at music threads, but personally, I don't think that there are too many BS threads. As far as I'm concerned, you occasionally need a bit of a break from music, and the BS threads provide that. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy music, but I enjoy light hearted stuff as well, so I need to get away from serious music. Even when I'm at a session, I'll sometines nip outside for a bit to get a break.

If people don't like what I've just put, fine, but everyone's entitled to their own opinion, and this is mine.

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Whistleworks
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 10:47 AM

My dear friends,

It has been a week or so since I have visited this site. And, I see that almost 80 people now have had something to say. Some talked about the music. Others did not. Maybe this proves what I set out to say in my initial post.

I have always loved to talk about the music and how it impacts me and others. And instruments. And performing.

See you in six months or so.

Kindest regards to all,

Bob

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: The Shambles
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 11:31 AM

Is that not a little unfair? The post you started, this post, was not a music post. Why would you expect music to be discusssed in it?

It really proves nothing. Except that there are many views expressed here, all just as valid.

During the same week, as has been pointed out, there have many more than 80 posts, most of these exclusively about music, in the many other threads on the forum.

What you do is of course your decision. I hope we will all still be here in six months or so. If we are, I am sure you will be very welcome........

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Peter T.
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 11:32 AM

An important question is raised here: how come there are many, many recordings of bird calls, but none of birds doing other things? They certainly must make sounds regurgitating (I have seen mother birds do this, and a revolting maternal spectacle it is), and engaging in other bodily activities. Where is the Folkways Recording of Bird Flatulence from Around the World? This is surely a lacuna (a red-breasted lacuna) in the sonic archives.

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Art Thieme
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 11:43 AM

My post was a tall tale---an eminent part of folklore. Still the sounds emitted by blue herons are simply an excruciating SCRAWWWWKKKKK (as are their farts--albeit at fewer decibels)!!!

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 11:51 AM

On my PC the "messages since last visit" facility always freezes up, so I never use it. I'd sooner rely on the Tracer to keep track of threads I'm following.

So for me anyway it makes no difference how many posts there are to threads - except of course that threads which get lots of posts stay up the top of the page. If I feel like looking for a music thread, I just scroll to the bottom and start from there, and maybe save one that's been overlooked from vanishing of the page.

I think that 70% music threads in a time like last weeks is pretty incredible. What is often in short supply isn't music threads as such, it's music threads that turn into music discussions, but then that is always the case.

I think that more of us should use our imagination in crafting our posts sometimes - put in links to other relevant threads, especially music ones, and so forth. If we quote a song, stick a link to it, and so forth.

As for Bill Broonzy's view on Stravinsky, I'd actually be interested in knowing that, if he got round to expressing them. In fact all of Peter T's - Modes? What Bill Broonzy thought about Igor Stravinsky? Counterpoint in bluegrass? The provenance of handbills in early 19th century Dublin? struck me as interesting, if esoteric. What's wrong with esoteric anyway?

As I took his point, Peter was indicating scepticism at the assumption that there has been an exodus of all the people who might be interested in such topics. I'm sceptical about it too. There's a turnover of people from time to time, but that's not the same thing.

If "the serious music people" have moved on somewhere that is better for that kind of stuff, I'd be grateful to know where that might be, because I've never found it.

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: catspaw49
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 12:09 PM

Well, people have a way of going and coming and being replaced...........You know, like you lose a 'Bruce O.' and you gain a 'masato sakurai.' (:<))

Spaw

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Big Mick
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 12:42 PM

Yep, Spaw, that is a spot on observation. In my heart of hearts, I wish that the place would somehow serve the needs of all of those that have been here. Some that have left have touched my music and my spirit in very special ways. I miss them. I miss Bruce O. But it is as I said when he announced his departure, if you just can't live with it the way it is, then it is best you leave. That wasn't a desire for him to leave. Just that you can't change the essential nature of the place to what you want it to be. But I really think that the "goings" miss what the real beauty of the place is. The Mudcat can be whatever you desire it to be. And it can be different things to the same person depending on where the old noggin is at the time. This past 10 days it has been an invaluable place for me to get a read on 9/11 from a variety of perspectives, including the perspectives of friends very close to Ground Hero. Other times it is, for me, a place to talk issues near and dear to me, that inspire the music I sing. At other times, such as now, when I am headed into a time of change and intense work on new instruments, it is a source of knowledge that I can find no where else. And sometimes it is a place where I can escape from the very serious work that I do and just be a smartass, or crabby, or very serious. But at all times it is an inspiring place, where I have made many friends. In the end, that is why I will never leave. Because I have made true friends of the heart here. And they know who they are.

Yeah, I wish they would all come back, because I miss their contributions. I wish they would come back and quit complaining about the parts they don't like. Instead, just use this incredible village in whatever way suits their needs best.

All the best,

Mick

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 12:45 PM

McGrath, 70% would be remarkable at any time here. What has been forgotton is that Susan posted 30+ Lyric adds for spirituals on the 20th. Discounting that batch, going by Amos' figures, there would have been <40 musical threads running - or a balance of somewhere than <53% musical threads.

Personally I believe that paints a more accurate picture over the period in question.

Jon

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: The Shambles
Date: 23 Sep 01 - 01:01 PM

Is it the main point that, the period in question was a very remarkable period....... In all our lives?

Subject: RE: What has happened here?
From: Pseudolus
Date: 24 Sep 01 - 08:18 AM

I left for a while because or some of my own personal frustrations and aside from a couple PM's I didn't tell anyone I was leaving......and to be honest, I don't think that most people noticed!! LOL!!!

Frank