Farewell and thank you

[Rob MacKillop]

Sorry to hear this place is closing down, and also that Ian is unwell. Best wishes to you, Ian. We’ve crossed swords in the past, but I always had great respect for you, and this site is magnificent. 

Is it not possible to arrange for someone else to take over? It’s seems a shame for it to disappear altogether. 

And farewell to many other members. Without this forum it is unlikely I will be in touch with you again. 

Rob MacKillop

[Brian Kimerer]

It seems a shame to lose access to all this marvelous information that took so many years of effort to put together.

I don't think that this exists anywhere else in the world. Is there some way to preserve it?

Either way, many thanks to Ian for doing all this. Good luck in the future.

Brian Kimerer

[Russ Chandler]

First off thank you for all your hard work over the years, Ian.

This is a massively important resource for our select band. 

We have six months - let get our heads together and see what we can do to preserve our community here and the knowledge we've accumulated.

[F. Chris Ware]

Dear Ian,

First off, I'm so sorry to hear of your ongoing health problems; my sympathies and most heartfelt of wishes to you and your family. You've done astonishing and astonishingly generous things with this site, so much more than one would have ever anticipated or expected for something covering such an undeniably obscure topic. This said, I completely understand why you'd like to pull the plug, as anything can get wearying eventually.

I echo the sentiments of everyone who's already posted: there must be something we remaining sailors on the island can somehow do to keep it going, as the amount of material you've so munificently assembled here is, well, astonishing. It's made my crumbling piles of paper seem pretty dumb, especially when I can comfortably visit with the click of a button, and, of course, so can everyone else on the entire planet. Can we pass around the hat to cover ongoing costs? I'm happy to pay a yearly subscription (and am amazed that you never asked this of us all, actually.)

It's been interesting to see how the site's "cast" has both endured and shifted over the years, almost like a long-running television show with seasons, even for those of us who visit sparsely and post even less frequently. It's comforting! And your early instructional videos remain tops in my pedagogical book for their cordiality, formality and subdued enthusiasm. In short, thank you for everything you've done, and again, I wish you and your family well and I hope that something can be cobbled together to keep this all going, not only for its formidable library and community, but as an enduring tribute to you, as well.

All very warmest and kindest of regards, as always,

Chris W.

[Joel Hooks]

The BMG library could be moved to the Internet Archive, but I am a little concerned about issues published after 1930 and their orphaned status with copyright.  While I beleive the copyright is "abandoned", the Archive might have a different opinion. There could also be bad actors.

I've had my account vanish twice so far, which is aggravating. I am never given an explanation as to why but I presume it was due to a copyright complaint (which when I reach out, it is clear that all my scans are public domain, so they apologize and restore it).

My initial thought is to set up an archive account that would be specific to the BMG collection and thus not risk the collection that I have been amassing. 

I think I have all of the British sheet music that is on here.  Since I have originals from Elias Kaufman, my plan is to rescan them and include the title sheets.  But that will be a decade(s) long project. 

Currently I've been focusing on American publications since many have not been digitized. 

My bigger concern than the files are the vast conversations we have had. Though often pedantic to the general population, we have covered a lot of ground.  When taken chronologically one can see how we (me) have evolved over the years.  The Archive Wayback will likely have a snapshot of all of this but it can be clunky.

I've also found myself using this as reference material for things I remember scraps of, so I go back and find the discussion.

[Jackie Cook]

Dear Ian, 

I am sorry to hear of your health condition. I hope time and rest will help you feel better. This website has been wonderful and has helped me tremendously in my love for Classic Style banjo. I appreciate all of the awesome music and methods books here, that have helped me learn this incredible style. I wish you the best always, and thank you for all of your hard work on this site. 

Respectfully,

Jackie Cook

[Lucas Gonze]

Ian, 

I'm grateful for all you have done. A lot of music and happiness has come out of your work. 

Many years ago I worked on Ning itself, creating the software. Later I was able to enjoy the community you made here.  But all things come to an end. In our love of historical music we are constantly aware of how time passes and of how we all eventually move on, but hopefully the music continues. 

Best of luck. Thank you thank you.

-Lucas

[Steve Harrison]

As far as maintaining contact, it would be possible to open up a Classic banjo Blog on Google blogger or even create a classic banjo website on google. The basic site is free to set up but extras can be added and files etc. can be saved to the cloud. It wouldn't be as comprehensive as CB ning but over time it could possibly evolve into something useful. I'm not all that tech savvy as far as computers are concerned, I'm OK at using software but I haven't a clue about what goes on beneath the bonnet (hood) so to speak. It's worth a thought and open to discussion or suggestions....Steve.

[Trapdoor2]

Well, it has been a lot of fun! I'm sad that Ian has to shut it down due to illness, I hope the best for him and his family.

Many of us are "aging out". Fact of life, I guess. I hope a younger gen will find a way for Classic Banjo on the web. There's got to be some room at the inn...somewhere!

[Steven Watson]

Thank you, Ian, for all your work. This has been a wonderful, invaluable resource. It will be sad to see it go.

Some thoughts... Robert Coldwell, who runs the Digital Guitar Archive, might be willing to host the BMG files, as he does other journals. Though the copyright of the later issues might be a concern, as Joel says.

A possible option (if none can take over this site) might be to create a successor forum. PhpBB (much-used platform for forums) is open source so the only costs would be domain and storage, and given there's only 1000 members I would think it would be relatively cheap. It would be doable. The pdfs etc. could be hosted elsewhere using cloud storage.

It might be possible for Ian to export a data file containing all the forum discussion, via the Ning admin? It wouldn't be the prettiest thing to read, but it should be useful as an archive -- word searchable and more or less intelligible.

[Maximilian]

Thank you for this site Ian, it has been a fantastic resource! I hope you're keeping well and in good spirits.

Max

[Ethan Schwartz]

Is simply transferring over ownership of the site not an option on the table? That's something I would potentially be interested in taking on (somewhat depending on monthly cost, which I don't have a good sense of). As far as saving discussion posts and PDFs go (maybe not images and video), I think the best thing in the short term would be to create a compressed archive and share it amongst ourselves so that the files exist in multiple offline locations. Uploading everything to cloud storage presents the same issue as just keeping the existing site going: who is going to be responsible for managing it in the long term? 

[Jody Stecher]

Ethan, I think you would be a splendid host and custodian. I have been in touch with Ian.  On the subject of new ownership he wrote:  "I can’t transfer to a new owner as I won’t be able to offer support and explain how the databases and linked servers work, so unless someone wishes to re-write the whole site I am afraid the downloads will have to do."

I suppose it is possible that there are people who don't need explanation or support. 

Reading between the lines I think what may be implied is that Ning is not an easy entity to deal with.

My knowledge of how websites work is sub-basic. That said, it seems to my minimally informed mind that transferring all the contents of the present site to another host or entity or What-Ever-It-Is-Called might be a good idea.

Banjo interest and computer skills are not incompatible.

Ethan Schwartz said:

Is simply transferring over ownership of the site not an option on the table? That's something I would potentially be interested in taking on (somewhat depending on monthly cost, which I don't have a good sense of). As far as saving discussion posts and PDFs go (maybe not images and video), I think the best thing in the short term would be to create a compressed archive and share it amongst ourselves so that the files exist in multiple offline locations. Uploading everything to cloud storage presents the same issue as just keeping the existing site going: who is going to be responsible for managing it in the long term?