I've learned a lot about building up a web community, and because I love community spirit, I'd like to share a few thoughts for your consideration if you plan to start a club, or have one that's not doing so well. Too many clubs are left abandoned for lack of interest in that special interest! What went wrong? And, how can YOU avoid the same trap?

	Look around for the best place to start. Yahoo!Clubs and MSNCommunities are the two with which I am the most familiar. You may want to look for others using your search engine. They will take you through a step-by-step process of forming the group, and it is quite easy.
	The subject should be one you feel passionate about. Depending on your goals you may be spending a lot of time working at this, especially in the beginning.
	If you can, start within an existing community of clubs.
	Get Active and known within the community. If you just walk in out of no where and beg people to join your club, it will be awkward at best. Let people know who you are.
	Be ACTIVE within your own club. If YOU don't post, no one else will.
	Create UNIQUE CONTENT. Pictures, special posts, new activities. And then let the other clubs know that you have that content.
	Invite people. GET KNOWN. Yahoo! and MSN both have Invite functions. You may start by finding out who has listed the topic of your club as an interest and invite those people to join.
	Ask questions of the members. Get a dialogue started.
	Work with other club founders and community builders. Establishing a good relationship with the other leaders will benefit everyone.
	People often apologize for "rambling on" or "talking too much of your time" or any number of things. I always let them know that they are NOT imposing, that I do want to hear from them. It's GOOD to "talk"! It's really a talk club.
	Treat everyone with RESPECT.
	Be SUPPORTIVE.
	Greet newcomers and do everything to make them feel at home. The worst thing for new folks is feeling alienated. If you want your community to grow, make people feel at home in your "neighborhood". It's a big, bad, frightening world out their in the Internet Zone. Finding friends can be difficult and discouraging. So, be a friend.
	Respond to their posts, esp. the first one. This is the most important post! First impressions are indeed lasting!
	If they make a mistake, don't make a big deal. Just let it go. If you must "correct" someone on their first post, do so KINDLY, without it being a personal attack. They will be happy for the information and you will have made a new friend.
	If someone posts something which you do no want at your club, a flame letter for example, remove it and do not make a fuss. If you can, Instant Message (IM) or e-mail the person and explain to them why in your opinion it needed to be removed.
	The absolute last resort is to need to remove a member. I've done this once to a known troll.
	Keep your personal squabbles out of the club. If you are fighting with everyone, it will just create a spirit of disunity. And, since UNITY is what the aim is, this is quite counter productive.
	Discourage rancorous arguments. It's divisive. People can disagree in an appropriate, respectful manor. That way, they are sharing views with one another instead of insults.
	Remind people that the club is a public place. Highly personal posts should not be encouraged, unless it's a closed club and that is its purpose.
	You may want to have a closed club. This is one where only members can read the posts and is good for families or other closed lists of folks who want the exclusivity of membership. As founder, you can approve applications for membership.
	Look over the guidelines and pointers at the community's center. There is a lot of helpful information and things to consider.

We built Stupid Club from within the Yahoo! Weird Al Fan Clubs community. When I started Stupid, there were about 100 Weird Al clubs. With a few notable exceptions, most of the clubs had only a few members and virtually no activity.

Weird Al's 27th Club, Weird Al's Club2K, and a few others had laid the foundation. This is a great help. To already have the framework in place it's a matter of becoming a community member and building from there.

There are several types of communities available on the internet.

Yahoo!Groups and Yahoo!Clubs (which are about to be merged.), MSN Communities, both offer a number of features. MSN is quite sophisticated, and members can place photos, graphics or animated gifs right in the posts. You can moderate these communities, excluding messages and people that are not community appropriate.

Usenet Newgroups. This is the "Big City" of internet communities. It is a free for all. It can be brutal. It is unmonitored and known abusers, flamers, trolls and even people with severe mental disorders can cause quite a bit of trouble and are difficult to impossible to get rid of.

On the positive side, it's a place people can easily access whatever system or connection they use.

Usenet is accessed through the Newsreader on Internet Explorer or Netscape, or through Google.com.

Read the Frequently Asked Questions for the Newsgroup and know who you are dealing with. They may list regulars or even have a list of people who are known troublemakers.

Having or participating in an online community can be a wonderful, rewarding experience. It's a way to make friends and start some wonderful, supportive relationships. As some one once said to me, Friends is Friends. You can find people all over the world who share your interests and excitement over a subject. It's amazing just how many other things you will find that you have in common.

--Betsy Manning

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Copyright 2001 Betsy Manning. Copyrights for contributions revert to the authors.
Also Check out: Yankonomicron et Al
This is a Weird Al Fan run Web. It is independent (and goofy) and not affiliated with or endorsed by Al Yankovic, his associates, partners or pets. We are just his Stupid Fans and we love him lots! :) So don't blame Al for anything WE say or do. It's just NOT his fault!
Stupid Web Mufti: [Betsy Manning].
Last updated: February 21, 2002.

Contributors to this site include all the wonderful members of Weird Al's Stupid Club. I love you all! Thank you!