View Poll Results: Who representative are forumites of Cerocers in general?

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  • Forumites represent the average Cerocer on the whole

    2 6.06%
  • Forumites don't represent the average Cerocer on the whole

    25 75.76%
  • I don't know

    6 18.18%
  • Happy Christmas

    16 48.48%
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Thread: How representative is the Forum?

  1. #41
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Quote Originally Posted by Gus View Post
    ...I would not say that playing at such and such an event make someone any more important or influential than anyone else.
    I think I would have to disagree with you here because I personnally think that within the Ceroc and MJ community Jon and Wes Southport weekenders are considered to be the best.I really find it hard that you might dispute that.With that in mind I would say that any DJ worth his salt would consider an invitation to play there as an honour.The mere fact of being invited would,I imagine,at the very least boast the moral and confidence of any DJ,while if not actually making them either important or influential.

    Quote Originally Posted by Gus
    One of the most influential DJs, though not generally recognised, was Amir. My understanding is that his music in the 2003/4 period led to a lot of the tango fusion and ulta-lounge music coming into the mainstream.
    I have to confess that I always assumed Amir was a very accomplished teacher rather than a DJ.

    Quote Originally Posted by Gus
    ..... The DJs who I see as having made the biggest impact on the national or their local scene are the likes of JB, Marc, Peter Phillips, Neil (Blitz Chester), TWK etc. There are DJs like DD and John Baker who probably ahve also had influence but I'm not in their area so can't comment.
    As I said Gus apart from not knowing the names of all the DJs,I did omit Marc and I cant say I am familiar with Neil and John Baker but you have just named four of the very DJs that were in my list.

  2. #42
    Commercial Operator Gus's Avatar
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Quote Originally Posted by djtrev View Post
    I think I would have to disagree with you here because I personnally think that within the Ceroc and MJ community Jon and Wes Southport weekenders are considered to be the best.
    Wasn't aware I said anything to the contrary? Can you show me where? As to Southport being the best ... well yes, there are many people who would agree with you as the Blues room is a feature that rates very highly ... but again its down to what you want. There are people who will say that Rock Bottoms is better. In Ceroc v Southport I would probably agree with you that Southport is the more favoured event ...but that doesn't mean that everone thinks that way.

    Quote Originally Posted by djtrev View Post
    I really find it hard that you might dispute that.
    We all have our cross to bear.

    Quote Originally Posted by djtrev View Post
    With that in mind I would say that any DJ worth his salt would consider an invitation to play there as an honour.
    Ugg? There are events DJs like to play. Some because of the huge numbers, e.g. Stockport; Weekender main rooms ... or because of the 'focused' group of dancer, e.g., Southport Blues room, Jango. I'm not sure that I'd use the term honour. Would you do it for free? I sort of see what you mean, its great to DJ at a major event, but I think you can take it too far. Are you saying that if you have played at Southport then you are a DJ that the common masses of DJs need to take note form?

    Quote Originally Posted by djtrev View Post
    The mere fact of being invited would,I imagine,at the very least boast the moral (I hope you mean morale ) and confidence of any DJ,while if not actually making them either important or influential.
    I think you'll find most DJs who have played the Big Weekenders are well past needing 'confidence' to play these events. To be honest, its a lot easier to play these events than the smaller local ones. With 1000 dancers, its very hard to clear the dancefloor (though there have been valiant attempts over the yaers). A far more nerve-wrecking event is playing a small freestyle at a venue where you don't know the dancers and sweat as you try to encourage them on the dancefloor.


    PS Moderators .... think this thread need splitting.

  3. #43
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Quote Originally Posted by Gus View Post
    As to Southport being the best ... well yes, there are many people who would agree with you as the Blues room is a feature that rates very highly ... but again its down to what you want. There are people who will say that Rock Bottoms is better. In Ceroc v Southport I would probably agree with you that Southport is the more favoured event ...but that doesn't mean that everone thinks that way.
    Quite agree. Southport, tho admittedly I've only been to one, rates quite low on my list.

    Which brings me to representation.
    This forum appears to me to be unrepresentative of the MJ world in that the vast majority of MJ'ers are once a week social animals, whereas this forum seems to attract.... better dancers is absolutely not necessarily correct, but maybe 'keener' dancers describes it well. Although I think there might be other 'social' aspects chipping in as well. It also seems to have a much larger representation of Blues, and to a slightly lesser extent, WCS dancers than actually exist in the real MJ world. This is presumably related to the 'keen' aspect.

  4. #44
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Quote Originally Posted by TA Guy View Post
    Quite agree. Southport, tho admittedly I've only been to one, rates quite low on my list.

    Which brings me to representation.
    This forum appears to me to be unrepresentative of the MJ world in that the vast majority of MJ'ers are once a week social animals, whereas this forum seems to attract.... better dancers is absolutely not necessarily correct, but maybe 'keener' dancers describes it well. Although I think there might be other 'social' aspects chipping in as well. It also seems to have a much larger representation of Blues, and to a slightly lesser extent, WCS dancers than actually exist in the real MJ world. This is presumably related to the 'keen' aspect.


    I especially like the use of the word "keener"

    There are some people who post on here who are beginners. But they've demonstrated that they are keen to know more by joining an on-line Forum. The only problem comes when the "keen" dancers start giving advice.

    Recently it's been even harder to separate the "keen" from the skilled now that it's so easy to check your spelling ...

  5. #45
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Quote Originally Posted by Andy McGregor View Post


    I especially like the use of the word "keener"

    There are some people who post on here who are beginners. But they've demonstrated that they are keen to know more by joining an on-line Forum. The only problem comes when the "keen" dancers start giving advice.

    Recently it's been even harder to separate the "keen" from the skilled now that it's so easy to check your spelling ...
    Don't worry. I still don't bother checking!

  6. #46
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Quote Originally Posted by Gus View Post
    Ugg? There are events DJs like to play. Some because of the huge numbers, e.g. Stockport; Weekender main rooms ... or because of the 'focused' group of dancer, e.g., Southport Blues room, Jango. I'm not sure that I'd use the term honour. Would you do it for free? I sort of see what you mean, its great to DJ at a major event, but I think you can take it too far. Are you saying that if you have played at Southport then you are a DJ that the common masses of DJs need to take note form?



    I think you'll find most DJs who have played the Big Weekenders are well past needing 'confidence' to play these events. To be honest, its a lot easier to play these events than the smaller local ones. With 1000 dancers, its very hard to clear the dancefloor (though there have been valiant attempts over the yaers). A far more nerve-wrecking event is playing a small freestyle at a venue where you don't know the dancers and sweat as you try to encourage them on the dancefloor




    PS Moderators .... think this thread need splitting.
    On the assumption that if I was officially invited to play at Southport and given free board*then YES I would do it for free.

    *Or am I living in cloud cuckoo land!!

  7. #47
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Quote Originally Posted by Steven666 View Post
    Don't worry. I still don't bother checking!
    And some people are stealth "keen", in that they can spell and punctuate like someone with a brain

  8. #48
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    There's a discrepancy between the thread title and the OP here, which is a bit ing...

    But answering both:
    - "How representative of the MJ world is the forum?" - much more so now than it used to be a couple of years ago, I think. Still not particularly representative - it's quite teacher/crew/DJ top-heavy - but there are more actual punters posting now I think.
    - How influential is the forum?" - very uninfluential, I reckon, except for some specialised instances where there's a heavy forumite concentration, such as Southport. It's not supposed to be "influential", or a pressure group in any way, it's supposed to be a forum.

    And the third bonus question:
    Quote Originally Posted by Ghost View Post
    Why does the forum ban advertising if it would only reach such a small proportion of people?
    Advertising is banned because there's no way to make it work whilst retaining the essential atmosphere of the forum. It's nothing to do with the commercial side of things, so far as I know.

  9. #49
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Quote Originally Posted by DavidJames View Post
    Still not particularly representative - it's quite teacher/crew/DJ top-heavy - but there are more actual punters posting now I think.
    Is it? One of the things I was thinking about is how few Ceroc teachers post. Also, given there must be about 200+ 'teachers' in the UK ... how few of them contribute to threads.

    Having said all that .. though I think the Forum is unrepresentative .. is that an issue? I've always found it to be an invaluable source of information. If it doesn't represent the masses .. so what? The dancers who pack out my local venues wouldn't be interested in most of the topics discussed. They pack out the venues and don't really care about the standard of the teacher or the music ... they just go and have a good time ... because that is the standard they are used to.

  10. #50
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Quote Originally Posted by Rocky View Post
    If the Forum and its members were truly representative and were influential within the MJ scene as a whole they'd consider it to be important to be members too wouldn't they?
    The forum is certainly representative of your average modern jive customer - we have all ages, sexes, heights and races on here. We have professionals through to newbies. There really is nothing exclusive about this forum. You can suggest that it takes a "certain sort of person" to register to the forum, but it also takes a "certain sort" to have an email address or a mobile phone - there is no big deal about the internet to most people and this forum has long ago gone beyond only people who go to Ceroc classes in Scotland - to be pretty representative.

    I wouldn't say there is anything influential about this forum though - its just a forum. Occasionally it has been the first point of comment about certain things - but that merely makes it a good communication tool.

    As for Nigel, Nina et al becoming members ? Even if the forum was seen as hugely influential it doesn't follow that "they" would be consider it important to be members. If you go on a sci-fi books forum, you don't expect to have famous novelists hanging off your every word.

  11. #51
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Quote Originally Posted by Gus View Post
    Is it? One of the things I was thinking about is how few Ceroc teachers post. Also, given there must be about 200+ 'teachers' in the UK ... how few of them contribute to threads.
    From here, there are quite a few Ceroc teachers / Commercial Operators - certainly seems quite top-heavy to me.

    Quote Originally Posted by Gus View Post
    Having said all that .. though I think the Forum is unrepresentative .. is that an issue?
    Not to me - but then, I like being elitist

  12. #52
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Quote Originally Posted by DavidJames View Post
    From here, there are quite a few Ceroc teachers / Commercial Operators - certainly seems quite top-heavy to me.
    But how often do they contribute? Being a silent member of a Forum is rather like having sex in a full rubber suit in separate rooms.

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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Quote Originally Posted by Gus View Post
    But how often do they contribute? Being a silent member of a Forum is rather like having sex in a full rubber suit in separate rooms.
    I can promise you that Gus will be in a separate room from me the whole time he's having sex in a full rubber suit

    I don't even want to be downwind of that room

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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Quote Originally Posted by Gus View Post
    .......
    Having said all that .. though I think the Forum is unrepresentative .. is that an issue? I've always found it to be an invaluable source of information. If it doesn't represent the masses .. so what? The dancers who pack out my local venues wouldn't be interested in most of the topics discussed. They pack out the venues and don't really care about the standard of the teacher or the music ... they just go and have a good time ... because that is the standard they are used to.

  15. #55
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    ... and I'm presuming that with the tourists on the site that they aren't part of the data collection when deciding how representative the forum is? (e.g. Aussies & Kiwis)

  16. #56
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Quote Originally Posted by Gus View Post
    But how often do they contribute?
    Ummm, there are about 800 active members - I'm sure that there are more than 8 teachers contributing regularly, so if we assume that an average venue has 100 attendees, it's top-heavy.

    Further actual analysis would require, well, work or something.

    Quote Originally Posted by Gus View Post
    Being a silent member of a Forum is rather like having sex in a full rubber suit in separate rooms.
    Umm, OK, I'll have to take your word for that one.

    But FWIW, Neilsen did a useful article analysing typical forum demographics - in his article here:
    Participation Inequality: Lurkers vs. Contributors in Internet Communities (Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox)

    The summary is:
    In most online communities, 90% of users are lurkers who never contribute, 9% of users contribute a little, and 1% of users account for almost all the action.
    By that yardstick, this forum is far more active than normal - I'd say more like 75 / 20 / 5, rather than 90 / 9 / 1.

  17. #57
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Quote Originally Posted by DavidJames View Post
    There's a discrepancy between the thread title and the OP here, which is a bit ing...
    Opps that wasn't deliberate - feel free to change "Who" to "How"

  18. #58
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Have been watching this thread with interest, but am still not sure of the answer.

    Quote Originally Posted by Dreadful Scathe View Post
    The forum is certainly representative of your average modern jive customer - we have all ages, sexes, heights and races on here. We have professionals through to newbies. There really is nothing exclusive about this forum. You can suggest that it takes a "certain sort of person" to register to the forum, but it also takes a "certain sort" to have an email address or a mobile phone - there is no big deal about the internet to most people and this forum has long ago gone beyond only people who go to Ceroc classes in Scotland - to be pretty representative.


    The only things apart from dancing that those who post have in common really is a liking of on-line communities, the time to post – and possibly the sight of their own words

    I guess that the real question is how representative is the forum of the opinions and experiences of the average MJ dancer? There I’d say probably not very.

    I’m probably closer to the average MJer in that I dance once or twice a week, mostly at my local venue and do limited weekenders. I don’t have time for much more (though I wish I did) – and I certainly don’t normally travel miles and miles for an evening’s dancing (though I might admire the dedication of those who do). But a lot of people on here dance several times a week, and most weekends. I know wonderful dancers at my local venue who rarely, if ever, go to a freestyle.

    Quote Originally Posted by Dreadful Scathe View Post
    I wouldn't say there is anything influential about this forum though - its just a forum. Occasionally it has been the first point of comment about certain things - but that merely makes it a good communication tool.
    Again And should it be influential?

    It is true that your average forumite probably has more and wider dance experience than your average MJer, and so maybe MJ businesses are actually losing out on a resource here, however who would have the time/energy to plough through the opinions on here to distil something useful?

    The forum has been useful to me personally in trying to change things however. On the odd occasion when I’ve had a problem with something, it’s been due to this forum that I’ve known who to complain to, and therefore managed to get something changed through a direct approach (am thinking specifically about my experience with the first Putney freestyle which I posted about with some vitriol!) An effort has been made to improve communications due to constructive criticism – without the forum, I doubt I’d have bothered to complain.

    Also, being a member here, and seeing people make comments, encouraged me to do something about a problem (as I saw it) at my local venue. The comments were welcomed (and apparently I wasn’t the only one who had the problem), and my comments made a small but immediate difference on the night, and then the person responsible positively encouraged me to give more feedback in the future.

    I’d therefore suggest that if forum members would like the forum to be influential (do they?), they not only let off steam on here (which can be useful, if only to gauge other’s opinions - or is that all that folks want to do, have a good whinge?), but actually tell the organisers, directly rather than just through this medium, what they like or don’t like. True, you might not get the answer you want, and if the business is doing well despite what you think and therefore doesn’t want to change you can then take your hard-earned dancing dosh elsewhere, where the service is more to your taste. And that is often what it boils down to – personal taste.

  19. #59
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    I enjoy letting off steam even is nothing positive happens, I feel less frustrated. Quite therapic.

    To answer the question, firstly - where is the data that the forum would need to match up to, to be representative?

  20. #60
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    Re: How representative is the Forum?

    Quote Originally Posted by Twirly View Post
    I guess that the real question is how representative is the forum of the opinions and experiences of the average MJ dancer? There I’d say probably not very.
    How do you figure? Is there something special about forumites ? All of us have danced MJ at some point, we come from varied backgrounds. To suggest that people on the forum do not represent your "average MJ dancer" suggests there is something special about people on the forum to set them apart from everyone else. What is it then? Personally I think we are as "average" as any MJ dancer you could accost going into a Ceroc night.


    ...some people may think they're special on here...but really, they're not

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