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Before you say something, I know this has been discussed serveral times now BUT I recieved a mail from MindChamber yesterday saying that there could be a real change in the next time. Just read on...

hey, just wanted to let you in on something.

MindChamber

My mail back...

At 07/03/06 08:30 AM, DarKsidE_555 wrote:
Heya,

Btw. would you guys except suggestions from the audio forum users?

And his answer...

...yeah sure,. make a post about it in the forums and I'll point Tom to it.

So...for the 500. time!? (or more? lol) make your suggestions what could be changed in our beloved Audio Portal or post the links to the threads that passed away.

Thanks guys!

the main thing that should be sorted is that audio should be screened like flash so you dont get sooo much shit filling up the bandwidth.

There should be a batting average for audio lol

Remove the voting system. Make a submissions score reflected by half of the averaged total review scores.

-Prevents 0 voting, because the person would have to review to give a 0 and thus reveal themselves.
-Encourages reviewing versus just voting and moving on.
-Encourages more accurate reviewing.
(explanation)
1) Nowadays, there are songs that the big names produce that are immediately flooding with straight 10 reviews. This would mean that all of these songs would end up on top with perfect fives and everything else would be lost elsewhere. I believe that reviewers, realizing this, would be more inclined to be fairer about what they say and the score they give. To help, I think, it would be wise to have a reminder on the reviewing page that says to be fair and accurate. If there's something you didn't like, then does it really deserve a 10?
2) Songs that are given one 10 review would end up on top. If someone listened and felt it didn't quite deserve such a high score, they would review and give an 8 or something. As is typical of reviewers, they would then justify the score they gave by telling the artist what they did or did not like. Feedback = good for the artist!

Now, I'm not sure whether or not that would be completely effective at keeping all of the tracks by the big guys at a fair score, so here's another idea: Remove the "Total score" from the review and make the total score an average of the four factors. That way, the score given in the review can be as accurate as possible. If the song was TRULY completely original in style, PERFECTLY clear, VERY diverse, and included TONS of effort, then yes, it'd deserve a 10. But if it wasn't all too diverse, then why should it get a 10? Ten means perfect. Lack of diversity means lack of perfection. The score given in such a review would therefore be even more accurate, instead of just 9 or 10 it could be anywhere inbetween.

Also; find another system for the weekly 5. As it stands, tracks are being downvoted constantly, and most of the time it's because the downvoter wants a spot on the weekly five and is therefore destroying competition. Then again, the downvoting wouldn't be an issue if the said method above was instated.

I like the mentioned idea of screening, but only if the 0 voting problem is fixed (again, refer to above suggestion).

Another idea: organize a group of trustworthy regulars with the power such that if at least 5 or so of them vote X on a song, it will be deleted. The regulars are always on the lookout for stolen audio, as indicated by the numerous "Stolen Audio" threads, and this sort of power would be difficult to exploit and would help to keep stolen audio from flooding the AP.

That's all I got for now...

all good ideas folks

keep em comin' :D

also.. take the music off the frontpage of the audio portal, unless it is changed to feature various artists. i for one am really fukd off with hearing those tunes everytime I go to the audio portal. No offence to the guy that made the trx, but surely even he must understand that it's really goddamn annoying heaing those tunes over and over, even if you can switch them off. i think it's such a wasted opportunity. It should feature the best artist of the day, or something like that, it's been the same fucking trx for over 3 years!!! c'mon, sort it out.

i think the platinum/gold/diamond status should be taken off...it's the main reason people submit stolen songs (i believe) & mass d-load their own tunes

or if not taking them off have them be dealt with some other way

-Work out experience for reviewing on audio submissions. Would give more incentive to visit the AP.

-Give a (small) EXP bonus to flash users who successfuly fill out the audio credits part of the flash submission form. It hurts when an APer finds a flash where his music wasnt properly credited :'(.

-Change so you have to review in order to vote. This would prevent 'zero bombing' that seems to be on the rise recently, and would also give artists a much fairer score.

-IP logging to prevent users from mass downloading their own tracks

->>>BLAM AND PROTECT IN THE AUDIO PORTAL<<< Although maybe not actually issuing BP points for it, theres no denying that the audio portal is receiving a LOT of crap that is just eating server space.

-More dedicated moderators especially for the audio portal. There has been a massive increase of stolen music identified and with so few mods around, its taking a while for anything to be done about it.

-Change the AP front page flash applet (the one that currently plays paragon x9 tracks) work in a similar way to the NG mag audio applet. That little applet is horribly underused, and it would be nice to see it get more usage.

-More moderators on the BBS especially for the audio portal area. Although the mods we have are doing an amazing job keeping the place clean, most of the time theres nobody around and the audio BBS has been seeing an increase in traffic over the past few months.

-Longer description feilds for audio portal authors to comment on their music. The current is way too short.

-Option for completely disabling downloading on one or more of your tracks. This could be used for authors who don't want their music to be used in a movie, but still want exposure.

-Ability for authors to remove their submissions at their discretion.

-Clearer copyright notice on audio submission page. There have been a few questions popping up from people who don't quite understand what the copyright status on the AP is. It should be a priority to make sure that the authors understand their rights and what can happen to their music after it is uploaded.

-Clearer copyright notice in the .txt file that is downloaded with the audio files, so that people who download it know exactly what they are allowed to do with it.

-Clearer rules on what you are allowed to submit, notably the part in the submission form where it says:

1. You are making the legal claim that it is your own original work.
2. Loops you made from existing copyrighted songs are not your own original work.

This to me was a very confusing concept, as it seemed to have two meanings. The first I got from it was that point 2 was reminding you that anything you make from copyrighted music is not yours. Fair enough. The second meaning seems that you are allowed to submit copyrighted music as long as you don't claim that you made it.

-Audio batting average, of course. I'm getting tired of going through and adding it all up in excel :-P

-Space for an 'audio profile' at the start of each of the authors musical listings, maybe housing a photo and some information regarding what software the artist uses etc.

-Multi author submissions for collaberations.

-I'm not sure about this one, but it seems that the AP review system is completely out of line with the flash review system. It dosn't seem to be moderated at all, and audio reviews don't show up on users profiles, which makes it very annoying if that user wants to go back to see if they got a responce, especially if they forget the exact song name and/or author.

-Email notifications if your track gets used in a submission.

-More rewards, such as track of the month etc.

-I'd say top50 but i'm not sure how that would work, and I fear that it would just be the same 50 tracks that would never move. Perhaps a weekly top 50?

-Reinstate one-a-day voting instead of one-per-lifetime voting, to help combat the zero voting problem. My idea on this is that zero voters won't be bothered to go and zero your tracks every day of the week, but people who like your tracks and see they are in trouble can help you out at their discretion.

-If you don't reinstate one-a-day voting, then for the love of God, change the message where it says 'You have already voted on this track today!'

-Change in way the tracks are displayed on both the AP front page and in the different genres, so it shows author as well as track name.

-Change so that the system no longer messes up your ID3 tagging in mp3 files. This is also undermining our ability to protect our tracks against import into programs that we don't want, or making sure that people know who made it.

I think thats it for now, I'll post some more if I get any ideas.

Agreed on 99% of the stuff, Khuskan.

At 7/3/06 11:44 AM, Khuskan wrote: -Reinstate one-a-day voting instead of one-per-lifetime voting, to help combat the zero voting problem. My idea on this is that zero voters won't be bothered to go and zero your tracks every day of the week, but people who like your tracks and see they are in trouble can help you out at their discretion.

I'm under the impression that if a zero voter is aiming for the weekly five, they will use that to their advantage. They won't necessarily remember if they had already voted zero on something, but if has a higher score than their submission, the will zero vote it. The result, then, would be a downward spiral of scores, because zero voters would respond to other zero voters in kind.

-I'd say top50 but i'm not sure how that would work, and I fear that it would just be the same 50 tracks that would never move. Perhaps a weekly top 50?

Weekly top 50 is too much. Either Weekly top 20, or Monthly top 50.

I feel like Monthly might be better. When were on a weekly basis, zero voters are especially rabid because they don't have a whole lot of time to try and push down competition. If that were extended to a month, I feel like they'd be less inclined to so heavily spam 0 votes everywhere.

Do you ppl realy beleave that even 50% will be changed.
Even if it will it'll take years. (just my opinion)

Khuskan...
Those are all some great ideas! You must have really been brainstorming!

I would suggest having a little "tag" that shows whether an NG user is an animator or audio artist. Even both.

A batting average for the audio portal would be really cool and "featured artist of the week" or something would be really cool.

A seperate "audio artist" profile with programs used, music genre, and what not.

alter the frontpage of newgrounds so that the flash submissions are still where they are since there in a perfect spot and have been there for so long. but underneath the flash have the same number of audio submissions put there personally by tom since he does the frontpage of ng.

get rid of the voting system for audio. flash authors get zero voted as well but nowhere near the amount of bombs that weve took to the head.

if an audio submission is flagged as stolen it should be taken care of promptly. you guys should really be more careful of this 'cause you could get sued for allowing people to download copyrighted mp3s off the site for free.

reviews should remain optional but should be altered slightly. instead of originality, diversity, effort, and all that, it should have an option to pick where you choose something musical about it. like what key the song is in or one of the techniques used in the submission. that way we can tell if the person givin' a review knows anything at all about music or if they're just a person that liked or disliked the song/loop. and it can't be as simple as "are you a musician?", 'cause too many people that just play guitar consider themselves musicians and really don't know squat about music at all.

and probably the farthest thing from reality to happen... reward the monthly top 5 of the audio portal. it would have to be done in a very different way than on the flash portal since zero voting on the audio portal is far worse than on the flash portal. but here's my idea. construct a panel of Good, skilled, talented, mature, and regular audio artists to vote on all the audio that has been on the frontpage for the month. they will decide the top 5 for that month and the top five can be rewarded even if it's somethin' as little as stickers. weekly favorites and review crew picks and underdogs and turds of the week should all be implimented into this as well.

those are my suggestions. if none of them ever come to fruition then so be it. but at least it's an idea.

At 7/3/06 11:44 AM, Khuskan wrote: ->>>BLAM AND PROTECT IN THE AUDIO PORTAL<<< Although maybe not actually issuing BP points for it, theres no denying that the audio portal is receiving a LOT of crap that is just eating server space.

I was thikning about this point a lot. It would encourage a lot more votes if instead of the normal 10 EXP per day, it wold be 20. Not only would that encourage more flow to the AP, but it would also help with the whole 'it taking months and months to level up, and years to gain over 6 or 7 levels over 10'.

I'm agreeing on almost evrything that evryone is saying here, but i'll sum it up in a nut shell.....

we want to be on an even keel with the flash portal, same respect, same scoring, same stuff in profiles nothing more, nothing less. The AP has grew into something far bigger than Tom and crew i think ever thought, it could practically be another site, with less traffic of course, but none the less a successful one. it's about time we got shown some appreiciation.

Khuskan... You are a fucking god and genius... I really want all this to happen!

Khuskan's post is a collection of the most popular ideas offered by musicians, most of you haven't been around long enough to see them.

i don't think there should be a turd award for the audio portal...& if you want any reason why just go look at fat badgers flash submissions

At 7/3/06 02:34 PM, xXDathDalerXx wrote: i don't think there should be a turd award for the audio portal...& if you want any reason why just go look at fat badgers flash submissions

This is true,this has no use to make a turd of the week award.Like said DathDaler,there is not only Fat Badger,but many others who sucks with their retarded mentality.

Now for the topic.I think the ABSOLUTE priority is to find a way to stop the 0 voters.Because of them,artists who deserve interest are highly handicaped.I will not say the details,everyone knows them.

Many things ahve been mentioned already. If i repeat something, sorry.

To begin with, I think the most important question the administrator should ask themselves is; "What do we want with the Audio Portal"?
"What function do we want it to have, and what roll should it play in Newgrounds.com"?

Myself, I think the first and basic idea for the AP is the best one; its there for loops, or short songs for flash artists. I mean, if you really want to reach out with your MUSIC, you don´t hang out in the AP hoping for some talent scout to find you.

No, what should be incouraged in the future with hopefully a new voting/score system and the likes, are LOOPS, and COLLABORATION between flash+audio artists.
Yeah, i just made
this thread in a lame attempt to strengthen the two portals and unite them, but this is also what I belive is right for NG.

Face it, the visitors gap between the AP and the FP is HUGHE, and I really don´t think it is worth for NG to change direction, becoming a dedicated music site. Flash is what it´s about, and I think it should stay that way. There are plenty of great music sites out there that have years of headstart when it comes to system, reputation and so on. And doing both flash and music would be... i think it might be too big of a challange. Its better to merge them together;

- The result of an increased collaboration scene between flash and audio artists will in time result in higher quality flashes, wich will make this site even greater in what it show to the public, flash.

Therefore, I belive that a future system should encourage shorter loops when it comes to awards and reckognition, and also FLASH authors should get some kind of credit when using audios from the ever growing AP.

The system we know today should be changed alltogether. Here´s a couple of ideas;

- I would suggest "making a new" AP, simply leaving the old one and starting all over. Perhaps the new system could "sit on top" of the old one, i dont know really...
My point here is that there should be totally new genres, and sub-genres for the audio. The "sub-genre" would mention what type of emotion/flash value the audio would have. You should be able to search for both music genre, and emotion/flash value. This would make it very easy for flash authors to find what kind of music they are looking for.
So, when submitting an audio, you would list it after what musical genre it belongs to, and what "emotional/flash value" it has. Perhaps one should be able to list it in more than one "emotion" genre...
Example;
Genre; DnB
Emotion/flash value; chase/battle

- Some kind of blam-system should be introduced. There have been numerous difficulties when it comes to the bandwidth the AP steals (i read it all in the BBS :), so this should be a priority, i belive.

- When you have a blam/protect system, you need to get some kind of credit for that. I´m not sure here, perhaps it should be merged together with the blam/protect system the flashes have (just show in the profile how many audio contra flash that have been blammed/protected).

- In the future, it would be stupid of NG not using the resources they attract. Releasing music in perhaps a newgrounds-lable would be something, however, these ideas points in the "looping", aiding flash direction.
I actually think, how unfair this may sound, that perhaps top 20-30 audio artists of NG should have an "own" page, the NG Album Page, or something similiar. Here they could submit full songs, knowing they will get attention for it. And to get there, numerous systems could be set in motion;

¤ Some kind of average of how many people have viewed the flashes that you have had audio within. Meaning, if you have a total of 3 audios used in flash projects, then all the view count would automaticly get added, and set you on a proper list. This could be done in many ways, to make it fair; Last three months audio submissions - Whos the hottest loop-maker Right Now? Of course, - Whos the hottest loop maker over all time?
My point here is; Lists. Just look at how all other medias work, there are "top 20" lists in every freaking newspaper/magazine/TV/radio and so on. "what´s hot right now"? To be up to date is part of many ppls everyday life, and to everyone who works alot/are busy with school, it´s very comfortable having a trustworthy elite of "know how" reviewers who set the lists. In this case, it would be the newgrounds community and not some dirty half-failed journalist. And looking at what impact NG have as trend (well at least fad...) setter, this is shomething that could grow big, even though we´re mainly talking loops here (well, put it this way; the best loop makers will get the oppurtunity to get alot of attention. so i reckon the "top 30 list" or whatever will be really quality worthy and hopefully get visits from "normal NG visitors" as well as the flashes). To get an automated system bringing in the "top 30 musicians" could be a challenge, but if it could be done then it´d be fair and square!

¤ Of course, to get to the top, you should have to work hard - and from the bottom. Good loops should be brought forward and praised, even though they might be currently un-used in flash submissions. A fair score+reviewing system should take care of that. The basics could be lend from the FP system, but there probably needs to be a tweak or two to make it fit audio.

¤ Flash authors should benefit in some way if using AP audio only. Perhaps there should be a special prise every month that would benefit both audio and flash author?

- There should be a Sound Effect library, perhaps it should be outside the AP- voting system, perhaps it should get a small own one?... However, this would also make it difficult in deciding what sfx have been stolen from games etc...

More ideas to follow when they move into my head.

theres are all great ideas Rucklo, and definitely needs a thorough looking into.

At 7/3/06 05:56 PM, MindChamber wrote: theres are all great ideas Rucklo, and definitely needs a thorough looking into.

Sweet, glad you agree. I really belive in the AP being mainly for loops, and I hope it should become more loop-friendly in the future. If that will occur, I belive it will give many new audio artist the oppurtunity to make themselves a name fast, with just making catchy loops...

One other thing that needs to be sorted out in a future AP is what formats it should accpt? wav loops great, but filesize=nono. mp3 loops like crap, but filesize yes yes. When compressing in flash, your better of using wav though... anyway, i belive theres a reason they removed the ability to loop wav... but for whatever i know that reason could be bandwidth issues...

we should get a pig tottaly legal tottally official podcast from the fulps

At 7/3/06 02:03 PM, Erkie wrote: Khuskan's post is a collection of the most popular ideas offered by musicians, most of you haven't been around long enough to see them.

True, but he's still a god and a genius :D

i think we're asking for a bit too much now hahaha

At 7/3/06 08:29 PM, Triskele wrote:

At 7/3/06 02:03 PM, Erkie wrote: Khuskan's post is a collection of the most popular ideas offered by musicians, most of you haven't been around long enough to see them.

True, but he's still a god and a genius :D

I agree.

Give the author power to delete his/her own submissions. Edit the title and comments and file. I bet that these have been said but just making sure. :)

EVERYTHING I could have ever wanted to see implemented in the Audio Portal was mentioned by Khuskan, and with a heavy heart, I agree with Rucklo's post as well. However, one change I would like to see is to have a different avatar on forum posts, for example: If you're a normal user, the weapon system might work (fists, axes, swords, blah). If you're an audio creator, then maybe some headphones, hardware devices, turntables, a quarter note for noobs? I dunno just idea tossing, little aesthetics that might make this place even more fun. Picture uploads for songs, make the audio button in the NG MAG a little more visible (as khuskan pointed out, it's TINY!!!), And a page like the flash portal has, where the weekly top 20 are listed, daily top 20, all time top 50, monthly whatever, you know.

The NG mag´s audio panel is, as earlier mentioned, underrated indeed.

That panel should be merged with the AP frontpage. Ditch the 4 loops who are now playing (even though we all love paragon, those four loops are starting to get VERY annoying. I always shut them of ASAP...), then put a better version of the audio panel on the AP frontpage. BUT, important, DO NOT make it load along with the page, rather just show a small corner where the top five songs (or whatever songs deserves the attention from one of man good systems already suggested :). What i mean is that if someone wnats to listen, theyll just click it... basicly this would simply be links to the correct URL. There are loads of things to do with a player like this tho...

OR show a link to a newer and better version of the audio panel on the NG frontpage, and make sure the most important things from the AP gets spotlighted in there. Also an extra link in the BBS section, perhaps close to the stickies...

What I think should be evolved here is basicly an NG audio player, with many great options for this and that (search different genres, artist names and so on... Inspiration can easily be found from some of the greater music sites for amateurs around... Ill check more into it :)

At 7/4/06 09:01 AM, AdmiralConquistador wrote: And a page like the flash portal has, where the weekly top 20 are listed, daily top 20, all time top 50, monthly whatever, you know.

I just realized that that is going to mix genres together. Up to now, all the genres have been kept apart. Do we really want to do this? Do all u guys agree wit this?

At 7/4/06 10:36 AM, Winterwind-NS wrote:

At 7/4/06 09:01 AM, AdmiralConquistador wrote: And a page like the flash portal has, where the weekly top 20 are listed, daily top 20, all time top 50, monthly whatever, you know.

I just realized that that is going to mix genres together. Up to now, all the genres have been kept apart. Do we really want to do this? Do all u guys agree wit this?

Are there not a buttload of different flash genres?

There are comedies, serious shorts, weird things, games, puzzlers, actions games, music videos, etc. Possibly even more genres than there are genres of music avaliable on NG.