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Electronic Cottage is an international community where independent artists, musicians, writers and freethinkers can meet and share ideas, sounds, visual art, photos, zines, videos, reviews, news and info, opinions, tech and gear articles, and much more, all in the spirit of two-way communication.
EC draws inspiration from the Cassette Culture Revolution of the 1980s, 90s and beyond; Mail Art, Small Press and Zines, Dada, Fluxus, Punk Rock, Hacking, Circuit Bending, Anarchy, and Noise. EC values inclusion, democracy, experimentation, independence and freedom of thought and expression, open-minded exchange, and Community. ELECTRONIC COTTAGE originally was a magazine that took an inside look at the Home Taper Phenomenon, Cassette Culture and Electronic & Experimental Music. Hal McGee edited and published six issues of the publication, from 1989 to 1991. You can view info on EC magazine in the Legacy section of the EC site. EC has been reborn in 2018 in a new form, as an online community where artists and enthusiasts from everywhere can gather together in a safe, harmonious, non-toxic online environment and create connections and friendships. EC will develop slowly and organically, constantly changing and sprouting anew at every moment. It will not be fixed and static, but will instead react and grow and develop along with its members, friends, visitors and contributors. Look for changes and surprises around every corner! You just never know what is going to happen. Everyone is welcome to contribute. EC will be what you what you make it! You can create an Artist Page or write Reviews or contribute News Items. Or you can just enjoy the site, and comment if you want. EC is all about Communication in an open-minded, inclusive, freethinking spirit. All alternative-minded artistic people from all backgrounds, nationalities, genders, and ages are welcome here. HOWEVER, the EC Community will NOT tolerate: - racist, homophobic, transphobic, ageist, misogynistic and misandristic materials. Generalized misanthropy is okay, though! Hahahahahahaha! You CAN write and talk about difficult, controversial, and contentious topics and ideas. Just keep it civil and community-minded. Thoughtful and tasteful sensuality and explorations of sexuality are permitted! HATE will be denied! If you feel compelled to comment in a negative manner about a person's ethnicity, race, creed, religion, gender, political beliefs, or lifestyle choices, THINK TWICE before posting! ABUSE WILL NOT BE TOLERATED. Repeat offenders will be banned. We can exchange ideas and we can agree to disagree. Remember: the new EC is dedicated to two-way communication. Enjoy it! Love it! Get mad if you want. But ALWAYS show respect or you will be unceremoniously thrown out. Understood? When in doubt do NOT infringe on someone's copyright. We might all have different ideas on this topic, but you are enjoined to respect the creative property of other people. One more thing: This is NOT a political site! EC has no one viewpoint on political situations. It is mostly about ART and MUSIC and NOISE. If you want to argue about politics, please go to Facebook, Twitter, Fox News, CNN, etc.
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UPDATED on APRIL 8, 2018
Welcome to all of you. In recent days I have enlisted a staff of writers, artists, and consultants who will create Electronic Cottage and make it what it will be! Be sure to visit the EC COMMUNITY DISCUSSION page. If you know someone who would be a good addition to our EC Community, please tell them about the site. You can contribute on a regular basis and have your own page You can contribute on an occasional basis if you wish You are not required to have a regular page or column In fact, I have created new sections of the EC site where you can contribute your short news items and Reviews And of course we welcome you to visit the site without contributing regular or even occasional items. You can just enjoy the site, and comment on posts if you like. Page building tools at the site include: - embedding audio links from Bandcamp and archive.org - audio and video hosted on the site itself - embedding of YouTube videos - SEARCH function - blog - and of course the usual texts, photos, photo galleries, and slideshows - hyperlinks to other sites are easy to create Directly below are directions, guidelines, suggestions, and stipulations for creating an Artist Page. At the bottom of this blog post you will find info pertinent to ALL contributors to and Community members of EC. The content of your page will be totally up to you: - you could write about shows and events that you attend - review tapes, discs and online music, new and old - write label profiles - if you go on a tour you could write a tour diary, and tell about the shows and people you meet - publish an interview with a favorite artist - write about your experiences as an underground artist - publish pics of mail that you receive, mail art, recordings, etc. - write about gear and instruments, creation and modification - report on zines and zine fairs - share your new visual art such as collages, paintings and photos - share your poetry and other creative writing - concrete poetry, asemic poetry, articles, essays, opinions and editorials, more! - report about interesting radio shows and podcasts - write about Cassette Culture, DIY History, etc. - Etc. You will send the raw materials (words and pics) to me via email and I will do the actual layout of the page. Always send pics of the highest resolution possible. You can also send short audio files of less than one minute! Each columnist will get their very own page and they can write about and report on whatever they want. It will be totally up to each columnist what is on their page. I am picking people for the staff who have a lot of experience, who are passionate, eloquent, enthusiastic, community-minded, bursting with creativity, and who love to share. I think that this method will be a lot more fun and more realistic in many ways than a standard magazine that pretends that it can possibly be comprehensive enough to keep up with a worldwide scene that is so huge that nobody could cover it. So, I think that by having columnists write about their favorite recordings, shows, artists, and publications it will all be more personal and therefore more fun and manageable. In other words, would you like being burdened with hundreds of people who you don’t know sending their recordings to you to review them? Or would you prefer to write about things and sounds and people that you enjoy? Your column’s page can contain anything that interests you: reviews, interviews, videos, gig reports, zines, mail art, poetry, cover art, personal experiences collaborating with other artists, you name it! You can choose a title for your page and it will be your home on the Electronic Cottage magazine site. You will supply the raw materials such as words and pics and I will lay it all out. With this columnist method you will only be responsible to yourself and me as editor. And I can foresee it being relatively low-stress, and FUN! A few people have asked me when it will start, and here is my reply: The publication schedule of EC will be decided in the future. It will be a website and not a magazine in the true sense. So that means that it will always be visible. It can grow and build gradually and organically. We can add new articles one by one, as each writer develops ideas. The site will not be a static and fixed thing, but constantly moving forward and expanding outward and blooming. But also, maybe every two or three months we can send out a bulletin listing new additions to the site since the previous bulletin. Start working on ideas for your page as soon as possible. All of us are busy people with many other artistic projects and our personal lives. When you are ready to start creating your page, please contact me by email and we will start working on it together. - First of all, choose a name for your page. - I suggest that you put a photo of yourself on your page so that readers can relate the words and images to a face, but this is of course not a requirement. - Decide if you want to put your contact address on your page. - All Artist/Contributor pages will be blog style. This means that visitors to your page can comment on your posts. This will make the Electronic Cottage site more interactive and enhance two-way communication which is a basic principle on which Tape Culture and the DIY ethos are built. - If you are having trouble getting started, I suggest that you write a journal or diary of things that happen: mail that you receive, shows that you attend; tapes, discs, videos, Bandcamp and other online tracks and albums that you listen to, etc. You are welcome to publish posts as often and as much as you like, but don't go overboard! Keep your page fresh and interesting and lively and fun! Make your page as personal as possible. It is YOUR page!: make it your home and make it be just like you! As a staff member you are NOT subject to quotas on how much or how often you write or publish, but you are strongly encouraged to contribute a minimum of one post every three months. I want to emphasize that the writers and contributors are a Community! Make efforts to become friends in the truest sense. EC is my attempt to create an alternative environment online, one that is true to our ideals. No money will be involved. We will not accept advertisements and visitors to the site can view it for free. No subscriptions. I have said above that the content of pages will be the choice of the contributors. HOWEVER, as Editor in Chief I reserve the right to refuse: - racist, homophobic, transphobic, ageist, misogynistic and misandristic materials. We can discuss it but my decision is final. You CAN write about difficult, controversial, and contentious topics and ideas. Just keep it civil and community-minded. Thoughtful and tasteful sensuality and explorations of sexuality are permitted! HATE will be denied! The same holds true for comments on posts. If you feel compelled to comment in a negative manner about a person's ethnicity, race, creed, religion, gender, political beliefs, or lifestyle choices, THINK TWICE before posting! ABUSE WILL NOT BE TOLERATED. Repeat offenders will be banned. We can exchange ideas and we can agree to disagree. Remember: the new EC is dedicated to two-way communication. Enjoy it! Love it! Get mad if you want. But ALWAYS show respect or I will throw you out on your ass. Understood? When in doubt do NOT infringe on someone's copyright. We might all have different ideas on this topic. Respect the intellectual and creative property of other people. One more thing: This is NOT a political site! EC has no one viewpoint on political situations. It is mostly about ART and MUSIC and NOISE. If you want to argue about politics, please go to Facebook, Twitter, Fox News, CNN, etc. On Wednesday, April 4, 2018
I registered the domain electroniccottage.org Electronic Cottage is hosted at Weebly.com The domain registration costs $20 per year. I also purchased registry privacy protection for $10 per year, which will hopefully eliminate a lot of problems with spam. Use of the website building tools at the Electronic Cottage site is included in my personal "Pro Level" membership at Weebly, which is also where my personal website, halmcgee.com is located. I want to thank all of you for accepting my offer to contribute to the new Electronic Cottage!
Staff members should visit this page on a regular basis, because here I will give you directions, stipulations, requirements for your posts, information on deadlines, and make requests. We can avoid a lot of unnecessary emails if you will take the time to visit this page every day or two. You will be able to directly comment on every post I make here. In the spirit of openness all discussions about the site will be public at all times. Any visitor to the site will be able to view anything that any of you say anywhere on the site. If you have something to say that is not suitable for public viewing, please send an email to me. I want to direct all staff members to a special section of the site called STAFF DISCUSSION. You can reach it by clicking on that tab at the top of any page. It is a blog where you can introduce yourselves, ask questions, and make suggestions. You can freely make comments. As we develop the Electronic Cottage site it will be very important for all of us to share our thoughts and ask each other for help and guidance. As Editor In Chief of Electronic Cottage I will rely on all of you for your advice, suggestions, critiques, and tips on how to make EC better. We can all make EC the site we want it to be through fair, open and democratic give and take of thoughts and ideas. As Editor in Chief decisions on the course that the site will take will be my responsibility, but I cannot and will not do it without you. |
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