This expansion is mostly complete, but a few features will be first made available to the public over the next few days. The new features either already here or coming soon include:
NEWSFEED APPLET
In response to strong demand from our visitors, the refresh rate of the newsfeed applet on the front page of the website has been slowed down by a factor of two, giving readers more time to read through headlines before new ones come up.
STUDIO REFERENCE BOOK CATALOG
A new online resource in the style of the Interactive Frequency Charts and the Metering and Gain Structure guide, this applet contains a database of over 90 books and reference guides related to building, managing, recording and producing in your own independent studio as well as live sound applications. This catalog is easy to browse, with the books being divided up into nine different subject categories and displayed by thumbnail of the front cover. Separate category displays are available for standard print edition books and for downloadable electronic editions for the Amazon Kindle. Mouse over each thumbnail to pop up a custom Amazon.com detail box indicating user rating, price and availability from Amazon.com, and clicking on the thumbnail will retrieve and display the entire Amazon.com detail page for that book, including publishing information, publisher’s description, reader reviews and online ordering information. Never has finding the reference book on independent recording been easier.
KINDLE YOUR STUDIO
The truly remarkable Amazon Kindle, the lightweight and extremely portable wireless network-connected book and magazine reader, is also available through the IRN website now. With a capacity of about 200 books and real-time wireless download capability from the entire Amazon catalog from virtually anywhere in the world where there is cell nominal phone coverage, you can within minutes of receiving your Kindle, load it with all the studio reference guide books you’ll ever need, and have an entire electronic library and engineering mentor right in the palm of your hand as you sit behind your mixing desk in your independent studio.
NAVIGATION TOOLBAR
Across the top of each web page, just below the IRN banner, there is now a clickable navigation toolbar for instant access and easy navigation to the main pages of all new areas of the IRN website.
EXPANDED E-MAIL LINKAGE
Several different e-mail links to IRN are now available, including one for general information requests and comments, a separate one for contacting the webmaster to report issues with the operation of the website itself (bad hyperlinks, page display errors, etc.), and individual e-mail links to each editor/contributor to the IRN website. These e-mail links are all available directly from our new I/O (input/output) page, accessible directly from the navigation menu toolbar located at the top of each web page.
I/O PAGE
This page, mentioned above, provides full e-mail links for the folks behind the IRN website and some of it's content. It also provides full links to several custom XML/RSS pages that may be used by folks using news feed readers or aggregators to track our content.
NEW CONTRIBUTORS
Certainly the largest and most exciting addition to IRN is the addition of several experienced and popular audio and media engineers to our contributing staff. Each one has his own column where he will be able to share his ideas, thoughts and wisdom with readers about all things related to independent music production. These columns are all instantly accessible via the "Columns" button in the new navigation bar.
Additionally, they are all participants in a new feature called "Around The Console". "ATC" is basically a moderated roundtable discussion where these fine folks hash out individual topics and issues common to the independent recording community, and their conversation is recorded in print to be published in periodic format on this website for everyone to read. This feature is currently in production, with the first editions due to be ready shortly. Watch here for a more definite scheduling announcement. (For more information on these seasoned contributors, see Glen's column article titled "IRN 2.0" currently listed on his column page.)
Please feel free to e-mail any ideas or requests you may have for topics you'd like to see discussed in upcoming episodes of "ATC". Send such requests to info@independentrecording.net, and we'll see what we can do.
MORE NEW CONTENT
There is a second transcript-based feature just entering production called "Talkback", which will feature transcripts of interviews with the movers and shakers, the moved and the shaken within the independent recording community. Watch this news column as well as the IRN Newsletter for upcoming announcements.
Additionally we are soon adding a book review section, where we will be providing in-depth reviews of the ever-increasing library of books being written on the recording and music industry, along with direct links to where one may preview on-line and purchase such books from Amazon.com.
In development now, and available later this summer, a membership program for you our readers that will allow you to join a fully-featured searchable database of artists, engineers and producers that are serious about being an active part of the global independent music scene. Opportunities for getting your work heard or for collaboration reach-outs in a more selective format than simply a mySpace listing will abound here. Also planned for sometime later this fall will be an audio podcast program featuring some of the best offerings from our members, with a special perspective given to engineering technique as well as the pure enjoyment aspect of it.
And the stuff that made us quasi-famous from the beginning - our on-line resource applets - will continue to flow out of development as well, with works on critical listening skills and on 4D mixing technique also in the works.
So all in all, we hope this to be an exciting year for IRN, and even more so for it's end users. Good luck to all!
Our editors welcome this weekend's official start of summer with two different articles related to volume; the first having to do with volume and mic placement, the other with an audacious plan for ending The Volume Wars themselves.
In a major expansion of it's website, the Independent Recording Network starts it's move into a whole new level of operation and offerings to the independent recording community.