Before I start, I'll let you know that my English is occasionally bad. There might be grammar or any mistakes. And I'm a bit rude.
If you had to select a music genre to describe community's feel, what
would it be and why?
If I had to select, I'd pick something like 9 PM in downtown, just next to a jazz cafe and a rock bar. Honestly, I hate question about "if you had to choose, pick a genre for community". There's a lot genres out there, you can't pick one to even share it with community, you can't even make something to representative this. Alright, let's say the majority is about classical-music, jazz, blues, and rock. But how about the rest, like country, electronic, hip-hop, latin, soul, and stuffs? I don't know, maybe just not to make only one representative genre - make it 5 or more, that'll make the cultural difference in here more... happy.
What is the experience level of the average community member?
Some are just for making money, some are just for fun. They'll get a 50:50 on this. But what kind of experience are you talking about? If you're saying experience about playing music, I think it's equal, we're all learning here, no one is a pro here, we're all the same - we learn from each other, we steal each other skills. Make it to moderate if that's your question.
If you're saying experience about making or even performing music, there might be only 10 to 20 percent who really dug that. I think this is a site, where no matter how stupid you are, we're always gonna be welcoming you. If your question is off-topic, we'll guide you, sometimes we'll close it but we gave some answers. So basically the level of the users is limited, the random users who came into this site is barely low, and regular users just keep asking hard questions for them to get some rep(s).
Would most describe themselves as beginners or experts (albeit as much
as one can with music)?
Active members --> experts (mostly)
Random members --> some are experts, but mostly beginners.
Which musical trope(s) should be avoided?
Avoid these:
Music is not always about that. Music is not about notations. Some musician don't use notation until the rest of their life. Music is an art. Art is about expression of your free soul.
Name one feeling you hope the community's design communicates to new
users.
I can't name one, there's a lot of feelings for this community. @Patrx2 and @Shevliaskovic answers on this question is good enough. But here's mine:
THIS IS A COMMUNITY. If you're serious about it, and you did ask something about it, give us a bookmark. If you're just playing
around just asking question you don't really care, and after you ask,
you just leave it there, then f*ck off! This is like a bar, you came
to it, we'll have a chat and discuss it together, like a family - not
just like asking professionals or doctors. If you want to learn new
shit everyday, then visit us everyday! We'll get discussions running
all the time as long as we could! We're not just Q&A site for music,
we're a forum, together we learn our shit and treat each other like
family.
Pardon my language, because so many are just like that, ask a question and never check into it again - or treat the community just like a normal Q&A site.