Welcome to 🎹 Piano | Tell — V1!

navindra

PianoTell has officially graduated to independent hosting!

It took some work to get here, but we're finally out of beta and now at V1. 🙂

We're on Hetzner Cloud for €3.79 per month with no contract or minimum term. That's quite some value for money, less than I typically spend for a single Matcha Green Tea Latte. So if I just halt my matcha habit, I'll be saving money. 😃

With this move, I've made a couple of tentative tweaks.

Teacher Talk is now Teachers Board. This is based on feedback that TT could mean either the tech forum or the teacher forum. Sadly, we still have no teachers here. Most teachers seem to prefer to launch their own boards or groups, but I hope this can be a welcome home for them.

Meta is now Piano | Tell — Café. This was based on the feedback that Meta was an ugly name and the suggestion to name it Pub... Café just works for teetotalers as well. 🫖

If folks like these changes, I can make them permanent.

Also, a small bonus... since we now have plenty of space on the new server, I've opened up the ability for Gold Members to upload a Profile Cover in addition to the Profile Picture.

Let me know if you find any new issues or if old bugs resurface.

Next focus is on Recital #1!

twocats

navindra love it!! Thanks for all the hard work and thoughtful changes!!

Animisha

navindra I've opened up the ability for Gold Members to upload a Profile Cover in addition to the Profile Picture.

What is a profile cover, which dimensions should it have, and 2 Mb seems very small?

But otherwise, Navindra, thank you so much for Piano Tell!

WieWaldi

navindra Meta is now Piano | Tell — Café. This was based on the feedback that Meta was an ugly name and the suggestion to name it Pub... Café just works for teetotalers as well. 🫖

I didn't find Meta ugly at all. I found it very self explaining: topics about the forum itself.
Café /Pub... sounds like smalltalk without a topic. Agree on Café better than Pub.
Pub is something with beer and guiness and at 10pm the hooligans join.

Rubens

navindra
Give me your email address. Next month fees are on me, my treat, you deserve it. As long as the fees don't go up!

navindra

twocats Yours is the first post on V1! It's working! 🎆

rogerch

Looks great @navindra !! Thanks for all your efforts on Piano | Tell!!

twocats

It feels faster!!

rogerch

twocats It feels faster!!

I agree!

navindra

Animisha Yes, right. In your Profile, click Controls and then select Cover... like you said 2MB is the limit but that is actually plenty! Try it and see what works.

This is an example:

Sophia

WieWaldi I didn't find Meta ugly at all. I found it very self explaining: topics about the forum itself.

I think that the new café is meant to be more of an off topic forum, where people like me can show off their new crocheted piano bench cover 😝

Formerly there was no place for those because as you said, Meta was only used to talk about one specific thing.

At least that's how I understood it 😊

navindra

Rubens Thanks so much Rubens. I received a private offer as well. Truthfully, I'm not set up to receive donations or manage that at all.

It's also not necessary. Although I am sometimes frugal e.g. I realized after the fact that if I had used a referral link, I could have received €20 free credit on Hetzner 😫... it's certainly not a hardship. I'm still really impressed at the value for money we're getting here.

Maybe in the future, years from now... ~~I'll plaster every pixel with lucrative ads (just joking!)~~ we can go the community-funded route. 🙂

Appreciate the kindness!

shawarma_bees

Congratulations! Thanks for all your efforts. I look forward to Recital #1!

Sophia

Congratulations on a very smooth move! I love the new forum names!

Gombessa

Sophia I think that the new café is meant to be more of an off topic forum, where people like me can show off their new crocheted piano bench cover 😝

PW had an archived "Coffee Room" that was intended for off-topic discussions too. It was before my time but I understood it got a bit too rowdy and Frank just quashed it completely.

I'm right now unsure whether the Cafe is meant for similar off-topic discussions, or if it's more about topics relating to the "meta" of PianoTell (i.e., how should PianoTell do x, y, and z as it relates to the intended subject of pianos)? 😄

navindra

Gombessa Thanks a lot for sharing that. That's very convincing. Let's learn from PW and close the Café.

I think we can strike a balance. We can keep the off-topic friendly conversations where there are i.e. wherever people feel the most affinity and provide an "Off-topic" tag, similar to the "Internal" one that we have.

Tangential threads about music, art and such should be perfectly fine on PT. Occasional friendly off-topic is OK but rowdy topics (like politics) are out of scope for PT.

The paraphernalia thread is just great!

rsl12

I personally feel like having both are useful. Meta for things about PianoTell, and Cafe for off-topic subjects.

Sophia

Maybe the café is a little bit of both? Though I agree that some topics are probably not suitable if they really have nothing to do with music... for example politics could get ugly quickly.

But we have already seen some topics that are a little lost, such as the piano journey thread and the paraphernalia topic. Probably those would fit in that section?

I would imagine that once this forum is completely established, meta talk will subside, by then just one or two sticky posts would suffice...

rsl12

Sophia I would imagine that once this forum is completely established, meta talk will subside, by then just one or two sticky posts would suffice...

I had that thought too. But it would be nice to have one place to find all official announcements regarding PianoTell, even if eventually they become infrequent. If the cafe really takes off, it will be harder to find those official posts in the clutter.

But it's a matter of taste. I think either approach can work.

WieWaldi

Sophia Maybe the café is a little bit of both? Though I agree that some topics are probably not suitable if they really have nothing to do with music... for example politics could get ugly quickly.

Yes. This was my thought. This is a piano forum with piano and other music topics. I don't want Donald or Joe to be here. In this case it always end so
an argument

Sophia

So true!!

twocats

Pallas I like keeping an admin area and also having the cafe

Me too! Maybe a name like "Site Feedback" would be good for the admin area? I'm not thinking of a better name right now but I'm sure there is one.

WieWaldi

Why invent something new like "Site Feedback"?
"Meta" was just fine in my opinion. Even if it sound ugly for some or unpleasant for others. I really would like to see a dedicated forum for organisational stuff. Tips and tricks. About forum rules and other serious stuff. Even if this gets less and less posts in the future, it will act as a reference book.

I know there are people here, wanting to have a place for smalltalk and other funny stuff. I am one of those. But I want it to have separated from the serious. The serious topics should not get spammed with small matter discussions. And I want to avoid that mods see the need to make the important threads sticky. This leads on the other hand to a hiding of the funny stuff.

I vote for both: Cafe and Meta