Guild Website?

[Chisa]

Time to start getting something suggested by several members into gear: a Gaian Graphic Designers Guild website!

I'm planning for November's offical contest to be a guild site layout one, but I think we need to get some ideas on the content together first so the layout can fit that.

Some things to think about.... What kind of content should be on the site? Should we update it monthly, like an e-zine, or have a few people update it frequently? Is there anyone willing to write articles? Should we have lots of separate sections, or have everything on a main page?

Here's some suggestions put forth by members previously:

IcyBlaze

My Idea for a Guild Site:

We start a guild site.

On the home Page there will be information about the guild and links to peoples portfolio pages. The homepage will be designed by one person (Probably SilverVixen).

Each member is alloted one page for a portfolio. Then on each member's portfolio page, the Member will implement his or her own design that will be unique to everyone else's.

This is an example of the Gaian Fashion Guild's magazine/site. It's not amazing, but the basic idea is there, and with all the talented people that we have here, I'm sure we can make a really fantastic looking (and functional) site.

Tell me your ideas/opinions! 3nodding  

[Triskdaemon]

In my opinion, a site for this guild would need image hosting, links to member pages, and it would be nice if we could run contests and announcements off the site (clean up those stickies!) rather than the forum, which isn't really ideal for that sort of thing. It would also make the site a more integral part of the guild. If we don't impart some necessary function to the site, it will be just as it is now: there, but unused. Just my thoughts.  

[Chisa]

TriskDaemon

In my opinion, a site for this guild would need image hosting, links to member pages, and it would be nice if we could run contests and announcements off the site (clean up those stickies!) rather than the forum, which isn't really ideal for that sort of thing. It would also make the site a more integral part of the guild. If we don't impart some necessary function to the site, it will be just as it is now: there, but unused. Just my thoughts.

I think our l33t master GhoSt-X can provide hosting and knows how to set up a way for members to upload pics through a browser, which would be very useful. xd

Putting up things that people need to know but don't need to respond to - like announcements, resources and member websites is a good idea, as long as people don't mind having an extra place to check instead of one central place. Maybe try to update the site weekly, monthly, or something regular, so everyone knows when to take a look at the site for updates?

You're right about the need to make it a more integral part of the guild so that its used; we'll have to keep that in mind for all aspects of it.  

[SilverVixen]

Oooh so exciting! I think that having a main page with basic info, important updates and stuff, and then having each person allowed a page for portfolio stuff is a great idea! Also, I say we either have a seperate section for articles, so people can submit them anytime and they're always there, or we could have a monthly magazine type thing and have issues like that.

We could definly make it an important part of the guild. Make sure everyone knows the link, and is active in helping with content.

Good ideas! Lets keep 'em coming! xd  

[Poma]

This sounds like a good idea, the only problem I have with this is that well I have only been around here for a couple of days, but I still do not see much activity in the guild, it is mostly the same people posting. Thus, making the site could eventually be a waste of time if there are not many people to visit it.

On another note, I was wondering if we can set up portfolios on the site, or just different things that we have done for GAIA members, or what would be cool if we all got a page of our own, to customize, that would take alot of work and webspace but would be cool, its kinda like everyone has their own style and the website is just a portal into each one of our worlds.

One more thing, for image hosting, I know that many of you do not like photobucket.com but whats the big thing about it, I have used them now and then and they seem to be pretty good with hosting. I have also used my own server for hosting images the only problem with that is the bandwith goes waaaay down if alot of people connect, so sadly I can not provide my server as a means of storage sad  

[Chisa]

Poma

This sounds like a good idea, the only problem I have with this is that well I have only been around here for a couple of days, but I still do not see much activity in the guild, it is mostly the same people posting. Thus, making the site could eventually be a waste of time if there are not many people to visit it.

On another note, I was wondering if we can set up portfolios on the site, or just different things that we have done for GAIA members, or what would be cool if we all got a page of our own, to customize, that would take alot of work and webspace but would be cool, its kinda like everyone has their own style and the website is just a portal into each one of our worlds.

One more thing, for image hosting, I know that many of you do not like photobucket.com but whats the big thing about it, I have used them now and then and they seem to be pretty good with hosting. I have also used my own server for hosting images the only problem with that is the bandwith goes waaaay down if alot of people connect, so sadly I can not provide my server as a means of storage sad

It is true that we don't have a huge amount of activity in this guild... but still, I think that a website would be a good way to try and get more members involved, and also to help keep our guild more organised.

The idea of everyone having their own page is good in theory, but... at the moment, we have over 80 members I think, and its on the rise, so if every one of them has their own page, its going to add up to a loooot of space, which we just don't have at the moment.

There's also the problem of implementing it...
We could give everyone the username and password, so they can upload what they want at any time, but this would easily get very disorganised, things might be accidentally deleted, and its possible that some people would abuse the free space.
We could implement some of log in system, where members only have the ability to change their own page, and have a limited amount of space... but that would require quite a bit of knowledge of databases, and I don't know if there is anyone here that has the knowledge and is willing to do that.

I have no problem with photobucket biggrin In fact that might be the best place to store all the guilds banners and contest entries, to take the load off people's own servers 3nodding I'll have to look into making an account we can upload those kinds of things to.  

[GhoSt-X]

Poma

This sounds like a good idea, the only problem I have with this is that well I have only been around here for a couple of days, but I still do not see much activity in the guild, it is mostly the same people posting. Thus, making the site could eventually be a waste of time if there are not many people to visit it.

On another note, I was wondering if we can set up portfolios on the site, or just different things that we have done for GAIA members, or what would be cool if we all got a page of our own, to customize, that would take alot of work and webspace but would be cool, its kinda like everyone has their own style and the website is just a portal into each one of our worlds.

One more thing, for image hosting, I know that many of you do not like photobucket.com but whats the big thing about it, I have used them now and then and they seem to be pretty good with hosting. I have also used my own server for hosting images the only problem with that is the bandwith goes waaaay down if alot of people connect, so sadly I can not provide my server as a means of storage sad

haha .. that amounts to something like a webring .. that is quite possible ..  

[Caolfhionn]

Chisa

It is true that we don't have a huge amount of activity in this guild... but still, I think that a website would be a good way to try and get more members involved, and also to help keep our guild more organised.

The idea of everyone having their own page is good in theory, but... at the moment, we have over 80 members I think, and its on the rise, so if every one of them has their own page, its going to add up to a loooot of space, which we just don't have at the moment.

There's also the problem of implementing it...
We could give everyone the username and password, so they can upload what they want at any time, but this would easily get very disorganised, things might be accidentally deleted, and its possible that some people would abuse the free space.
We could implement some of log in system, where members only have the ability to change their own page, and have a limited amount of space... but that would require quite a bit of knowledge of databases, and I don't know if there is anyone here that has the knowledge and is willing to do that.

maybe instead of every person having a whole portfolio page to themselves, there could be group portfolio pages for people who specialize in a certain kind of graphic design, like one page for web site designers, one for logo designers, etc., and there would just be a brief description of each person, a picture of their best/most recent work and a link to their website or online portfolio [assuming they have one]... there would probably be less members involved, since not everyone specializes in one type of design, and it would take up less space on the guild website because nobody would have a full page.  

[Poma]

StreetArtistNYC

maybe instead of every person having a whole portfolio page to themselves, there could be group portfolio pages for people who specialize in a certain kind of graphic design, like one page for web site designers, one for logo designers, etc., and there would just be a brief description of each person, a picture of their best/most recent work and a link to their website or online portfolio [assuming they have one]... there would probably be less members involved, since not everyone specializes in one type of design, and it would take up less space on the guild website because nobody would have a full page.

I like this Idea too, lol smile  

[Chisa]

I like that idea too, it'll definitely make things a lot easier. And if we just post asking for profiles in this guild forum, it'll mean that only members who check the guild forum will have a profile on the site... which is fine by me (hooray for the active members!).

Ooh ooh and we could have a monthly featured member, a person who has been an active part of the guild, and do an interview or something... that would be fun! And a good way to promote and thank people who make good contributions to the guild.

And a 'Hall of Fame' for contest winners.  

[SilverVixen]

Wonderful wonderful! I like the idea of the pages that are about a certain type of artists, that might build some good teams and critique groups!

The featured member thing would be great too!! It could be part of the e-zine portion of the site, if we still wanted to do that? I think that articles related to this stuff would be fun to write, and we could hopefully get a lot of people involved.

I had a thought about the less active members. Let's make a list of all the people we haven't seen in awhile, and split them up between us, and send them all short PMs that say, hey, we haven't seen you in awhile, you should come see how much the guild has grown. Something like that. biggrin  

[Skymon]

These are all great ideas! Maybe we could issue out jobs for some of the more active members, and really make it a group effort. Webmasters, news writers, contest organizers, etc.  

[ZedPlus]

I'd like to get in on this. I'm definitely going to submit something to the contest, at the very least. I can also do any web app coding that needs doing, as that's my day job for the most part. I've got a CMS that I can give to the project, and if there are neat ideas that people have, I could lend time to those.

I do think that the group probably won't grow that much unless we work towards growing it, so things like a nice site would most likely help.  

[Poma]

Yes.... give parts out for people to do, I think we are all capable people here, atleast when it comes to websites. So was it Chisa who was in charge of this whole things.... Lets get this rollin.  

[Chisa]

I'm not in charge, just... a crew member with way too much time on her hands xd

Great ideas so far, lets try and figure out what we need to put on the site, then we can figure out what jobs we need, and people can volunteer for those.

I'm glad so many people are showing interest crying Go you guys! I think this can be really great if we all work together on it. 3nodding