i know this is a bit too late, but stickers at the battle of the bands would have been good.. though you'd end up with a whole bunch of bros with bad taste probably.. anyhow, if you could print some stickers and mail them to some of the kids out across the country/world on this site to handout at shows, etc. as well as doing the same that might help spread the word a bit.

You could also have a contest to see who can create and display the coolest/funniest/craziest/most creative mixtape collective promo at their school/in their town/etc.. all within reason and law OF COURSE.. we dont want anyone getting in trouble for vandalism, etc. or anything.

- Submit a tshirt design to threadless.com (ie: the desktop you designed) and have a very subtle logo (or corresponding text that explains the design and purpose) that points to the site.
- Message everyone that lists the movie 'High Fidelity' as an interest on Myspace OR join the High Fidelity group and recruit from there... at least they will appreciate the top 5's.
- Design online postcards that current members can email to potential members, including a "Referred by:___" portion, that can in turn be passed on.
- Something related to Search Engine Marketing that I don't understand but have a vague comprehension of.
- Have everyone who uses any type of online music forum post a shout out to the site.
- Numerous Craigslist postings?
- I might be able to give a head's up to people at the (ugh) rock radio station I used to work for in Eugene and my buddy MIGHT be able to mention it on air or through the station's website.
- Contact people at alternative newspapers (ie: the Willamette Weekly) who might want to check out and/or report on the site.
- If stickers are made, I know the owners of 2 record stores that could distribute them on site. I'm sure other people here have similar connections. Maybe that entails a super basic press kit for super-keen members?

Ok, that's all the advertising major has to offer. My brain is a little dulled from afternoon vino.

Hey eric do you know anyone at the radio station here on campus? I know somebody named Eli that I think said he knew you.. I'm pretty sure he's got a show on KBVR, maybe I could get him to sign up here and mention it on the air.

If you guys started selling stuff and Eric (or someone else good at designing things) I would buy it. Most websites that I see have really crappy shirt designs and whatnot, so buying the merchandise isn't worth it unless you're a die-hard fan. I'm sure that Eric could make some way cool stuff that would actually be worth buying, even if you're not huge into the Collective.

Also, bumper stickers. Make some stuff that looks cool, I'd buy it.

good ideas everyone, now go do em...I'm lazy.

Yes. Stellar ideas, everyone. I love you all!

And btw, this voting system, IMO is better than most other systems where it just averages score given.

Make an advertisement-type thing on pieces of cardstock 2in by 3in or so, with the mixtape logo on one side and a description of what the site is all about on the other (to be more enticing) that could be handed out at parties/shows

If you give me $16 and a sandwich, I will storm the KOIN center at 11pm and dance naked on Jeff Gianola's desk. We can write "mixtape collective dot org" across my abdomen and consider that science DROPPED.

But I also like the ideas that involve T-shirts!

I liked the business card flyer idea.

Heavy web promotion is a must. Myspace, LiveJournal, Xanga, Friendster. Anything like that where a mixtape community has formed.

Promotion on bands websites, label sites, etc etc You might be surprised at how accomodating a lot of those seemingly big fish can be.

Keep the referral contest going, just award winners every month...or week.

More later...

Not to plug my own website here, but I run a music discussion/ vinyl trading messageboard with over 6k members and it'd be the perfect place to advertise (it's $15/month). A couple people have already posted on there about this site (that's how I found out about it) but an ad would get a LOT more attention.

A lot of indie/ hardcore/ metal labels have pretty big messageboards on their sites which a lot of people frequent, so look into posting on those too, possibly.

The idea of this site is pretty cool, so I'm fairly sure that word will spread fast. My site grew to be pretty huge (millions of hits a month) through nothing but word of mouth, so I imagine this will too :)

Alice - it's totally cool to plug your own site here, it's definitely related:

http://www.vivalavinyl.org/

If you guys ever decide to put banners up here, I'll totally trade, too.

I can put up a notice on some of the message boards i post on.

Hi yes, I really don't like that baby badge. That is one ugly baby. Could you do something about that?

Other than that, good job!

More badges! I want 2340832 of them please!

you need to allow HTML in tags so we can post links better.. and you need to fix your link system in the tags cause it always puts a space in them, and if the link makes it to a 2nd line it breaks!

I start at UofO's radio station tomorow...I could see about saying something on el radio. And when I say I start tomorrow, I mean, I start at 4 AM.