I personally think it would be a better idea if we didn't use the shout box. We are a big enough community that setting up an IRC room wouldn't be out of the question or unreasonable. Personally, I prefer IRC, but that's just me.

I like the idea of having a music banter chat, also it would be cool if we had a collective mediafire account, where everyone had their own folders or something..

A chat room has been mentioned numerous times and we did have one a while back but no one used it. As for a mediafire account: it sounds like a good idea but how could everyone access it? Each person would have to make sure they logged out each time they were in there. I will look into this a little more.

That's a great idea too. Do any of the mods know how to work IRC and be an op on chatrooms?

Also, you can have little java applets that link to an IRC room for those too lazy to get a superior IRC program :p:

Why is the world music forum closed? I would have liked to discuss northern indian classical...would that just go in the classical section then? Even though I think I have there are only American/European Classical there.

http://www.musicbanter.com/country-folk-world-music/

It's not?

Wow, basically I am insane. Sorry about that.

just scrap the whole thing and turn it into lolcatbanter.

I really like this idea, if it would work.

I'd be down with a collective mediafire account. If we wanted to upgrade I'd have no problem chipping in.

As for improvements I think providing users with a custom @musicbanter.com e-mail address would be nifty.