Patrick Burns

I really like the percussion. So many different 'places' outlined in the tune with their own snare/hat patterns, openness of the hat, etc. For example, the A section of the athletic theme: the lead/bass/hats all tighten a bit while the snare is dropping at half time. Fun times.

Yeah, worthwhile and fulfilling are the right words I guess. Certainly the "achievements" aspect of games rightfully loses its depth as you age. Peeling the achievement flavor away, I guess things like escapism/narrative/fantasy are what still have some meaning for me from time to time. And that shows in the games I chose to play. Though even that has faded. I had a strange thought recently about this recently... related to thinking about dating again. You know how there are people who just don't understand video games or for that matter fantasy genres/media of any kind? I heard Midna's Desperate Hour from Twilight Princess recently and was transported back to some teenage memories of playing Zelda. I thought to myself, even if I never play another game again, I don't think someone can understand me if they don't relate that sort of transportation---or make believe, if you want to be call it like it is. And it's something more than just enjoying fiction, you know? It's late. I'm getting into that weird, late-night writing headspace.

The Big Stage!

At the beginning of college, I was really into WoW. But college and my first relationships really sunk my taste for playing games all the time. These days---nine years on---I play maybe two games a year. They're usually the "best" from the previous year or so, and I'll just be consumed with it for maybe a week----like Oblivion or Undertale. My changes in taste are not based on a lack of free time. (I am in graduate school, but I have no kids, am single currently, no pets, no roommates, I don't go out and party, etc.) It's just that I want to spend my time on other things---things that are ... it's hard to describe ... part of a "larger landscape" in my life. I'm trying to continue my 20 year relationship with the guitar, continuing some psychology related research/reading that that I started in undergrad, and trying to finish graduate school in an other field entirely. All those things are long term relationships that have years behind me and decades of landscape open before me. But I value my past with games. Games (and this site) are responsible for much of my relationship with music. Games helped develop a lot of my imagination and identity. But it's a paradox now... I was watching my brother in law play Breath of the Wild recently. I started watching some YouTube videos and scheming of ways to get my hands on the game. But at the end of the day, as big as that game is, it feels small compared to the landscape of the other interests I've been fortunate enough to cultivate. Everything in moderation, I guess.

Nice job. Glad some people still put care and thought into album titles that actually cause us to reflect on stale genre norms and force us to confront the Other inside each of us.

nuff said. I was at a workshop put on by one of my favorite guitarists years ago. someone raised their hand and asked, "how do I get noticed?" His response: "get good."

Wot in tarnation... That's awesome. I've been very into FJM since being exposed to him through KEXP a couple years back. Was Just listening to him today, in fact, and am anticipating the new album. How did this come about for you?

Nice! Checks out... (with an extra turnaround)

Decades ago jazz musicians began circulating a 'book'... a sort of underground compendium of the chords/melodies/lyrics to lots of jazz standards. It was organically assembled and shared over time, with no single definitive version sold by anyone. (I guess it was an inevitable product of the invention of the photocopier.) Today, though, publishing companies have gotten on board, done the legwork to get publishing licenses, and offered "Real books" for sale... Personally, I think the internet makes a lot of the impetus for a Real Book obsolete, but it's a nice thought... I mean, I'd be happy to see a VG Real Book (OCRealbook?!) on my bookshelf, but I'd probably rarely open it, ha! ...or would I? But honestly, unless one of a few people just did the huge task of making it by themselves, I just see lots of potential for song selection and notation arguments.

A vg realbook is an interesting thought experiment... but here's my imaginary set list / jam list... Zelda - Great Fairy's theme (how could you open with anything else?) Metroid (NES) - Brinstar (letting them know you're the OG) Mega Man - Snakeman (push that opening energy) CT - Millenial Fair (feels good mane) CT - Secret of the Forest (take a breath, learn some forest secrets) Zelda - Song of Storms (everyone's drunk on forest secrets, touch them inappropriately with zelda) Earthbound - Onett (there's the sunshine again) Sonic - Green Hill Zone (crowd pleaser) Sonic 2 - Chemical Plant (because you've got the chops, and ice cap is too short) Super Metroid - Lower Brinstar (darkness brooding again) Super Metroid - Lower Norfair (rock. and. roll.) Yoshi's Island - Underground (we're safe now, extended jam time) Mario 64 - Dire Dire Docks (rising back to the surface with some melody) Super Mario Word - Overworld (because NES 1-1 is too cliched at this point) DK - Stickerbush Symphony (a cheer goes up from the crowd) CT - Corridors of Time (of course) Zelda - Darkworld (the crowd wonders when the show will end, but they don't mind because zelda) Kirby's Adventure - Butter Buildings (seriously when is this going to stop, ooooh shiny!) DK - Aquatic Ambiance (crowd forgets their evening plans and decides to follow you anywhere) Final Fantasy - Prelude (misc FF suite so you don't get shanked after leaving the stage) Final Fantasy III - Altar Room Final Fantasy IX - You're Not Alone Final Fantasy any - Chocobo Final Fantasy VI - The Decisive Battle Final Fantasy VI - Terra (bring them to their knees with your sweet overdriven nectar of life, walk off the stage) CT - 600 AD (encore, let the tears flow)

Clever transition between themes, Andrew. I never consciously noticed how the Sub-C Map theme was sort of a variation on the B section of the Overworld theme. In fact, it may be better to say that that part of the Overworld theme is just a little preview of the Sub-C Map... which maybe is why getting into Sub-C always felt so much like home-base in-game... like you were really moving forward with the heart of the story when you got into Sub-C, at least to me. Good times they were, playing this game with my big sister. And the accordion lead situation was good.

ReMixer has jar of peanut butter, has jar of jelly. OCR wants to be a cool guy. There's bread laying around... OCR asks for jars of peanut butter and jelly. Uses bread. OCR makes yummy PB&J, cuts it in half. OCR Gives half to ReMixer and half to Remixer's best friend, Listener. Sandwiches are good, ReMixer and Listener happy. OCR doesn't eat, but OCR is happy too. The bread runs out. Listener has extra bread. OCRemix allows listener to continue eating sandwiches... ...but asks listener to first contribute a slice of bread before each sandwich. ReMixer sees OCR using his peanut butter and jelly as bargaining chip in order to acquire bread. ReMixer accuses OCR of taking advantage of ReMixer's tasty spreadables for personal bread collection OCR is sad. OCR eventually asks ReMixer how they should keep make sandwiches...

You would be right, if you consider OCR's YouTube channel as merely a glorified file hosting service. You are missing a lot of the equation if you see it as that. OCR faces two directions. In one direction, it provides a brand across different platforms to which listeners can reliably return for certain kinds of music---more reliably than searching for all those content providers individually. In the other direction, it provides musicians a platform to have their labors of love heard by a larger audience and to receive greater feedback and even instruction. Furthermore, it does all this in such a way as to help shield this gathering under the umbrella of fair use. None of those arms of OCR work without the other arms. You can't arbitrarily divorce the YouTube channel apart from it because the YouTube channel would die without the essential functions of the rest of the OCR organism which requires a lot of work to maintain.

People subscribe to OCR's social media for the same reason they subscribe to anything---the perception that there's reliable quality/relevance being produced. All of those things I listed--all the peripheral work--enable OCR to have that reputation, and enable their relative success on social media compared to our individual efforts as remixers. In the past I've had certain songs on my own channels for years, and they don't get the same visibility that OCR gets in a few hours---on the same platform. So of course OCR provides benefit on YouTube, to bother remixers and listeners. Regarding operating costs---my message was to point out that operating costs are not the only work going into OCR. (Which is why I'm not sure what you're trying to argue by pointing out that those things I listed are not "operating costs"---that's what I thought I was explaining to you.) You seemed to be arguing that OCR provides no added value on YouTube, so I listed the efforts that do in fact contribute to why OCR does provide added value on YouTube and other social media platforms. Tell me if I'm wrong---but you seem to be arguing that things which are "operating costs" in an accounting sense---e.g. web hosting---are the only things that we should consider when taking stock of the appropriateness of ad revenue---that the staff should not conceive of ways to ease the burden of volunteer efforts or invest in expanded efforts in the future.

That's because drugs pose a societal threat outside those channels. Not only that, but the pharmacist is personally profiting from the endeavor. While I agree that not all channels are the same, I'm not sure of how that metaphor applies to the situation. As far as YouTube being divorced from the operating costs of this website, you're making the very incorrect assumption that some are making here: that operating costs are the only benefit provided by OCR. The diversity of work that goes into this community is much more than operating costs of the website.That work includes of course maintaining a website and forum (and all the hosting, tagging, organization requirements therein), but it also includes maintaining standards of curation quality that upset the fewest number of remixers/listeners, maintaining sufficient standards of transformation/remix to help the fair-use argument fly, providing a social media platform that consistently and quickly brings visibility that our individual pages do not, serving as a sort of proxy to educate interested parties when there are copyright issues (like when the youtube channel was brought down or when the final fantasy project was questioned), cultivating good will with hundreds of individuals in the game development community, planning and organizing ways to help the endeavor grow despite being volunteers with 'real lives,' maintaining the restraint needed to prevent arguments from grinding things to a halt, the list goes on. All of those things and more contribute to the recognition/viability OCR has as a whole, including what it is able to accomplish on social media.

You're right that they aren't a 501c3 --- I am highlighting their interest in becoming one as at least one reason we should trust that they aren't squirreling our remix dollars away. Whether it ends up being practical or actually happens is another question. It all comes back to trust. Legal constructs provide an easier avenue to trust in certain ways, but the staff still has to cultivate trust overall. OCR staff, from what I've seen over the years, have continually demonstrated the spirit behind legal constructions like non-profits: stating a greater good mission and bringing in revenue solely to support that. That's why fair use applies to OCR's activities, that's why we shouldn't be worried that ethics are being violated, and that's why I think that people's reaction to YouTube monetization should be more understanding. Newt I gather that you and I don't disagree... but one of the reasons I wanted to post is because I feel that even positions such as "it's OK but you should have asked" or "they probably haven't taken a meaningful amount of money"--- while legalistically fair --- are very unfair to the non-remixing sweat put into this community over the years---work which is inherently less fun than remixing, and work which should have garnered the staff a large amount of trust capital up to this point. That work should have earned within all of us the understanding that there's nothing dishonest here, because the dishonesty in this case pre-requires some ultimate self-interest, of which there is obviously none.

If the terms were your main concern, you can disregard my responses. I mistakenly gathered that you were concerned about being unfairly involved in something new or risky, which were the concerns I was addressing.

The obtrusiveness, of course, is not the issue at hand in this thread. You're right--it's the idea of ads there in the first place. My point on obtrusiveness is that obtrusiveness is one of the many things that OCR must consider as the designer of this OCR product. The obtrusiveness was a factor in certain banner ad decisions, and it's reasonable to want to assess the obtrusiveness of ads on YouTube. My use of the word "neutral" was not neutrality in a political sense regarding the issues raised in this thread. I mean neutral from that observational standpoint when trying to assess the obtrusiveness of YouTube monetization. Once something becomes a conscious issue that people are aware of---that people take sides on---you've lost some ability to observe how it would have impacted the delivery of your product in a purely practical sense.

We don't seem to be on the same page. I'm not asserting that YouTube monetization is OK because its in the terms, so there's no need to keep referencing the terms (the terms were never really of much concern to me, personally). I'm saying that YouTube monetization is OK because its functionally, legally, and ethically indistinguishable from what the site has always done. So when you say "inform people when you do things with their work" then I agree. It's just that I don't anything "has been done" with our work that's at all different from before, and that's why I think a few people are getting upset unnecessarily.

The point of contention here is precisely that---whether we're being involved in something new or not. I recognize that it seems new because we associate YouTube monetization with the everyman who builds a successful, lucrative channel for themselves... but YouTube is just a platform for revenue. It's how that revenue is used that makes the difference. So you shouldn't be afraid... not of legitimate ethical or legal implications. Of course, that doesn't mean that organizations don't use the legal system to bully other organizations, and in that sense anything is possible (as it always has been). But OCR isn't antagonizing any publishers, not by a long shot. OCR is not giving anyone a reason to cause us trouble. In fact, part of the value that OCR provides all of us is the industry respect that is nurtured through some projects and contacts. The main idea, in my assessment, is that remixes are generating revenue to promote more listening and more remixes, etc. etc... same as it ever was, same as it ever was.

I agree that communication like that goes a long way---and it's important that OCR remain communally-determined in many respects. But I also don't feel my voice diminished by them deciding to test it on part of the catalog before announcing it. Once it's announced, your ability to neutrally observe its obtrusiveness is diminished.

It hinges on trusting that the staff is acting in good faith. The pursuit of 501c3 status is one leg of my trust, and I offered it up in my post as something that those less trusting could get behind. My own trust is based primarily on what I've observed on the site over past 12+ years, but I recognize that this is not enough for everyone.

Much of this has been stated, but I thought it be helpful to have the ethics spoken to by another remixer who isn't on staff. Regarding whether remixers should trust the staff --- the fact that 501c3 status is being voluntarily pursued by the staff should be enough to inspire trust. If you didn't know, it would mean that OCR would have to report publicly a lot of financial information, including revenues, expenses, and information on whether/how it compensates staff. And it would be a federal offense to intentionally misreport that information. Regarding profit --- as has been pointed out, it appears that many of us here are unaware of what profit means. Both for-profit and non-profit companies would love to grow. Both would love to generate more money than they spend. The difference comes in what happens to that extra money. Both can chose to pour that extra money back into the company for it to grow (marketing, research and development, staffing, etc.), but only the for-profit has the option of distributing the profits to the owners/shareholders. That's the difference. Non-profits generate profit... they just have to pour that money back into the organization's stated purpose. And we have no reason to believe the OCR staff has done anything other than this, especially in light of them wanting to attain a certain legal status that requires them to publicly report exactly how they're doing this. Regarding paying remixers --- that is immediately a for-profit situation, as zircon stated, and that immediately endangers fair use issues. "But wait, why is it legally OK for OCR to do it for themselves but not OK for them to pay Patrick Burns?" Because OCR is an organization with a stated public/artistic mission, no shareholders who profit from dividends or the sale of the organization, and uses the money in a certain fashion (soon-to-be legally obligated to use that money in a certain fashion, as the staff voluntarily desires). Patrick Burns has no binding, stated purpose for the greater good, and can use the money however he pleases---most likely a burrito bowl that will contribute to his BMI and increase the public healthcare burden (but even if I used it for my kids, it's still for-profit). In other words, the money going to OCR is fair-use because that gathered money has no other outlet than the further promotion of OCR's fair-use mission. I, on the other hand, can take the money anywhere. Regarding testing the monetization quietly --- the entire idea "that someone should've asked us" is based on the unfounded assumption that OCR is doing something selfish. On the contrary, we have no reason to believe the money isn't going precisely back into the function which inspired every single remixer here to submit to OCR in the first place: visibility and community. (And soon we might have public documents to verify this, as the staff obviously desires.) Give me proof that anyone on staff is using the monetization for personal gain, and then I would agree that we should have been asked. My feelings: OCR provides a platform which isn't within my skill set---a platform which would not exist through my own self-promotion, nor through the collective, individual self promotion of all remixers here. Even if you assume that the homepage's value is minimal, social media buoyancy doesn't come easy. I have been given no reason to distrust the staff, and the staff seems proactive in making their non-profit status official, thus providing some transparency.

This exists because of you, man!

Yeah, I think there are a lot more avenues to find and share nostalgia these days... in the process making it less potent, as you point out. Also---and this has always been the subject of disagreement since I first started coming here---our arrangements don't add nearly as much in the post-redbook audio era. Not only has the music evolved away from less-abstractable melodies, but there's an instant wow factor for a DAW production of a low tech melody that serves as the lede when you're sharing a track with friends. Appreciating arrangements of already well-produced material requires a listener who's much more fixated on the music than the average listener, imo. There are definitely still plenty of arrangements from the older days, but those of us who might engage with it are busy with careers and families. At least OCRemix still has decent search ranking (first and second page) when searching for specific game composers, which is how I discovered the site back around 2003. There will always be a niche for this community. But there was a time when the community was a cutting edge little novelty in several related areas that all seem to reinforce each other... there was a more common core of game music cannon just ripe for the picking, digital music production was just gaining mass accessibility, people were sharing old game tunes and MIDIs easily for the first time, emulation was cool, file hosting was starting to make sense, forums were still more meaningful than social media... We've just got so many other options to fulfill our music/digital/social/creative needs these days. But I've never been a creator of digital platforms, so I'm sure there are others with more concrete experiences to share.