Someone asked this good question over on the Artfire Forum and here's the admin's answer:
So let's talk goals. This isn't a top down broadcast kind of discussion. This site is the first of its kind. We are engaged in community directed development a process that creates the foundation of the site and then opens the development process to the members to direct our growth, functionality, goals, mission and vision.So here is the ideas we have and the goals we have set, these are open to input and feedback from the community.
1) We want to help sellers sell - no matter where. Using the following:
A) Education - teaching and mentoring new sellers and helping experts strive to improve through rich media lessons, expert consulting, third party support, and community mentoring.
B) Systems - creating a selling platform that is functional, simple, customizable and most importantly - fully integrating, to the best of our ability, your promotion and management of all selling sites through the artfire platform. We seek to be a hub that allows you to manage your business, no matter where you are selling.
C) Bringing Buyers - Reinvesting money from the site into buyer marketing. This will start on Internet sites and print channels, then shift to include broadcast, new media and more traditional channels. We intend to champion the handmade movement using all of our marketing and PR resources to shift this trend from micro to macro and create an environment where handmade buying is much more the norm.
D) Positively impact the planet and our fellow humans - cooperatively build a site that pools our indivdual resources, money, service, impact and creativity to improve our environment, help those less fortunate and support humanitarian efforts in research, education and the arts. By collecting and focusing a little from each of us we can make a dramatic impact in many of these areas.
E) Become the preeminent place on the Internet for artists and crafters to collaborate, partner, communicate and share via extensive, rich, functional community features and interaction points.
F) Create a self regualting, self supporting, self reliant community where each member can have both responsibility and interaction at a level that best suits them.These are a just a start.
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