I'm looking into forum email notifications. It seems that odolany is right. You can subscribe to a thread by RSS at the top of the page. But, I think it's not ideal for most people.

I agree with the DM style music games. I do have some like that I can put up here. While traveling I was working on a character based music game. Gonna get that one up next.

And as for DM. I understand your call as a vote of preference for a kind of "workshop paradigm" ;), as it's 100% compatible.
This one person who makes things happen during the game, adjusts everything to participants, makes variants on the spot and takes care for the process. That is like it usually goes with "dungeon masters" and "teachers" alike (and some other MC roles). I'm sure notrightmusic has something in his vaults where this role is given interesting tasks for the Preparation stage. ;)

Is there a way to be notified when people respond to our posts?

D&D is an interesting take. imo music games have indeed a lot in common with RPGs. Although to be honest I have no idea what are the tasks of designers there and what is a usual process.

I'll move here also your quote from 'Introduction' thread:

I've always had trouble defining what a music game is. The definition on the front page of this site comes close to what I imagine they should be.
I've had people tell me that a game is defined by having winners and losers, but that is too narrow a few for me and many games suggest otherwise. It's also worth noting that games don't necessarily have to be fun either.

I know designers very attached to winning conditions, I'm not one of them. Jesper Juul adds a nice "outcome that players are emotionally attached to" to his definition, sort of midway.

…But for fun… we could discuss more. I guess some put forth 'engagement', do you think game should be engaging? Or at least aim for being engaging.
There would be a few distinct categories of those that are not fun (also not engaging): "Bad games", "games inspired activities" and "games, metaphorically speaking". Last one is not the least as "game" serves as a default metaphor for so many things, that it's almost impossible to find a basic meaning now. I think reserving literal meaning for rule-based activities with the purpose of being fun/engaging would be elegant, at least. ;)

Anyway, I'm convinced that at this wiki there is a place for people with any possible understanding of a music game or a game ;).

I agree with you here. I hope that pick up and play games can be thought of as a regular activity for anyone interested. That's my focus for this wiki. However, I still love more in-depth games that require a bit more. Give me all the games!

There are also other kinds of meetings with games - actual workshops that promise learning. These are much more organized, often payed and advertised through the authority and achievements of the leader. I've been to some (only those free ones ;pp) - usually inspiring.

But a game can be it's own activity regardless of meetings. It's just a matter of how many people know games (some specific games or just are familiar with the activity). When there are not many people at local jam session and they know games, we can sometimes play a round or two (leaderlessly).

I hope music games will some time be just an available activity in any situation when people meet.

But actually you seem to touch on a topic that makes the distinction in question most clear and even emotionally relatable. The game in what I called a 'workshop' format requires this leader/teacher/gamemaster figure. And a game of 'board' format ideally wouldn't need anyone like that.

The preference might be also connected to the fact that you as a professional musician participate in many projects and those by nature need some sort of structure. I'm much more of a hobbyst and wouldn't find much pleasure in people telling me what to do ;p and that is also how I understand games.

1. Preparation - I don't know any games that require all players to prepare props ahead of time. If some kind of preparation is required then it's usually one or two people who do it, usually those who set up and are in charge of the game meeting. Unless it's a classroom setting and an assignment is given. Usually these preparations are small - such as "come up with a motif," or "think of a few events." Big preparations are almost always done by the people in charge of a game meeting. I often the one who's in charge of game meetings so I might have to build, for example, a wooden spinning wheel for a game. I'm one of those people who would gladly do it! Then I have a spinning wheel in storage for whenever I need it for future games! At most of my game meetings, gatherings, workshops, parties everyone shows up with no extra preparations needed. Except if they're playing they might have to bring their instruments.
"the ideal situation is to provide a ready prop and encourage players to make their own versions (if they will)." I agree with this.

2) Not specifying all rules - For the most part I agree. Game rules contributed to this wiki library should be concrete, unless there is a specific reason to have free choice in the mechanics, I still imagine it would be rare. There is also a Variant chapter that can help solve some problems that might arise in being strict with this rule.
However, there are times when not specifying all the rules and leaving choice is important. Creative education for example - which would include classrooms, workshops, videos, or whenever one hopes to get people to play 'game designer.' When doing this there should be an objective in place. What is the main idea to be taught? And that objective should be the core of the game mechanic. We might even want to have an 'educational games' category here in the future, but for now, the library is for people to find games that they can play. So, for the most part, the game rules should be complete. If a mechanic is left open, most of the time it's just bad game design.

1) is mostly a practical problem. It is just great if you can pick up a game basically any time you play music, but of course having props is often fun. Still I'm an advocate of using props that you can provide as a print-out and use the same props in defferent ways for different games.
And I realize that it's indeed personal, because, honestly, I'm just bad with pencils and scissors and find working with them boring and frustrating at the same time. ;)
But my point is: the ideal situation is to provide a ready prop and encourage players to make their own versions (if they will).

2) is for me also about a projected player. For the same reason I don't want to imagine that future player of a game likes drawing I don't want to imagine that a player is interested in game design.
Choosing a ruleset is asking 'Which way the game played would be more fun?' (I'm convinced that rules we choose almost always have effect on that). And answering that question is a designer's job, it's not a trivial one and requires lots of testing.