The document details the establishment and maintenance of a community-based music website in Newcastle, focusing on local artists and events since 1999. It highlights the website's extensive content, including profiles of over 4,500 local musicians and a comprehensive gig guide, while emphasizing the role of volunteers and open-source software in its operation. The aim is to promote local music culture, foster community engagement, and provide a unified platform for Newcastle's music scene.

1. Maintaining a Community Based Music Website with Open Source Software Open Source Developers Conference 27 th November 2009

2. In the beginning… Newcastle has a thriving music scene Members of the community lacked cohesion No support from commercial radio .com excitement in 1999

5. Newcastle Music Directory www.newcastlemusic.com Online since 1999 Over 4500 local artists listed Focuses on music from the Hunter Valley and Central Coast Site has over 8000 pages Updated frequently Sections include: News Links Videos Gig Guide

6. TE Archive Online since mid 2002 Site is located at 15min.org (ie. 15 minutes of fame) Features articles from the TE liftout from May 1998 to March 2006 Over 13,000 pages Over 6,500 images

7. Geographical Focus Focuses solely on musical artists and websites from Newcastle and the surrounding regions Allows the site to be comprehensive

8. Geographical Focus

9. Why “Local” Music? You can talk to the musicians after the gig

10. Why “Local” Music? You can talk to the musicians after the gig The musicians will play weekly/monthly in your area

11. Why “Local” Music? You can talk to the musicians after the gig The musicians will play weekly/monthly in your area CDs are cheaper

12. Why “Local” Music? You can talk to the musicians after the gig The musicians will play weekly/monthly in your area CDs are cheaper Support the economy of your local region

13. Why “Local” Music? You can talk to the musicians after the gig The musicians will play weekly/monthly in your area CDs are cheaper Support the economy of your local region Local musicians don’t mime

15. Why Do This For Free? From Wednesday’s keynote talk: Volunteers are “not motivated by financial or material gain” Volunteers are “motivated by ideology”

16. Volunteering Many local musos effectively volunteer their time for their passion Much of the local music industry is run on goodwill

17. Aims Focus strictly on the region around Newcastle, to the point of actively excluding news from other areas

18. Aims Provide the Newcastle region with a musical identity of its own that bands and artists are proud to identify with.

19. Aims Provide the region with a comprehensive list of current gigs and events.

20. Aims Provide a comprehensive list of links to locally based websites that relate to the music scene.

21. Aims Provide up-to-date and informative profiles for as many local bands and artists as possible.

22. Aims Provide maps and information about local pubs, clubs and musical venues.

23. Aims Provide an archive historical information about the local music scene for long term reference.

24. Aims Provide a unified voice to highlight the musical talent of the region to people from other areas.

25. Aims Meet and collaborate with other people interested in the local music scene

26. Looking Back … Started compiling links and information about the music scene in 1999 Have published over 20,000 pages about the local music industry on the internet Have volunteered over 7000 hours to the local music scene Received an award from in October 2005 for volunteer services to the local music industry Involvement in local music festivals and competitions All while working full time as an Engineer

27. Volunteers Award in 2005

29. Effects of the Regional Focus Never any argument about what should be included on the site Restricted market – only really of relevance to the people of Newcastle (~1million people) Allows the website to become vwery comprehensive (~80% coverage?)

30. Types of Information Bands and Artists Radio Larger Bands and Orchestras - Marching Bands, Orchestras, Choirs Services Music Shops

31. Types of Information Recording Studios Mobile Discos Music Organisations Record Labels Production Tuition

32. Types of Information Media Events Managers and Agents Sound and Lighting Promotion Photography

33. Sources of Information Free webhosting services such as Geocities etc. Mp3.com Their own fully hosted domains mp3.com.au www.abc.net.au/newcastle as part of the ABC Newcastle Music Awards PureVolume.com MySpace.com Blogs on services such as blogger.com Press releases

34. Sources of Information Newspapers flickr.com Triple J Unearthed YouTube.com Booking agents and promoters websites Facebook Google Calendars Twitter ABC Contribute Word of mouth

35. Link to External Websites Often the artist will maintain a bio/gig guide etc on another website newcastlemusic.com has no login system

36. Automated Aggregation of Information More recently websites have allowed access to information via: RSS API Copying information from external websites (with the artists permission)

37. Embedded YouTube Video Bandwidth supplied by YouTube Information retrieved from YouTube via RSS Playtime Author Upload date About 2000 videos are embedded in the site

38. RSS Really Simple Syndycation Many websites automatically generate RSS “feeds” when you update them Livejournal MySpace Blogspot Youtube Flickr etc. RSS allows people to subscribe to your blog Alerts people that you have updated your website without them visiting the site. Is a form of XML (eXtensible Markup Language)

39. Artists Blog Entries Automatically brought into the site daily via RSS feeds Subscribed to over 3500 myspace blogs from the Newcastle music industry Provides an excellent source of up to date news about the local music scene

40. The Gig Guide Published around 1300 local events per month An additional 500 events from outside the region on the artists profiles Significant effort is made to filter out the local gigs

41. Number of Local Gigs Published

43. The Gig Guide Database Required a complete list of local venues and artists Compilation of such lists took over 5 years Required significant local knowledge Currently contains: 650 venues 4500 artists

44. Venues from the Newcastle Region Indexed using Google Maps

45. Venue Locations

46. Venue Locations

47. Sources of Gig Information Booking agents Venues Band Homepages Google Calendar Various other sources

48. Maintaining the Gig Guide Identifying and removing duplicate entries

49. Maintaining the Gig Guide Identifying and removing duplicate entries Catching misspelled band or venue names

50. Maintaining the Gig Guide Identifying and removing duplicate entries Catching misspelled band or venue names Deleting cancelled gigs from the database

51. Maintaining the Gig Guide Identifying and removing duplicate entries Catching misspelled band or venue names Deleting cancelled gigs from the database Ensuring that the correct band and venue are linked to a particular event in the database

52. Maintaining the Gig Guide Identifying and removing duplicate entries Catching misspelled band or venue names Deleting cancelled gigs from the database Ensuring that the correct band and venue are linked to a particular event in the database Specifying the time of an event if not otherwise stated.

53. Updating Gig Information Identify source Disable all future gigs from that source For each gig: Re-enable if already found in database Add new event if not found This allows for cancellations/modifications

54. Maintaining the Gig Guide Database maintenance is not performed on the webserver Uploaded twice a week Much more stable and maintainable as a result

55. Gig Archive Over 50000 gigs from around the region All gigs link to artist profile and map of venue Archiving started in November 2006

56. Open Information Local booking agents and promoters are protective about their business practices Which venues they represent How often venues have entertainment Contact details for venues and artists

57. Open Information Local booking agents and promoters are protective about their business practices Which venues they represent How often venues have entertainment Contact details for venues and artists

58. Bringing the Community Together

59. Open Source Software All websites built on open source software Apache MySQL Wordpress Various libraries (Magpie RSS etc etc)

60. Open Source Software Allowed the management these websites and the data behind them on a shoestring

61. In for the long haul … Open Source technologies allow flexibility and continuity

62. The Stickybeak In use on all websites since 2002 Released in 2004 Operates in a similar way to Google Analytics Available from www.stickybeak.com

63. Newcastle Music Directory Page Requests Per Day

64. Silverchair Profile Requests

65. Artists Profile Requests

66. Section Usage

67. Sitemap

68. Web vs Print Media Internet and print media very different types of content Advertising in music print media often considered content on music websites Case Study: Reverb Street Press

69. Reverb Street Press Content Street Press content was analysed during late 2007 Approximately 10% of the space was devoted to local artists Over 40% of the page space contained advertisements

72. Advertising

73. Conclusion Open source technologies have allowed the Newcastle Music Directory to grow in an adaptive and economical manner over a sustained period of development.

74. Conclusion The result is a website which provides relevant information about the music scene to the people of the Newcastle region.

75. http://www.newcastlemusic.com/ twitter.com/newcastlemusic

77. Local Music on the Internet Library of over 13,000 songs Sourced from: JJJ Unearthed Mp3.com.au MySpace ABC 1233 Awards All are indexed by: File type Stream/download Stereo/mono Play Time File Size Sample Rate Bit Rate

78. Newcastle Survey February 2007 515 Download MySpace 2033 Stream MySpace 1598 Download mp3.com.au 846 Download Triple J 1508 Stream ABC Count Type Source

79. Bit Rates For Files in Newcastle Survey Feb 2007

80. ID3 Tags Allows attributes to be embedded in sound files Possible attributes include: Artist name Song name Genre Filesize, bit rate, sample rate Important for players to identify songs Important for listeners managing mp3 libraries Search for “id3 tag editor” on the internet and you will find many freely available programs to manipulate these tags More information at http://www.id3.org/

81. ID3 Tags in the Local Music Survey 81% of songs did not have the “title” tag set 78% of songs did not have the “artist” tag set 85% of songs did not set the “genre” tag

82. ABC Music Awards Archive ABC Local Radio changed their website in March 2008 Deleted their 2500 page archive of previous music awards entries They have allowed me to republish the information

83. Referrals From Google