> While it is informative, it could easily > turn commercial or biased - perhaps only because you will need money to pay > for its hosting! > The way Marko used to manage vocalist.org was more neutral, IMHO. What if I > or other Vocalisters give you archives or other stuff that will bring > traffic to your site, and then we discover that it is more and more about > "Self Hypnosis" or "Speech Level Singing" or whatever?
Most of the links on vocalist.org have no affiliate arrangement and the likelihood of the site earning any significant commission is very slim. If anyone would like to order 13500 USD worth of sheet music from the site, then that would put me close to break-even point, after which all I would need to find is money for the monthly hosting costs.
To not accept affiliate agreements with products which naturally complement the site, would, in my opinion be madness. If to "turn commercial" means to feature banners unrelated to singing such as ads for swimwear which I have seen elsewhere - then vocalist.org will not be "commercial" while it is under my ownership.
I expect vocalist.org to be a hobby which loses money, but not too much. I am an ex-company director and IT specialist who is now training as a classical vocalist - running the vocalist.org website seems to me to be a natural project for me to take on.
Marko did a fantastic job and may have had a more "neutral" approach, but he was donating his time and the university donated the server. Donations are nice, but free and "neutral" donations do not tend to go on forever. Of course, the web site vocalist.org did not go on forever as it was. Maybe marko became busy with a "proper job"; http://www.ltt.de/java-days.2002/helsinki.shtml ????? THE Marko ????
I hope vocalist.org can grow in to a useful free information service for vocalists worldwide. It is now only a couple of weeks old. I have managed to write a couple of articles for the site, but I have not had much time, so there is still not much content.
Yes, I will gladly accept contributions for the site. I too want the site to be more about "whatever", but I can not just pluck pages full of original content out of thin air.
John
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