I go through phases working on Beatbots. When I’m into it, I’m really into it. I’ll get home from work, feed the cats, then boot up the laptop and work on the site for a solid 3-5 hours. This is after spending 8 hours on a computer during the day – a good part of the day spent looking at Beatbots. I’ll do this sometimes up to 4 or 5 days a week, depending on my other obligations, including Friday nights and Sunday afternoons. This will usually go on for a few weeks (or more if I’m working on something really big) until I burn myself out, then I take a few months off and enjoy the fruits of my labor.
Recently, I’ve had the Beatbots itch … and been scratching like crazy. Here’s some of the new stuff I rolled out on the site:
The Beatbots Calendar:
This is my second attempt integrating WebCalendar for the Beatbots Calendar, this time around to much success. I’m spending a lot of time and energy adding events and promoting this, trying to get as many people in the area using it as possible. The calendar has RSS feeds built in, which is awesome! You should subscribe to it.
Digg Beatbots Articles:
I’ve added Digg links throughout the site, so readers can share their favorite content. If you’re not aware, Digg is one of the forerunners in the social bookmarking department. This is another step towards getting Beatbots content out to a larger audience.
The Beatbots Mailing List:
This has been implemented on the site for some time (launched with the new site design last December), but I’ve only recently started to use it – sending out news mailers to keep the public informed as to what’s going on with the site. I’ve realized that I need to do more on a regular basis to gain and retain visitors and the email list is a step in that direction. You should sign up for the Beatbots Mailing List if you aren’t already on it. No spam. Seriously.
On the horizon:
With those things down, there are only a few things that I can see on the horizon (in the near future) for Beatbots. The first and foremost is generating RSS feeds for the webzine (funny, now that Beatbots is branching out with the Message Boards and Calendar, I can refer to the original Beatbots as the ‘webzine’). This would be huge, allowing people to get updates with new site content without having to check the site. Given our format (free-form publishing, with no set deadlines), it makes it hard for the average person to keep up. With RSS feeds, the content would be delivered to them!
A second, less important feature I’d like to work on is the integration of the Beatbots A/V Club (something I’ve been brainstorming for a while). The A/V Club will be a blog, essentially, were Beatbots peeps can post the audio, video, etc. content that they make. I could see it broadening down the line to include links to friends and friends of friends audio, video, etc. Think of it as a Forkcast, of sorts.
Oh, and there’s a bunch of work I need to do on the back end, but that stuff is boring to talk about. Blah blah database tables, blah blah blah. More news coming soon, in the mean time …
