Tutorial Six: The internet and online communities

For this tutorial I have chosen the almighty guitar and music (again!). The three communities I have chosen are ultimate guitar, you tube and foo fighters.com.

1)   http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/ 

2)  http://www.youtube.com/ 

3)  http://www.foofighters.com/


Descriptions

1. Ultimate-guitar.com: This sight is mostly used for people who play the guitar or bass to acess free TABS (music sheets). Here you can access millions of TAB by pretty much any band/artist you can think of!!!. Also included on this site is news, reviews (bands, gear etc), interviews, lessons, forums, contests, youtube. A must wensite for the guitar/bass player and music fan!
2. Youtube.com: Everyone knows this site, probably does not need explaining. This site is perfect for listening to your favorite music but also checking out amazing covers and uploading your own music! Here's a song by John Butler Trio that Ive recently discovered, its truly amazing!  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VAkOhXIsI0




    3. Foofighters.com: Im a crazy foo fighters fan and I just wanted to use this band as an example of fan web sites. Here you can find anything to do with the foo (haha a rhyme) this includes news, tour, music, videos, film, fans, shop, biography and forums. You can find these kind of sites for pretty much any band!


What services are provided?

All of these sites are interactive in there own ways. Ultimate-guitar you can chat to other users about gear, bands and TAB. One can also upload TAB so others can use these. Youtube is very interactive with space for comments under neath for feed back or in some cases abuse, also other people can suggest video's for others to watch or have their own channel that people can access and get email updates when a new video is uploaded .Foo fighters.com has chat rooms for fans to mingle about the band and upcoming tours and albums (wasting light out now!!!!).


One might ask why someone would want to contribute to these sites? the answer is fairly easy. People that access these sites share a common interest with the millions of other people that are on these sites daily. Being a person that visits these sites quite regulary I can say I enjoy sharing my views, beliefs, likes/dislikes and having discussions with other individuals who enjoy the same things I do, which is a natural thing!!!! People are seeking enjoyment and maybe more knowledge about the things they love. It could also be they are seeking something they want for example they wanna learn a new song, watch the latest music video or find out information that you cant access regulary some where else.


Here are some examples of what you could see on these sites.

Foo Fighters: Here is an example from the forum on the site. A fan letter to dave grohl.    http://bbs.foofighters.com/showthread.php?t=31600

Dear Mr. Grohl,

Knowing you are an avid chess player, I was wondering if you would be interesting in playing me sometime. I understand you are very busy, so I am willing to wait until the end of your current tour before playing you in a Best of 3 chess game. I hope it will be enjoyable for you and myself, as well as the large crowd such an interesting match-up is bound to draw.

I feel we should use a glass chess set, I feel it looks better and refracts the light nicely, but I will use a standard wooden chess set if you want to.

I would also like to play you at Scrabble, but I feel that with you being American, it could lead to arguments over correct spelling, so we'll play Risk instead.

Thank you for your time,
Thomas.

Ultimate-guitar: Here is an example of guitar TAB, hunger strike by Temple of the Dog.

------------------------------------------
-----0---3-----3--------0---3-----3-------
---0---0---0----------0---0---0-----------
-0-----------0------2-----------2---------
------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------         

play 4x j      
------------------
------------------
------------------
------------4b----
0-2--0-2----------
0-2--0-2----------

 Youtube: Here is an example of a young man putting his cover of "ocean" by john butler trio on the net, sharing it with the world to see. Truly amazing, a must watch!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T10cNbHnkYQ

Ethics

Some of the ethical issues with these sites is that no-body actually knows who the person is commenting. 

A good example of this is youtube, when people leave nasty comments, all that can be done is blocking the indivdual.

People think and say whatever they want cos theyre just a name on a page. This can also be bad as you dont know

the age or the sex of that person.

Overall these communites are pretty good. They have about as much identitification of indivduals as any other site and

administers watch the sites closely for in appropriate comments or videos. These communities help to bring people

together with a common interest and I would recomment these sites to anyone who shared the similar interset.

Matt out =)