State of mind

[tufftie]

As I mentioned in a post earlier I'm starting up a forum regarding mental health issues. In particular I aim to get it to charity status to stop the stigma associated with mental health.

Please feel free to have a look and join but please note although it's been in the pipeline for a while I have only just set it up - so the appearance etc will need to be tweeked!

stateofmind.myfreeforum.org :: Index

I might add all the work that goes on behind the scenes really makes me appreciate the amount that Stu and others put into it...not that I didn't appreciate it before but...!!!

[Boddie]

Have you bought the domain name?

[tufftie]

Originally Posted by Boddie

Have you bought the domain name?

How do you mean? It's a free forum site?

[Boddie]

Originally Posted by tufftie

How do you mean? It's a free forum site?

I am thinking bigger picture. If this is successful then thats one heck of an address to remember.

What is stateofmind.co.uk?

What could it be?

The owner of stateofmind.co.uk could turn it into a narcotics appreciation site, then your site could be confused by association of web adddress.

I'd rethink the name and buy the domain. You could always still use myfreeforum.org but if it goes big just drop the my free forum part and go with the dedicated domain name.

Imagine if Stu had gone with wildaboutbritain.myfreewhatever then someone bought up wildaboutbritain.co.uk before he secured it?

I only say this because I reckon you could be onto something here. This could be a very popular site indeed

[tufftie]

Thanks for the advice it's very much needed! I see what you mean! How do you go about doing this and is it very expensive?!!! Sorry I'm a bit clueless with theses things!

[Boddie]

A domain name will cost you less than a tenner.

Do you want to start PM'ing me on this?

[eeyore]

the other thing to watch is how many similar domain names already exist

for example

www.stateofmindnz.com- is the site for two hip hop producers
www.stateofmind.com is registered to a name server but not currently in use
//www.stateofminds.com] is a hip hop social content site
url=http://www.stateofmind.org.uk]State of Mind - are a corporate stress consultancy
and
url=http://www.state-of-mind.co.uk] is darius sutherland photographer.

(incidentally ignore the broken code above - i did that deliberately to force it to show the URLS rather than the site titles)

It may be that you might need to rethink your name - and its not a bad idea to google it before you get too wedded to it.

also with regard to applying for charitable status, one of the key things that the charities commision looks for is that you are doing something different from what other charities are doing. - see here http://www.charitycommission.gov.uk/...on/think.asp#2

what you propose is laudable but how does it differ from the work of the much larger MIND Mind, For better mental health | Mind

[tufftie]

Thanks Eeyore Open to name suggestions - this is the thing that held me up with setting a forum up! Been looking into the charity situation and this seems to be the only UK forum that would be dedicated to reducing stigma (although there is more to the forum than that). There is another site in the UK but it is not a forum. I also realise that the 'charity' has to have so much income before it gets charity status.

[tufftie]

Something I should have added is that you don't have to be a sufferer or know one to join the forum. The idea is to start actively reducing the stigma and this is something we can all do.

[tufftie]

Having finally regained some of my health I have at last done the web page for the forum! Design for the logo is being worked on by Dave and Jez, so hopefully that wont be too much longer I'd like to thank Dave, Jez, Claire, Boddie and Eeyore for their help an encouragement with this site.

Now it's just a matter of increasing the traffic!!! (Hint, hint, hint!!!)

State of Mind