2007-10-13 [HiddenFire]: I've just got some tough classes right now. Once they're over, I'll be able to devote more time to other things.

2007-11-08 [HiddenFire]: Alright, I've got the preliminary skeleton of the site up and running. I should be able to set up a message board soon too. The theme is easily changed so don't go thinking that's what we're sticking with. For now we just have to get in there, dig around in the code and tweak it to fit our needs. I'm all for making anyone who wants to help fellow admins in order to accomplish this. If anyone knows a fellow artist who knows PHP and MYSQL and prefereable also WordPress and PHPBB then PLEASE try to see if they'll help out... but don't spam.

This is going to be a community, type site. I think we missed out on the whole community thing here. People just signed up to get the comments and never came back. We need to encourage people to come back on a regular basis.

Until I get the forum set up, we'll keep the discussions here.
Check out the basic site so far at: http://www.commentexchange.org

I've only got one class this session, hopefully it won't be a tough on me as last session and I can actually manage to get stuff done. I want to try to get as much done in the next 5.5 weeks as possible (because next session I'll have 2 tough classes again).

Thanks for all the support and encouragement. Lets go make something big! Let make something that matters! Let us take elfwood by storm and have them running to get to us. I know we can do it.

YAH!

2007-11-12 [HiddenFire]: Alright guys, I'm in the process of setting it all up. I've got a simple forum up and running and you can register as a user and have your url display immediately. It even sorts EW and DA users.

Right now I need to figure out ideas for forum groups and forums inside those groups. That should be fun.

2007-11-12 [HiddenFire]: Head on over to http://www.commentexchange.org and take a look at how things are moving. I need to get some registered users in the database so that I can test that everything works right. So far... it seems to behave alright... but it's just me in there.

2007-11-12 [HiddenFire]: Now that the site is up and running, I'm going to be spending time making it pretty. We need to get some more users in... so I guess we'll have to go through and send messages to each and very member on our list. Actual emails would be best, that way we'll make sure they know. Or perhaps just a simple comment on the main page of their gallery. That way, it's also an announcement that other EW/DA members will see.

Thanks for the support everyone. Lets make the best out of this.

2007-11-13 [HiddenFire]: Oh hey, just wanted to mention that because I'm just that awesome, we're ranked as the #1 page on google for the search "comment exchange" which is about as good as anyone could ask for. I don't think anyone will have a problem finding us.

2007-11-15 [HiddenFire]: I just wanted to let everyone know that I'm going through EW galleries and commenting on galleries of those who have the term "comment exchange" in their user profile. I figured that these people would be the most active members (as opposed to those who joined and never added the declaration to their pages).

Feel free to do what I'm doing (I'm not done yet). Just make sure that I haven't already left the notice. and if you do leave a notice, also leave a comment about their art, that way you do not get flagged for spam.

Just thought you should know.

2007-11-15 [Estantia]: My stuff on elftown's more updated than elfwood by a LONG way, I treat elfwood more as an archive ^_^'

I'm also finding myself with a fair bit of uni work too, so that's taking up creative/commenting time too.

2007-11-15 [HiddenFire]: That's cool, the ET CE will remain here, but as a reduced Comment Exchange, Dedicated completely to ElfTown Artists. I think that would greatly increase ET Artist's commenting and traffic rates. Hopefully this move should benefit everyone.

2007-11-15 [Estantia]: of course, who know, I may eventually get my own site/gallery... somewhere...

2007-11-16 [HiddenFire]: I've got all of the above... except none on ET. I've got an EW a DA and my own site with it's own domain. Actually, EW and DA are great for sending traffic back to a main gallery site. In all honesty, for me, it's about driving traffic back to my gallery site. I consider EW and DA community sites more than gallery sites. That being said, I'm all about the community of it. I consider the CE a niche in the community. So far, we're the only one's in this niche... you can't beat that.

I'm thinking about opening up the CE to blogs as well... but I can't make up my mind. Every other aspect of the CE is about art and writing (stories)... not blog articles. The only advantages to doing so would be that traffic to the CE would DRASTICALLY increase. I'm not sure what the other effects might be... I'm just afraid that the bloggers will take over. *shrugs* I don't know. I'm still thinking about it.

2007-11-16 [Estantia]: it's your site, I'm sure you'll work something out.

2007-11-17 [HiddenFire]: Well, that's not what I wanted to hear. :P
For now, I think I'll just see how things go and work from there. We're gaining members slowly but surely. I think the advantage of using ET was the fact that we could leverage the advertising of the wiki awards. I remember our membership exploding just after we won. I'm not sure how we could get similar results. Who knows.

2007-11-18 [Estantia]: hm, i can't say i know that much myself, maybe get the word to pass around deviant art?

2007-11-18 [HiddenFire]: I think I might have to go on some massive commenting runs to help build up traffic. If I make some great comments on other people's galleries, they'll follow those comments back to mine and see what I declare myself to be, a CE member. It's possible. I'm just totally against outright advertising for that particular site. My other two sites... I'll pimp those out whenever I get the chance! ^_^

2007-11-19 [Estantia]: :P hehehe

2007-11-20 [Kshatriya Karahatay]: hate to help your indecision, but I'm not sure about adding bloggers either...
On the one hand it would increase traffic to your site, and if you had paid advertising on it, that would be the way to go to make money. The down side, like you said, is that bloggers would probably take over. I tend to think that if you really want to do something of the sort for bloggers you could create a sister site for them. I don't know, i just wouldn't want some depressed teenager who only blogs about death and suicide and can't form a sentence without cussing every other word putting garbage comments on my artwork just so I'll look at his blog so that he can feel... something.
Maybe I'm a mean person that way. But I think, as an artist, I want to help other artists and writers and be critiqued by people who are thoughtful and know what they're talking about. However, I've found that *most* (not by any means ALL) bloggers/people who join internet communities don't fall into this category. 
Hmmm... I'd better stop now before I insult someone. :)

2007-11-20 [HiddenFire]: Even if you insult the stupid whiny death obsessed kids, who cares? But I digress. Nah, I suppose I should state in the rules that the comment exchange is essentially several different bubbles... that is to say, that if a deviant art artist comments on an EW gallery... there is no oblication to return the comment. Also, if a blogger comments on your artwork, then you would not be obligated to comment on their blog.

The only time the bubbles intersect would be for EW galleries and libraries. I must admit, I don't really read much. If an EW artist comments on my artwork and they are also a writer, I will opt to comment on their artwork instead of reading their stories. I guess I'm lazy like that.

2007-11-20 [HiddenFire]: oh, and I set you up as another admin, K. You've got almost as much power over the site now as I do. You just lack ftp access, but you can still upload stuff... somewhere, I know there's a link. But that doesn't really matter. I trust you, feel free to do what you want with your new found powers... but don't delete me, that would be mean. :P

2007-12-12 [Kshatriya Karahatay]: lol!  oh, alright, I won't delete you. ;)

2007-12-12 [HiddenFire]: ^_^ I'm grateful. Heck, even if you did, all I would have to do to get access back would be to manually put me back into the database as an admin... might be difficult to do though. hmmmmm... yeah. But anyway. I'm really linking how things are going.