"Moving on" from OC ReMix (split from BGC apology)

[JJT]

i think jimmy's a jerk. a real jerk.

*runs back into seclusion*

[Mirby]

its like jedi school for musicians.

this should be the new slogan for the forums

[The Joker]

Oh wow, I had no idea that this was even an issue. I know on NGI I recently said I was taking a break from remixing for the foreseeable future, but it was more along the lines of there just not being enough time, or even enough inspiration to remix anything at the moment. That coupled with the fact that BadAss 1 & 2 are some of the best things I think I've ever been involved with in the community, & make for as good a swan song as any, make for a compelling reason to kinda fade into the background, not that I was at the forefront or anything.

I know for me it's just a lot more enjoyable to make something original, rather than try & make an already existing song personal. I get that. The reasons someone gets into remixing vg themes evolves into the reasons to write original tunes.

[djpretzel]

Oh wow, I had no idea that this was even an issue.

It's not really an issue, per se, it's just something we decided to talk about

I know for me it's just a lot more enjoyable to make something original, rather than try & make an already existing song personal. I get that. The reasons someone gets into remixing vg themes evolves into the reasons to write original tunes.

Uh, sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. I kinda-sorta think the whole point I was making was that "moving on" and "next level" - and now "evolves" - aren't the best words to be using, because for a lot of people, myself included, it's not hierarchical like that. There's no reason to think of writing originals as necessarily being an evolution; it's just a different ballgame altogether. Plenty of folk alternate between both, and this continued idea that it's one or the other and that there's some sequence of steps/levels to be moved on from (or evolved to) seems really, really, really, REALLY, artificial and bogus to me.

Edited October 1, 2013 by djpretzel

[The Joker]

It's not really an issue, per se, it's just something we decided to talk about

Uh, sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. I kinda-sorta think the whole point I was making was that "moving on" and "next level" - and now "evolves" - aren't the best words to be using, because for a lot of people, myself included, it's not hierarchical like that. There's no reason to think of writing originals as necessarily being an evolution; it's just a different ballgame altogether. Plenty of folk alternate between both, and this continued idea that it's one or the other and that there's some sequence of steps/levels to be moved on from (or evolved to) seems really, really, really, REALLY, artificial and bogus to me.

I was just talking more myself, in a personal way rather than a ocr wide way or whatever the proper term would be. When I started making music, I wasn't all to into making original music, I just liked remixing vg tracks. As time went by & I improved my craft, I started toying around with original stuff. My use of evolved was less about one or the other, but more about the fact that remxing led me into making original music in the first place.

Edited October 1, 2013 by The Joker

[Argle]

It depends on when you come to OCR. A lot of people start their musical journey here and branch out. Conversely I've been writing original music for eons and frankly I'm bored of it, so for me OC remixing is a good change. If I get bored of remixing I'll go back to originals, or finally learn to play my guitar, or quit or something. Whatever strikes me fancy.

[The Joker]

If I get bored of remixing I'll go back to originals, or finally learn to play my guitar, or quit or something. Whatever strikes me fancy.

Yeah, pretty much this, you know, if life doesn't get in the way & I just don't have time for music anymore, which would suck.

[ectogemia]

They prioritize making it known who the remixers are because those two lines are on the very top.

I'm not accusing anyone of any douchebaggery or intentional maliciousness here as self-promotion is necessary and usually innocuous, but I would say very, very confidently that OCR is prioritizing OCR in a description which is > 95% about OCR, regardless of whether or not the remixer's name is included in the top 2 lines (and to be a butt, the artist's name first appears on the 3rd line).

And eyes are drawn to links. They're a different color than other text. They're underlined. They're clickable. They lead to more content. OCR knows this because there are six links to various OCR pages surrounding the contributing artist's name. "ReMixer: ectogemia" in the YouTube description does me no good, and I know this because I didn't see a glut of traffic on any of my content hubs, despite garnering 4,000 views on my remix. "ReMixer: ectogemia," however, is a lot more effective. When a friend, artist, contractor, label, YouTube channel, etc. directly links to my content, I *always* receive a glut in traffic and a permanent increase in likes/follows.

Simply put, prioritizing someone means putting him/her, first, and although OCR's library is composed entirely of user-driven content, those users are not being prioritized, not being put first. I'm not sure how you could possibly mistake that by looking at the YouTube description's architecture as it is.

Edited October 1, 2013 by ectogemia

[timaeus222]

Simply put, prioritizing someone means putting him/her, first, and although OCR's library is composed entirely of user-driven content, those users are not being prioritized, not being put first. I'm not sure how you could possibly mistake that by looking at the YouTube description's architecture as it is.

It may come off that way to some people, but I wouldn't believe it's intentional, and it doesn't come off that way to me.

Edited October 1, 2013 by timaeus222

[Jamphibious]

I'm not accusing anyone of any douchebaggery or intentional maliciousness here as self-promotion is necessary and usually innocuous, but I would say very, very confidently that OCR is prioritizing OCR in a description which is > 95% about OCR, regardless of whether or not the remixer's name is included in the top 2 lines (and to be a butt, the artist's name first appears on the 3rd line).

And eyes are drawn to links. They're a different color than other text. They're underlined. They're clickable. They lead to more content. OCR knows this because there are six links to various OCR pages surrounding the contributing artist's name. "ReMixer: ectogemia" in the YouTube description does me no good, and I know this because I didn't see a glut of traffic on any of my content hubs, despite garnering 4,000 views on my remix. "ReMixer: ectogemia," however, is a lot more effective. When a friend, artist, contractor, label, YouTube channel, etc. directly links to my content, I *always* receive a glut in traffic and a permanent increase in likes/follows.

Simply put, prioritizing someone means putting him/her, first, and although OCR's library is composed entirely of user-driven content, those users are not being prioritized, not being put first. I'm not sure how you could possibly mistake that by looking at the YouTube description's architecture as it is.

I definitely agree with this. On one hand I'm honored to have had over 6000 views on my remix posted last month, its an awesome feeling. But on the other hand I've barely had any new traffic to any of my pages because of it. In fact the few follows and likes I've gotten on Soundcloud recently are almost entirely from the remixes I've done in the Wily competition, which doesn't get nearly the amount of views that the YouTube channel does. Though personally, I'm not really at a stage where getting lots of follows concerns me much since I don't have much material available outside of OCR. I can definitely get why some people may be irked by the whole YouTube description thing though.

[Argle]

Agree that remixers should have their links posted right up top in the Youtube. It takes very little extra effort, and it's a good way to use OCR clout to help the musicians who contribute to its success.

[Cash]

I think it would be great to have links in the YouTube video description to the artist's own personal site or hosting page.

This would be a good thing to bring up for the next OCR Talkback Live. Perhaps plans to update the YouTube descriptions are already in the works, but the people who run the site are all incredibly busy. I know people say it takes very little effort, but I'd imagine there are other priorities.

[timaeus222]

Agree that remixers should have their links posted right up top in the Youtube. It takes very little extra effort, and it's a good way to use OCR clout to help the musicians who contribute to its success.

I would support this, though it would honestly take a few full days of effort (i.e. a tedious length of time) to update every single video description, or at least many of the early and later ones. Add that to album kickstarters, album releases, judging, writeups, and a whole bunch of other behind-the-scenes and you've got even more time added to those few full days. I've done something just like this before to my own videos, and it's a big pain even for just one little edit on a few hundred videos, let alone 800~2000.

Edited October 1, 2013 by timaeus222

[Argle]

I would support this, though it would honestly take a few full days of effort (i.e. a tedious length of time) to update every single video description, or at least many of the early and later ones. Add that to album kickstarters, album releases, judging, writeups, and a whole bunch of other behind-the-scenes and you've got even more time added to those few full days. I've done something just like this before to my own videos, and it's a big pain even for just one little edit on a few hundred videos, let alone 800~2000.

I think the important thing is that they start doing this going forward. That's the easy part, no real effort required. There's no time like the present. Going back and retroactively adding links for past remixes, I agree that will be time consuming.

[djpretzel]

ecto, we spoke about this via private message, and Larry & I completely agreed and indicated to you that we'd be working on many of your suggestions.

I'm confused as to whether you're reiterating this publicly because you just really want to drive your point home more emphatically, or because you didn't take us at our word... you mention the word "douchebaggery" and insist that you're not accusing us of it, but I'm a little confuddled as to why you'd feel the need for this almost verbatim reiteration. Who are you trying to persuade?

I think both artist profile pages on OCR and YouTube descriptions can both be modified to better promote artists, and most of what's been suggested Larry & I are both on board with... don't know how many ways to say it. I'll add, however, that we do consider promotion of OCR itself an equal goal, and that we want the success of each individual artist to extend to ALL artists by virtue of promoting the community at large. In this instance, what's being proposed isn't at odds with that goal, and a better balance can be achieved, and we were actually discussing this prior to your remarks via PM and prior to this thread.

We've been in between site phases for a LONG while now and it's curtailed our ability to make more significant modifications to the site code. In this instance, the code that auto-generates YouTube writeups is actually the same code responsible for remix pages on the site, and currently it isn't pulling back individual artist links & references, so the modification in question goes beyond simple templating and will actually require some data access changes. It's doable, but atm we're releasing albums, posting mixes, and still trying to fulfill our FF6 kickstarter, and it's going to take a bit.

Your tone - and this could just be a "lost in translation" type of thing where text is failing to convey the accurate emotion - comes off as a little begrudging & antagonizing. By saying that you're not accusing anyone of "douchebaggery," you kinda-sorta introduce that specter, FYI, and it comes in the context of your repeating here what we had already discussed & explicitly agreed with via PM on August 27th... At any rate, we hear you, we don't disagree, we appreciate the feedback, and while we will continue to ensure that OCR itself is promoted - as we believe this helps ALL artists on the site - we WILL be taking many of the proposed measures laid out in this thread, which we had previously contemplated and agreed on prior to their suggestion.

In the meantime, if you can work towards the science that would allow us to clone myself or Larry, please proceed

As a sidenote, if ALL you want out of OCR is promotion for yourself, well... we're going to try harder to provide that, but here's our mission statement:

• Appreciate and honor video game composers and their music
  

• Encourage artistic expression and development through fan arrangements
  

• Preserve and promote video game music of the past and present
  

• Provide resources and connections for the game composers of tomorrow
  

• Distribute great, free music to the world
  

To summarize, just in case there's ANY confusion: Our sole purpose for existing is not to make you rich or get you clicks, but we do take artist promotion seriously, and we agree that there's room for improvement. Edited October 1, 2013 by djpretzel

[ectogemia]

I think something was indeed lost in translation, haha. When I talk about rules 'n' policies and otherwise serious business, my tone gets pretty sterile, and on the internet -- ESPECIALLY on a forum -- sterile, businesslike tones always come across as assy and condescending. That's totally not what I was going for. I was just trying to be matter-of-fact and frank, not the flipside of that, judgmental and blunt.

To be totally clear, I'm not upset with any of the administrators of OCR at all about the state of artist promotion. And although we spoke via PM, the goal of putting the opinion on a public forum is *not* for you (djp, Larry, et al.) to see what I have to say (again), but for the rest of the community who is interested in a constructive thread like this one. The goal of stating it publicly is not to incite anything or anyone since I love the community here and think it's awesome that you're looking for ways to improve artist exposure, but rather to raise awareness for what I perceive to be an area where there's room for improvement. By doing so, I think a lot of good ideas will come from people who agree with me, and a good one was already proposed by someone who read what I had to say, so mission accomplished.

That's all I was looking to see happen by posting about the matter publicly. I'm not trying to call anyone out, just trying call into question the state of things and get the best solutions to the problem aired by those who are interested or otherwise have a stake in the matter. OCR is good people with a unique goal to glorify the somehow overlooked, amazing subculture of video game music and composers. I'd never shit on someone promoting that subculture which is as important and inspiring to me as it is to you.

edit: Yeah, I see what you're saying about the mission statement. OCR wasn't created as a vehicle to promote remixers so much as it was (and is) to promote interest in video game music in general. But now that OCR has grown for nearly a decade since that mission statement was written (I assume), I think the site's promotional powers could be put to use more for the artists who helped to grow it, especially since many of us -- myself included -- are now video game composers, so promoting our music would be in line with the mission statement as it is now.

It may come off that way to some people, but I wouldn't believe it's intentional, and it doesn't come off that way to me.

I also stated and wholeheartedly meant that I don't believe it's intentional or malicious. It's just the way things are, and I think change is reasonable in this instance to benefit everyone. By pointing out what I pointed out, I wasn't painting anyone as an enemy or perpetrator, I was stating facts which are... well... facts. And I pointed out what I perceived to be the implications of those facts with respect to traffic and follower generation. Agree or disagree with those implications; that's fine. That's what a healthy debate is all about.

Edited October 1, 2013 by ectogemia

[Brandon Strader]

The sheer douchebaggery of you, ecto.

Hey, you figured out how to get a response about stuff they talking about secretly. Nice work though. Sometimes you hope but can't be sure.

[djpretzel]

I think something was indeed lost in translation, haha.

Cool, glad to hear it.

I'm personally frustrated/disappointed with the lack of change/development the site has seen this year, but the compensating factor is that we've posted a ton of great mixes, some amazing albums, and are wrapping up our FF6 Kickstarter. I'm really psyched about making some of these changes, and was discussing with Larry recently how we might just take a step back and start modifying the current site instead of waiting for the next version, which is somewhat dependent on our forum software. Hindsight is always 20/20, but in retrospect I think it was a mistake to focus so exclusively on all changes being part of the next site version, instead of rolling them out incrementally.

The sheer douchebaggery of you, ecto.

Hey, you figured out how to get a response about stuff they talking about secretly. Nice work though. Sometimes you hope but can't be sure.

Actually, Brandon, we had already provided a response to him directly, and nothing was explicitly "secret" - just private. But if Nathan wanted to share the idea with the rest of the community and get some more thoughts, that's obviously not only cool by me, but also a good idea.

Edited October 1, 2013 by djpretzel

[ectogemia]

The sheer douchebaggery of you, ecto.

Hey, you figured out how to get a response about stuff they talking about secretly. Nice work though. Sometimes you hope but can't be sure.

I love you Brandon, but maybe if you trolled less...

Hindsight is always 20/20, but in retrospect I think it was a mistake to focus so exclusively on all changes being part of the next site version, instead of rolling them out incrementally.

.

You live, you learn. Glad there's no animosity, and the message got through as intended, haha. I'm a busy guy, too, and I know things don't just get themselves done. All in good time, I'm sure.

Edited October 1, 2013 by ectogemia

[Brandon Strader]

I love you Brandon, but maybe if you trolled less...

The denotes a lack of trolling! I was merely teasing, I knew you could take it!

Not to take the opportunity of this line of conversation as a chance to air any dirty laundry, but Larry TOTALLY didn't respond to emails I sent in the past! Yep, it's true! I sent one a good while back offering to help with an OCR sources project for v6, and more recently asking about FF2 stuff. Might be my bad, I probably should have emailed djp or something. Not a big deal anyway.

I don't think it is OCR's fault that people think OCR is the remixer. OCR puts the info in the description, and if you don't hit "Show More" on YouTube the third line is the last line and it DOES say who the ReMixer is. It might just be a matter of oversight by a ton of people. There's definitely ways they could improve visibility or -something- that helps remedy the situation but I just wanted to say my opinion, that it's not OCR's fault.

If they make a new OCR video template, it's POSSIBLE that they could work in a field that could be edited for each specific artist / title, maybe even source, to work that information into the video. I still think the video should be simplified and possibly cleaned up a lot, as well as modernized. They probably got all of that under control, but.... just sharing what I think would be cool....

[timaeus222]

I also stated and wholeheartedly meant that I don't believe it's intentional or malicious. It's just the way things are, and I think change is reasonable in this instance to benefit everyone. By pointing out what I pointed out, I wasn't painting anyone as an enemy or perpetrator, I was stating facts which are... well... facts. And I pointed out what I perceived to be the implications of those facts with respect to traffic and follower generation. Agree or disagree with those implications; that's fine. That's what a healthy debate is all about.

Yeah, I wouldn't believe you intentionally conveyed that tone, and we all have our days. The implications remain the same, but the wording was what bothered me. Anyways, enough of this dwelling.

I don't think it is OCR's fault that people think OCR is the remixer. OCR puts the info in the description, and if you don't hit "Show More" on YouTube the third line is the last line and it DOES say who the ReMixer is. It might just be a matter of oversight by a ton of people. There's definitely ways they could improve visibility or -something- that helps remedy the situation but I just wanted to say my opinion, that it's not OCR's fault.

Actually, I just checked a whole bunch of videos, and the third line is visible even without clicking "Show More".

EDIT: Wait a minute...

different, and

too. I guess someone's hard at work! =D Edited October 2, 2013 by timaeus222