MA Summit a Massive success!

Last weekend saw the revival of the MA Summit, the weekend conference designed to help full time and part time martial arts professionals. From start to finish this was an extremely well run event by Bytomic Distribution as the two day programme of interactive seminars and lectures offered something for everyone. From a neutral view point I was impressed by the quality of speakers, from Ronald Osbourne on teaching success to Andy Norman and the guys from his Kesyi Fighting Team. 

Me with Martyn, founder of the Focus Master

As we were a sponsor of the event in terms of offering full service media coverage, Bytomic had asked us to put on a stand to showcase to attendees of the MA Summit what we had to offer from Martial Edge. Jason and I came up with something original to not only attract interest in Martial Edge but also to amuse. Thats right kids we came up with a punching machine with the help of Andy Weightman of Boxright to really get the testosterone flowing.  Stay tuned for the feature on that one as we filmed snapshots of the instructors taking part in our competition to find out who had the hardest punch during the two day event, it will be online soon.

Martial Edge down time

I explained in last weeks blog update the technical team have been working hard behind the scenes to sort this issue with the site occasionally going down.  So as you have probably noticed the past couple of days the forums have been going down and will probably need to do again at some point this week as the transfer is complete. This is because we dont want to lose any of the new posts that will be made during the final change over. Anyway all I can say is trust me and of course the technical team as this will be all sorted by the end of the week and those slow loading times and site crashes will be a thing of the past.

Fresh content

I received a couple of emails last week about fresh editorial content for the martial arts articles section. This is not something we have been neglecting in fact the complete opposite. Behind the scenes myself, Ben and Lesley have been looking at how we can really develop the editorial side of Martial Edge to keep a constant flow of information coming through the site, after all not everyone wants to have a profile page and debate in forums. Therefore next month you can look forward to some fresh interviews, articles and reviews from the team and our wider community of writers and contributors.

Martial Edge needs you!

Thats right we need you.  Today it will be around 58 days to Christmas and before the big day itself we want to have 1000 active Martial Edge members. This would cap off a remarkable year for the site and would mean that looking forward to 2009 we would be in a strong position to really start to kick those old rickety and often amateur martial arts portals into touch.  So how can you help us do this?

Well start in your clubs, tell fellow students about us and what the site is trying to achieve which is of course to create the worlds largest online martial arts community. Instructors out there include the site in your emails, your club and organisation newsletters etc. I know some of you like to use a variety of different forums throughout the week, so therefore that is no excuse not to tell everyone about us in those forums too.

Forum bugs

I wont say too much here as I am at risk of repeating myself from last weeks blog but we are still ongoing with fixing one or two issues!

Phew!

Thats all for this week folks.

Pete Mills
Senior Editor/Co Founder
Martial Edge The Worlds Largest Online Martial Arts Community

General Martial Edge News

This month make sure you check out Martial Arts Illustrated Magazine as the cover story was written by your very own Martial Edge editor Pete Mills thats right kids me!  As some of you know Chris Crudelli has been a friend of Martial Edge since we re launched the site in its present format since last year and he kindly agreed to do a cross promotional exercise with Martial Edge and the folks from MAI. If you do get your hands on a copy make sure you have a good read of all of it as you will find a cheeky advert offering 10% off in our Martial Arts Shop. 

Help I need technical assistance!

I thought a quick mention here about some of the minor technical glitches you are currently experiencing in the forums and what we are doing about it was necessary this week.  With regards the forums we use third party software which basically means our guys have not built it and therefore we have to rely on these third parties getting back to us with our queries which can take some time. I know the bug where threads cant go past page 11 is annoying and the one in the beginners area for titles of threads are just two examples but we are dealing with it. Anyhow keep yourself updated in Talk to the Team as we will post in there as things progress with this. Hopefully though we will be sorted on this front.

The real die hard Martial Edge fans have also spotted that on random  occasions the site seems to implode and subsequently goes offline. At first we were thinking that we didnt have enough hamsters running the machines but our clever technical guys led by Jason discovered that rather then Hamsters causing the problem rather it was a build up of temporary files. Thats right temporary files and if your thinking that does not make any sense join the club of non technical people. However along with the forum bugs on friday Jason is kicking off a server revamp so hopefully these Hamster failures –to you and I will be a thing of the past.

Bytomic MA Summit

I have already mentioned this in previous blog updates but for the instructors out there next weekend the MA Summit. The event organised by David Lowe of Bytomic Distribution will have key note speakers including KFM Stunt and fight team for Batman, The Dark Knight - one of the most successful school owners and speakers from the USA - Frank Silverman, motivational speaker and trainer - Richard Wilkins from the Ministry of Inspiration here in the UK and Fari Salievski - a huge success from Australia plus many more. The team from Martial Edge will also be at the event so make sure you get your hands on some tickets as there are some still available.

London Stage Show 10th December 2008

We have organised a couple of competitions now that offer a bit of live entertainment such as Kung Fu Panda and Babes with Blades.  We love these events as it gives us a chance to meet you guys and of course everyone enjoys winning competitions! Anyway this is more of a heads up then a competition announcement as on the 10th December we will be attending the Kick Ass martial arts stage show presented by Chris Crudelli with special guests The Babes with Blades. So if you would like to meet the Martial Edge Team and of course meet the people who use the Martial Edge website I reckon this would be a perfect 2008 meet up opportunity!  More details can be found at my forum thread on the subject.

Pete Mills
Senior Editor/Co Founder
Martial Edge The Worlds Largest Online Martial Arts Community

On Saturday night the team from Martial Edge attended the Clash of the Titans hosted by Martial Arts Illustrated in Huddersfield. The clash has been going now for some twenty odd years with Taekwondo legends such as Dave Oliver and Kenny Walton gracing the earlier clashes and of course greats of the competition such as Alfie Lewis.

Saturdays event saw Bob Sykes back in action at the golden age of 46, leading his team from the Colne Valley Martial Arts Academy. The two other teams in action were Puma Taekwondo and North West Chinese Kickboxing. Apart from some dubious refereeing and decisions and the occasional bout where the kickboxers forgot how to kick it was a splendid evening of freestyle sparring with Bob Sykes academy team taking the honours.

Between the bouts were XMA demonstrations from children from various schools including the Sheffield Dragons. Personally I think the XMA is a refreshing way for youngsters to get involved in the martial arts which can only be a good thing right?

The finale to the evenings events was a demonstration by Britains got talent finalists, Team Strike. The lads from Strike put on a good show and the only negative was that both Jason and myself had to literally drag our respective ladies away at the end  apparently Team Martial Edge doesnt cut the mustard like Team Strike.

Way of the Warrior Competition

Ok guys well we have had no takers on this so far. If you have not already read the rules on this months competition to win a signed copy of Chris Crudellis Way of the Warrior all you have to do is get five of your fellow martial arts students to get involved with Martial Edge so get cracking as it closes at the end of this month!

Building a Community, maintaining the quality

Having met a couple of you guys at various Martial Edge events and of course through chatting in the forums it appears that an overwhelming concern is maintaining the sites forum as Martial Edge grows.

For those of you that have missed these various conversations check out the various threads in Talk to the Team such as Critique other Forums! Expanding the community and Largest Martial Arts Community.

The topic of maintaining the community feel interests me and the team a great deal as it is clearly a core aspect of the site we want to ensure survives as the Martial Edge site continues to grow. Jason and I have always maintained a liberal approach to the forums in that as long as a - No Profanity and b - No Personal Attacks are made then pretty much any topic is allowed.

The question is how do we move on from this as the site grows? Undoubtedly we will get people signing up and logging in who have no interest in the community aspect and clearly the team cannot be online 24/7 - nor do we have the time or inclination to be getting involved with personal disputes between people who use the site. Food for thought and something we should be all thinking about over the next few weeks. 

Pete Mills
Senior Editor/Co Founder
Martial Edge The Worlds Largest Online Martial Arts Community

Babes with Blades

On Friday night we attended the Babes with Blades theatre show at Jacksons Lane Theatre in London. As we came into the theatre the babes from the blades had gone about creating the scene with oriental music being piped through the theatre and the smoke machine on full blast! As for the show itself it was a demonstration of some fine martial arts skills with a mix of contemporary dance. From my perspective I feel that this type of show is fantastic for the martial arts and I wish Cecily Fay and her team all the best in putting on more of these shows.

We ran the Babes with Blades Competition last month and below I have included a picture from the event. From left to right Competition winner Sophie a.k.a Hopsy Bailu, myself top left, James a.k.a Bailu Taiji top right and bottom right Cecily Fay.

Chris Crudelli competition

With the launch of his new book Way of Warrior with Dorling Kindersley Martial Edge are giving away ten signed copies of this terrific martial arts book. I have seen some related threads in the forums this week on how ace the way of the warrior book looks guys all I can say is get entered into the competition!! Not only does this book retail at twenty five pounds but it will be a signed copy by Chris Crudelli and delivered to your door.

Pete Mills
Senior Editor/Co Founder
Martial Edge The Worlds Largest Online Martial Arts Community