Benji wrote:First, to Jason Tee, who oh so eloquently described the site as "dull and unorganized" and then later posted that he hope he didn't offend anyone.
Well Jason, don't worry, you've probably only offended a handful of people. Namely me, Maysan, Glenn, and whoever else who has spent their time contributing to that site. My basic response is "screw you"
Maybe dull wasn't appropriate. Maybe saying "so unorganized" wasn't either. However, these comments aren't as harsh as your inappropriate response. All I can say is that I am happy that I do not have to moderate this board anymore.
VMH could use a little cleaning up once individuals have time. Even the welcome screen is a combination of recent news, a complaint against EMI, and a biography. I realize that any modifications won't be easy since there is several hundred pages to deal with.
There's nothing wrong with a little constructive criticism.
How funny...some of us can make comments and say comments that arent necessarily appropriate, yet when someone says something of the same to you, you realize that OMG (Gasp) That wasn't appropriate...BUT WERE YOU THINKING WHEN YOU SAID WHAT YOU SAID...uh no...I think not.
All I can say is that I am happy that I do not have to moderate this board anymore.
Why is that Joe?
Anyway I can design a much better website than that.
I bet you could... ??? ... And if that is the case, why not offer support and help to this site that you seem to see as inferior to you and what you can do. Why not contribute to the site so that it DOES STAY updated?
It was about as much fun as being a referee/umpire/etc.
Regarding being a Moderator, I'd like to quote the Flintstone's where Fred is reading the Little League Umpire Book that ends with "... just remember sticks and stones may break your bones but names can never hurt you."; but I cannot seem to find the entire quote on the Internet.
BTW, there's a difference between stating an personal opinion, being inappropriate, and being totally out of line.
im very well aware of the differences in stating a personal opinion, being inappropriate and being out of line.
I dont see why moderating the forum was such a hard thing. Its not like there werer tons of debates, usually it was just chat about this or that, then occasionally something would happen and a debate would spawn, but isn't that the point of a forum?? Which is why I dont understand why you make it sound as moderating was such a complicated, and hard thing to do.
vanessamae.com was the first site i eva found, it was great, had heeps of info and a lot of other stuff 2, i admint it hasnt been upgraded extensively in a while, but everytime i go their there is something new. as for the mailing list, i think it was that that put me onto the yahoo VM group. else i would of had no idea about the yahoo group. i cant remember having anything since, but i still got one or 2 things from it.
to Jason Tee,
--> Well,
--> I'm sorry about my statement..
--> Anyway
--> I can design a much better website than that
have u eva tried to make a site with so much info, as many pages, making sure they all work together and looks half decent? im a programmer, both normal application and web based, and i can tell u now, its not easy making a proper site. u maybe able to design a site better, but could u actually code it and get it on the web? not only that but have it up as long as www.vanessamae.com has been up for. i can assure u now, getting a reasonable site out is NOT putting a title in front page express followed by a few fancy pictures.
i rather like the site, and even though its not updated all that much, it still has heeps of relevent infomation for thoes just interested in VM or thoes that have know about her for a while. and can someone please tell me a site that is more updated than www.vanessamae.com? (besides forums) as id like to c it.
Hello all, Maysan and I run the vanessamae.com site and I can understand everyone's concern for its lack of updates. There are many reason why it has been quiet for a good while since any updates have been added. But I'll offer the 2 primary reasons why the site has been stagnant for a while.
1. When Vanessa dissolved her relationship with Mel Bush, my contacts to Vanessa and EMI also dissolved. When I can't talk to or email her or her management there is not much I can do to get honest up-to-date information. Especially considering that I live in the much-neglected USA. (her record company in the USA "Virgin" & "Angel" were equally kept in the dark).
2. Time. I have a young family and am a busy person with work and a home. Maysan, (recently married) has been busy building a successful business in his troubled homeland of Indonesia. We each have so many projects that doing all we'd like is quite a troubling challenge.
I had reconnected with EMI when they wanted to push Vanessa's "Subject to Change" CD. They were really helpful initially. Supplied a sample CD, photos and such. They wanted to have an "Ask Vanessa a Question" contest where the winner would win a CD. I convinced them that they should have 10 CD winners across both Haidee's and my sites. And then,... EMI seemed to have lost interest and nothing happened. As far as I know no one got anything. Very Disappointing. Even when Vanessa played in Indonesia last year just 20km from Maysans home, he got no email or tickets from EMI even though that, and more, was promised.
The forum on our site was something EMI had asked us to do. I was concerned because I felt we would be stepping on Haidee's turf as she had/has a great forum already up and running. But EMI had great plans so we moved forward. Our forum was supposed to be a more direct interaction with Vanessa.
I have not pushed the Vanessamae.com forum at all because doing so, in my view would be stupid. That is, this forum,.. Haidee's forum, is a great place where Vanessa-Mae fans gather and share thoughts, stories and information. Why divert and divide this dialog. So when EMI stopped calling we stopped supporting the forum. I had it offline for a while but it is recently back up as we actually do have some designers working on the site.
Now as for general condition of the site. Yes, very true. We are quite out of date. I suppose I could have taken some material from Haidee's, Sebastian's and others (as many have been quite free with lifting our material without credit) but that was not really what I wanted to do. You guys were carry the flame quite well.
For those long time fans you likely know we've been around for a long time, actually longer than our site lists as were were originally on free pages in the mid 90's. You've likely noticed many of your old Vanessa-Mae links go to dead pages now. We will always be active, always be here, always provide information. We (Maysan and I) currently have designers working on the site to provide a fresh & new interface. We have also preserved many of the old early premiere VM's sites of Tommy Newman, Norman Choo, Frank Langberg and Keith's Classical site (you all do remember them, right?) and are considering how to handle them, (maybe an oldies page of sorts of the content of dead sites) don't know it's all in the works currently. I have so much content it's an organizational nightmare.
Hey,... Chat and discuss freely, have fun. Play Vanessa's CD's and be sure of course to "Keep it Red Hot"
Jason, No problem.
Critcism is fine and usually helpful provided it is delivered in a constructive manner with a positive basis. The current design was done long ago and tools and methods have improved greatly. Weve been working on paying customers sites and let our VM site languish until recently. We, like Haidee will be displaying a new look quite soon. You've seen our resurected forum which served the techscape interests and includes the Vanessa-Mae component. I'm not sure where we'll go with that as 2 forums is not really sensible (to me anyway).
As for the mailing list , there has actually has been 2. The original (VM-L) started by in June 1995 by Tommy Newman (called Francis at the time) and Frank Langberg. The first 6 months grew to maybe 25 people but the posts (all by email) were often a waste, lots of 1 to 3 word replys to 1 to 3 work comments which almost killed it then it began to roll and we soon had 200 to 300 members, many active. It was great fun for several years. Frank Langberg was hosting and managing the list on his universities computer and was getting some complaints. Also at that time VM-L activity was dropping, info being shared was no fresh and Frank was soon leaving the University. We took over the List and Franks site and ran it for a while. The List software we used worked but was poor. After a few months we bought software to run the list and it was faulty, people got hammered with 100 repeat emails, an installed patch actually made it worse. Had to shut it down.
Is an email list a viable offering today now that the internet is fairly mature? I don't know. But it is good for people who don't check the forums regularly to get a "Breaking" email about a TV appearance, concert of quarterly message to fans by Vanessa. Personally that's all I see a "list" good for now.
Thanks for this explaniation. It certainly clears the matter no w ehave some background information.
We all know how bad EMI is with help and providing information. It must have been really disappointing to you and Maysan, and probably also to Vanessa-Mae herself, alltough she is part of the team and can demand or force changes.
We have expresed several times in this forum our hopes that Vanessa-Mae would change record company. As it seems now, she is considering her options for this.
All I did at the start of this topic is mentioning that Maysan restarted the mailing list. I told this forum that I had posted in the forum of VMH some critical notes regarding the mailing list because I had suffered some negative experience with it in the past.
Maysan didn't reply to my post, but deleted it instead. And when I posted it again, Maysan simply deleted it again and diabled my login.
I am rather annoyed by that. I hope you, as well as others and espacially Benji, can understand that.
I have always liked VMH as website very much. The design is beautiful and information about Vanessa-Mae is very good until end 1998 and 1999. Sadly enough updates with new photos, articles and tour dates became rare.
I hope that with a new 'state of the art' design, VMH will become an active and lively site again.
I'm glad I could add some background and clarity to the discussion. There is much more detail than what I wrote but to write more kind of abuses the intent of the forum.
Discussing Vanessa-Mae, her music, and our feelings and interactions with Vanessa and her music are more the intentions of a forum and not discussion of each other.
Basically, to stay on topic.
I feel it is this belief that compelled Maysan to delete your post. It wasn't that it was really off topic but that it was laying the seed for, lets just say, unhealthy discussion. We have all seen, read and experienced some rather nasty discussions unfortunately. I believe Maysan was trying to get things rolling out on a positive. So do try and be supportive, afterall we are all are looking to a common goal.
So please don't take it personally. Thanks
Remember he (Maysan) has spent his own money to buy the software and server to run this, we also pay for the traffic (bandwith) through the site. Why?? because we are dedicated to support Vanessa and her music. Ten years from now we expect to still be here, even if Vanessa folds up, gets married and lives a quite life in a small villa in south east France (you know, she's got to be near the ski slopes . :laugh: )
As for Vanessa changing to a new record company. It would probably be good to move to a more progressive organization but such a move is also very risky. Doing such cuts your business ties and can actually disrail her career. My feeling is that she should have changed 3+ years ago when she was still very hot and could use that leverage for a better deal.
Her strength is in Asia and her marketing efforts completely waste their potential. She could readily become a superstar in asia with a group such as Avexnet behind her who very actively support their stable of artist throughout Asia and fully understand the internet.
Vanessa's approach is still very European. She should play to her strengths,.. Asia. As for the USA, I'm sorry to say that the US Music industry has become a money controlled closed system. Some label only push and support agressively 3 artists. Just listen to US radio and you'll hear what I mean.
I appreciate Maysan's work with his site to promote Vanessa-Mae and her music very much. I care about Vanessa-Mae and I welcome all work and initiatives that favour her career and her personal well being in that.
I agree that we should focus on that what binds us and that is Vanessa-Mae and her music. We all want the best for her and we all express this in our own way. That is good.
But I stick to my opnion that there were no reasons for Maysan to delete my posts and disable my login.
I feel not welcome in his forum anymore. I have sent him an email to express my feelings and to explain why I posted my critical notes and doubts regarding the mailing list. I asked him whether he appreciates my contributions to his forum and if yes to re-activate my login. I am not going to register again myself.
Benji wrote:First, to Jason Tee, who oh so eloquently described the site as "dull and unorganized" and then later posted that he hope he didn't offend anyone.
Well Jason, don't worry, you've probably only offended a handful of people. Namely me, Maysan, Glenn, and whoever else who has spent their time contributing to that site. My basic response is "screw you"
Maybe dull wasn't appropriate. Maybe saying "so unorganized" wasn't either. However, these comments aren't as harsh as your inappropriate response. All I can say is that I am happy that I do not have to moderate this board anymore.
VMH could use a little cleaning up once individuals have time. Even the welcome screen is a combination of recent news, a complaint against EMI, and a biography. I realize that any modifications won't be easy since there is several hundred pages to deal with.
There's nothing wrong with a little constructive criticism.
The reason for my harsh response was because:
1) It wasn't 'constructive criticism' .. Constructive criticism includes ways of improving on the current design. Saying it's 'dull and unorganized' is not constructive criticism no matter how you look at it.
2) For him to turn around and say that 'I can build a better website' lets me further know that his comments weren't out of concern for the site.
Now actually, you did offer constructive criticism by saying that the site should be updated with recent photos, interviews, etc. However, I know that that's easier said then done. Glenn already addressed most of the reasons why the site hasn't been updated. But even in its outdatedness, it provides a doorway to the past for those who are just getting to know Vanessa-Mae.
