Downward Trajectory of Brony Music (New Blog Launch pg 3 on)

[ph00tbag]

I definitely agree with Freewave. In general, I think we should always keep in mind how we can take other sites as partners. If we want to become a recognized part of the community, we have to engage in it. Just because we're filling a niche doesn't mean people will go right to it.

[ExoBassTix]

Both Eq beats and pony.fm are small potatoes compared to soundcloud and bandcamp. We can worry about people rigging the system when we get to it

Hold it right there.
Why not move towards perfection and get this problem solved before it happens?

[A2Z]

Sorry Freewave, I was meaning to update the thread with some of the stuff we discussed over there. It's tough keeping all the good points people are making a part of a large collection of ideas. There is another option we have as to obtaining and releasing content for the main purpose of the site being music highlights. A couple of concerns I myself would like to have addressed though, and maybe this can be cleared up for everyone to be in the same thought process.

- How much content are we going to be producing ourselves, and how much will be reblogged material from other sites?

- Exactly what kind of role are we going to be playing in the community as a whole? Are we trying to introduce music from a larger variety of artists that release quality content (peppered with extra things), as opposed to the (what is considered) a more biased and chaotic method as what EQD presents? If so, how do we grade what is considered "good" content for the blog and listeners?
OR
Are we going to be acting as a "go-to" site for people to see everything that other sites are posting, and what artists are general are doing in the community? If so, shouldn't we just abandon this blog site then and just join forces with the staff from pre-established music blogs/sites to help bring listeners more varied content from a wider source range? Or might we be working with them as our own blog to help find quality content for others to use to their advantage, as we are being more "hands-on" and digging deep for the best tracks floating around in the Nether? Which then comes back to, how do we define what is "good" content?

---

I know I bring up the topic of "Purpose and Goals" a lot, but I just to make sure we are all wanting to have the same end-goal in mind during the planning stage. It's quite natural for a project's mission statement to change (sometimes more than once), and I just want to be sure we have all roads shifted to the direction that we are heading.

As mentioned earlier, a new plan that has been pitched to find and grade music is as follows:

POOL SYSTEM

1) We have compilers, or staff, or submissions from other sources (or all of the above), bring in material that they think might be good for the blog to showcase. All these songs are collected into a POOL, where they are organized into a folder system separated by genre and view-able by ALL members of the staffing, and volunteers.

2) All staff and volunteers may then listen to any or all of the songs in any of the genres that they like. The songs will be stripped of their names/artist and given a number so there is minimal bias on the song and people can hear the song for what it is, not what it is named or who wrote it. Once done listening, a rating (maybe 1-10) will be given to the song. After a large number of people vote, the highest rated of all the songs in each genre will float to the top of the list.

3) The top rated songs from each genre (can be more than 1 from each if need be, or limited to one per post every so often) can then be featured in a music post, with the song and artist name added back on (obviously). Articles can be written for exceptional pieces that are marked as such in the POOL, or can be written on an artist that has been getting a lot of their tracks selected to be showcased. Once a song is picked to be showcased, it is removed from the POOL, giving other songs just below it more of a chance to be picked for the next showcase. The showcase can be run at any frequency that we need it to based on the volume of tracks that getting received and rated.

This plan will hopefully give us a method to at least handle the "What music are we going to post?" question, and everyone can contribute to the process of picking what is showcased, but no one person has complete authority over what the majority is preferring and what will be seen in the showcase. With enough people staffing and volunteering, hopefully the workload won't be crazy. The primary time spent will be spent listening to tracks and giving a grade. Choosing will be up to which songs have the highest grade, which I think defines what is more "good" for a larger audience to hear, and therefore should get more recogniztion. After all, if we highlight TOO MANY songs, the blog can become cluttered easily with content that doesn't necessarily meet quality standards.

There is a variation to this plan that essentially skips the POOLING part, but that plan can be discussed once I have more legit info on how that process will behave. Everyone, please feel free to share what everyone thinks or would like to change about this.

DISCLAIMER: IF ANY OF THE FOLLOWING IDEAS GO AGAINST COMMENTS ALREADY STATED, PLEASE COMMENT ON WHAT HAS BEEN DISCUSSED ALREADY AND/OR IGNORED. THIS IS A LOT OF INFORMATION TO KEEP UP WITH IN SUCH A SHORT AMOUNT OF TIME SO THANK YOU FOR YOUR PATIENCE AND PARTICIPATION.

[Freewave]

If EQD and Everfree are Rolling Stone and Spin...I'd like to be Pitchfork. More underground and for the musicphile. BUT i dont want the snarkiness of THIS ISNT GOOD .5 stars. I want to highlight what we like, ignore what we don't or treat that as "news" from another source.

Now that doesn't mean that we HAVE to ignore the mainstream. In fact I think behooves us to include stuff that would be dumb NOT to include and REBLOG. The top 10 videos of the month while annoying and popular for popularities sake is worth a reblog when its publishes. So is our collected Equestria Daily spotlights of the month which i will continue collecting in a youtube playlist (which i already do for bmd).
If places like Everfree, Pony.fm, Eqbeats can get us top tracks of the week then we'll publish those too.

What I've recommended before though is if we do our own spotlights let keep them breaking artists (not as well known but good) and an artist focus if we can vs necessarily focusing on every new track. What we can do is have genre corner's which really do the unthinkable of spotlighting top artists and track from a genre for a month (YAY). No one is doing much of this....

We can also cut through those cluttered EQD MOTD for our "music of the music of the day". Most people won't listen to 15 or 20 tracks thrown together. Let's try to pick our favorites when they publish them. Those that don't get in aren't awful, they just weren't our favorites of the bunch. Having a few compilers cut down that list and then we joint decide our favorites is worth the effort. Maybe 5 or 6 tracks. Tracks that get big visbile spotlights can get a single "EQD highlighted these tracks" for the week. No need to do post for post reblogging.

I'd be fine for even doing some spotlights for music we come across that other sites haven't hyped yet. If good stuff makes it our way lets check it out. No need to use other sources exclusively.

So multiple places where a musician can get featured: in the genre spotlight of the month, music of the music of the day, track shout outs (particular writer shout outs his favorite tracks currently), interviews about who's underrated out there, artist spotlights, etc, etc....

Lets not open up our own EQD listening panel to rival with them because that's confrontational (going after their market share), time consuming, and a losing battle. Lets pick up what they don't do well (motd too cluttered and missing a deeper muscian focused view of the community), reblog what they do do well (important news you still should know news). EQD has become a one-stop shop because people don't like clutter, but you can have a well rounded site that has more depth, more community ties, and isn't rejecting people left and right but are help pushing them forward.

We don't have to be CNN, we can be Google News and pull news and info about mlp music from a variety of places BUT also add lot of our own original content as well. WE become the one stop shop and if you're on tumblr we've already infiltrated your feed when youve subscribed.

[Freewave]

Both Eq beats and pony.fm are small potatoes compared to soundcloud and bandcamp. We can worry about people rigging the system when we get to it

Hold it right there.
Why not move towards perfection and get this problem solved before it happens?

Because music is subjective and because most of the people on those sites are small and breaking artists still. Also because it makes sense to get some stories from other sites that will network with us. I don't want to be "your top 5 sucks" when obviously it got enough views to warrant making the top 5 and when lists from different places will be different based on whos' there and who the audiences are. If we cover a wide range AND our own views, we show the range of the music in the community and let the viewer decide who they like and who they skip next time. We also get seen as a new site when other blogs and sites say "check out this cool new site" thats seeing them as a partner rather than as competition.

[ganondox]

Agree^. Likewise I hate when a musician or artist's blog becomes FULL of ask responses. I'm likely to unsubscribe to Eurobeat soon just for that reason even though i like that he's active and responsive to people (which is actually a postitive and unusual trait in this community). It just becomes an annoying feed when its irrelvent to you and what you want to read.

I don't want us to be super annoyingly active, answering pm's publically, or reblogging or writing irrevlevent stories.

One further idea came to me recently that i may pursue. Many people have asked about making the blog more then just a tumblr and also post to a dedicated regular styled website. While i will want to go with a tumblr as it has social advantages we should take advantage of i will talk to my friend Feld0 and look into MLPForums and Poniverse as possible tie-ins and places that COULD web host a site. They get a lot of traffic from the brony public and are a very well designed. We could use their existing blog structure to capture features, see if he'd even entertain the idea of helping design a stand alone site for us, or a dedicated multimedia friendly subforum for the site. Dude is a genius with code, friendly, and hosts the pony.fm site which could use some help and support too. Worth seeing if we can help each other.

A pony.fm and eqbeats monthly spotlight (best tracks of the month according to their stats) could be a nice monthly guest feature with mutual exposure as well. Something to think about.

Would it be possible to run multiple tumblrs? It would be more complicated, but it might be more convenient for the users, maybe. There could be one main tumblr, as well as a couple side tumblrs for more specific topics, including one for feedback were we could direct people to to ask questions.

[v.lossity]

Agreed ^ however I have faith this is going to be good, and I'm looking forward to having a source of good music on tumblr. I'd be willing to contribute in any way I am able.

[Mr. Bigglesworth]

"How to fix it."

Y'know. We could try and "fix it", OR we could (forgive the pun) stop kicking a dead horse.
The reason a lot of the big names aren't making pony music is usually because making music about colorful horses isn't something anyone wants to define them as an artist, so they're moving on to their own projects to try become a little bit more than "one of those guys who makes music about my little pony".

Pony music had a big boom onto the web, and it got a lot of attention for its novelty. It was fun, but trying to continue something like that past its prime will only make it stale and boring.
Or, given the current state of pony music, more stale and boring.

It's dwindling out and you just need to let that happen. Don't try and fix it.

[ganondox]

"How to fix it."

Y'know. We could try and "fix it", OR we could (forgive the pun) stop kicking a dead horse.
The reason a lot of the big names aren't making pony music is usually because making music about colorful horses isn't something anyone wants to define them as an artist, so they're moving on to their own projects to try become a little bit more than "one of those guys who makes music about my little pony".

Pony music had a big boom onto the web, and it got a lot of attention for its novelty. It was fun, but trying to continue something like that past its prime will only make it stale and boring.
Or, given the current state of pony music, more stale and boring.

It's dwindling out and you just need to let that happen. Don't try and fix it.

Oo, a post about the OP. The thread has sort of taken a different direction since then. Anyway, I agree that if no one wants to make or consume pony music than no one needs to make or consume pony music, but the special thing I see here is not the pony music itself, but the sense of community. Eventually pony music is probably going to die, but that doesn't mean the sense of community needs to die with it. If we can reinforce the community we had than maybe we can eventually organically transition into a non-pony centered music site, but still with the sense of community.

[ExoBassTix]

"How to fix it."

Y'know. We could try and "fix it", OR we could (forgive the pun) stop kicking a dead horse.
The reason a lot of the big names aren't making pony music is usually because making music about colorful horses isn't something anyone wants to define them as an artist, so they're moving on to their own projects to try become a little bit more than "one of those guys who makes music about my little pony".

Pony music had a big boom onto the web, and it got a lot of attention for its novelty. It was fun, but trying to continue something like that past its prime will only make it stale and boring.
Or, given the current state of pony music, more stale and boring.

It's dwindling out and you just need to let that happen. Don't try and fix it.

I'm just going to give an example to explain my problem with your text (which I call pessimistic, sue me).

The Jungle scene flourished in the 90's. People liked it and all. Then it sort of died down.
But people still make it, love it, all of that.

Some people kick dead horses because they are dedicated to that dead horse. They love it and don't care if others don't (or if they just don't know of it).

Now that doesn't mean that we HAVE to ignore the mainstream. In fact I think behooves us to include stuff that would be dumb NOT to include and REBLOG. The top 10 videos of the month while annoying and popular for popularities sake is worth a reblog when its publishes. So is our collected Equestria Daily spotlights of the month which i will continue collecting in a youtube playlist (which i already do for bmd).

I disagree. Just because Gangnam Style is awesome doesn't mean you gotta reblog/repost/retweet it. It's better to show people what we like to bring them. And next to that, these top-10 things ... If we can see them, our audience could find them by themselves too, so let them.

music of the music of the day

That's pretty much rebeling against EqD's MOTD thing. Even though we're trying to best them, we shouldn't rebel against them.


@A2Z, if we do that pool system, do you plan on keeping all denied tracks in the pool forever? I recommend keeping them in till after a second voting round and remove them then to make place for fresher stuff.

[Freewave]

I'll be reading and commenting on the above BUT

"[5:05:59 AM | Edited 5:06:01 AM] Cpt. Kickdrum (Exo): [25-10-2013 18:34:00] Magnitude Zero: do we want musicians to submit their own stuff? hmmm
[25-10-2013 18:34:05] A2Z: or will FIMMusic contact me about whether or not the quality is up to par

I had just started thinking on this one, and I think it could be an idea that people can submit their (or others') tracks directly to the compilers (in the case that we will make it work that way, with the pipeline), so there is a smaller chance that they will miss something that we could want to spotlight. In the end, compilers would just collect massive shitloads of tracks and all, so I think that, if we get enough dedicated people, and a way to effectively and efficiently manage the email address (possibly we could make a few email addresses that span over certain tags/genres/styles/whatevers), the email system could be of use for those that want to get a chance of getting more people to know their stuff.

[6:02:55 AM] Freewave .: See exo this is where we get into EQd territory
[6:04:05 AM] Freewave .: and that means we have floooods of entries, and have listen to loads of music, and pass on a lot of not great quality music, and make people upset. People love eqd when they got on, but they hate when they don't or if they were expecting a spotlight and got a motd.....

[6:05:00 AM] Cpt. Kickdrum (Exo): I just know that the place has small appeal to me
[6:05:37 AM] Freewave .: and thats why we dont want to duplicate their WORKLOAD with half the staff and 5% of their readership off the start. So we find through eqd motd, other site referrals, our own day to day listening, and some OCCASIONAL "hey is this good?" on mlr, skype, or elewhere. Avoid direct track submissions on fimmusic.

[Freewave]

"How to fix it."

Y'know. We could try and "fix it", OR we could (forgive the pun) stop kicking a dead horse.
The reason a lot of the big names aren't making pony music is usually because making music about colorful horses isn't something anyone wants to define them as an artist, so they're moving on to their own projects to try become a little bit more than "one of those guys who makes music about my little pony".

Pony music had a big boom onto the web, and it got a lot of attention for its novelty. It was fun, but trying to continue something like that past its prime will only make it stale and boring.
Or, given the current state of pony music, more stale and boring.

It's dwindling out and you just need to let that happen. Don't try and fix it.

I'm just going to give an example to explain my problem with your text (which I call pessimistic, sue me).

The Jungle scene flourished in the 90's. People liked it and all. Then it sort of died down.
But people still make it, love it, all of that.

Some people kick dead horses because they are dedicated to that dead horse. They love it and don't care if others don't (or if they just don't know of it).

Now that doesn't mean that we HAVE to ignore the mainstream. In fact I think behooves us to include stuff that would be dumb NOT to include and REBLOG. The top 10 videos of the month while annoying and popular for popularities sake is worth a reblog when its publishes. So is our collected Equestria Daily spotlights of the month which i will continue collecting in a youtube playlist (which i already do for bmd).

I disagree. Just because Gangnam Style is awesome doesn't mean you gotta reblog/repost/retweet it. It's better to show people what we like to bring them. And next to that, these top-10 things ... If we can see them, our audience could find them by themselves too, so let them.

music of the music of the day

That's pretty much rebeling against EqD's MOTD thing. Even though we're trying to best them, we shouldn't rebel against them.


@A2Z, if we do that pool system, do you plan on keeping all denied tracks in the pool forever? I recommend keeping them in till after a second voting round and remove them then to make place for fresher stuff.

Agree on the response to Mr. Bigglesworth. the whole MLP music dead, move on, is dumb. There's a thriving scene and hundreds of musicians still making the music and that's what this site and this blog intends to focus on. the community that's still leftover.

I don't want to "confront" EQD's MOTD because to me that's the only section that myself and my peers seem to have an option to get into. But as some EQD listeners have said they put a lot of stuff that is just passable in there. I'd like to see if we can find the gems that really JUST missed the spotlight that are inventive and great and give them additional shout outs. That's not confronting EQD, thats taking what they've thrown into grab bag of 20 assorted tracks and picking out some of the best to highlight and say why we like them. We don't have to call it "music of the music of the day" but i want people at least sending their tracks to eqd so they can get on there vs not sending them in at all. Again what I like from there and what you liek from there will be very different and that's why we have to see this blog as "this is what i like" vs "this is what is good".

We are going to be one of the ONLY great brony music sites on tumblr is my aim. Our feed is going to try to cover gammit so that people don't have to shop elsewhere. I want the reblogs to cover a lot of the brony mainstream and other sites news and views but i want our original content to provide what isn't there and go deeper. The up and coming artists that are just as good and maybe a bit more passionate. The underground stuff we like and that is a bit different. It's still up to the person who's reading to decide what they are looking for, what kind of music they listen to, and to go from there. But i want to offer them the selection and choices.

[Freewave]

Would it be possible to run multiple tumblrs? It would be more complicated, but it might be more convenient for the users, maybe. There could be one main tumblr, as well as a couple side tumblrs for more specific topics, including one for feedback were we could direct people to to ask questions.

It's possible if the need is there and someone can run it but we'd need to know what alternate tumblr we'd want and why?

If someone want to run a rock or metal feature each week to publish it on their tumblr and we re-post it as a regular feature on ours we certainly can. The beauty of tumblr lies in reposting content that is there. I can also post stuff that requires loads of embeds or multimedia on BMD side pages or mlr or youtube playlists.

[ph00tbag]

"How to fix it."

Y'know. We could try and "fix it", OR we could (forgive the pun) stop kicking a dead horse.
The reason a lot of the big names aren't making pony music is usually because making music about colorful horses isn't something anyone wants to define them as an artist, so they're moving on to their own projects to try become a little bit more than "one of those guys who makes music about my little pony".

Pony music had a big boom onto the web, and it got a lot of attention for its novelty. It was fun, but trying to continue something like that past its prime will only make it stale and boring.
Or, given the current state of pony music, more stale and boring.

It's dwindling out and you just need to let that happen. Don't try and fix it.

But this isn't really what's happening. There's tons of brony musicians out there, and there are several who are absolutely phenomenal, and deserve a lot more attention, but since they don't have accessible lyrics sung by AAA vocalists, and an awesome guitar riff, they don't get spotlit, and they don't get the attention they deserve. Some of them stick around because they love what they do, even if they're wallowing in obscurity. Others leave in frustration because they do genuinely work their asses off, but never seem to get recognized. And that's unfortunate, because no one was really able to tell them, "your stuff has that grain of brilliance in it, but you can probably do these things, and get better." Because EqD's system is impersonal and obscure, and EFR, for its relative fairness, is more about just presenting the music than about developing talent.

So that's why we want to do something that supports the development of new talent, and gives them a way to get exposure, as well as feedback. We can also try to educate listeners a bit--listeners that know what they're hearing generally appreciate it more.

[Freewave]

^^^AGREE^^^

We really do want our original content to focus in this area. People aren't following the next waves because its so hard to know who they are. We can help break down those barriers that are not making them the next leaders of focus of our current scene. Even if the music isn't "perfect" from some a lot of the time there's quality substance and massive effort made in this creation.

[Callenby]

But this isn't really what's happening. There's tons of brony musicians out there, and there are several who are absolutely phenomenal, and deserve a lot more attention, but since they don't have accessible lyrics sung by AAA vocalists, and an awesome guitar riff, they don't get spotlit, and they don't get the attention they deserve. Some of them stick around because they love what they do, even if they're wallowing in obscurity. Others leave in frustration because they do genuinely work their asses off, but never seem to get recognized. And that's unfortunate, because no one was really able to tell them, "your stuff has that grain of brilliance in it, but you can probably do these things, and get better." Because EqD's system is impersonal and obscure, and EFR, for its relative fairness, is more about just presenting the music than about developing talent.

Thank you. You articulated that better than I could have.

[ChocolateChicken]

It seems like you guys are planning many things in this forum. Can somebody summarize what the plan(s) are for those of us who haven't been keeping up with this thread but are still interested in knowing what's going on? I really don't want to read several pages of posts in what can be summed up in one post.

[HMage]

I kinda lost track as well.

[ph00tbag]

Well, the main focus is going to be providing tools for talent development in the community, but also promotion of musicians by musicians. That's going to entail a number of things, but it's all in very early planning, right now, so it's definitely going to appear very nebulous and open-ended.

[the4thImpulse]

Well, the main focus is going to be providing tools for talent development in the community, but also promotion of musicians by musicians. That's going to entail a number of things, but it's all in very early planning, right now, so it's definitely going to appear very nebulous and open-ended.

As I haven't been following this thread much what I don't understand is how having a new site (tumblr?) is going start helping the music scene. Why can't MLR continue to evolve towards these goals? Is there even enough of a listener group to require an extensive system of ways to feature artists and their music? It seems the rampant desire for new content from the fan base as a whole has died down a bunch. I don't think that's something any of us can control.
(There is zero negative intent in my questions here).

A recap thread may be a good idea now that you have some direction you're basing you early plans on, especially for those so us who couldn't keep us with this thread.

[A2Z]

CURRENT STATE OF AFFAIRS (10/27/13 | 2:16AM CST):

Apologies for keeping so many interested people in the dark. The speed at which this project has been evolving is rather fast and hard to keep up with. A lot of talks are happening both within this thread and in the Skype group chat. A lot of what people post here and say over there are taken into consideration during these early planning stages to better formulate a method at which to succeed in our goals. We all appreciate everyone's enthusiasm and contributions to help with this undertaking.

To start, a generalization of our goal, or purpose of existence if you will, is to be a music blog. The primary content will be the presentation of the music that many of the talented artists we know of in and around the fandom are making on a day-to-day basis. This blog will deliver content not based on any specific criteria other than what the staff and/or volunteers believe to be exceptional to listen to. This will be followed by a description/ short article as to why we made our choice or why others did. If it pleases us enough, or if it pleases a lot of other people enough, then we believe we should have that which pleases shown to our guests via our blog website.

What makes us unique from what many other sites are doing already isn't what we are trying to do better. It's what we are trying to do differently. We are wanting to be a central hub for users of tumblr and elsewhere to find a larger variety of fantastic music. This music is chosen by people who are themselves musicians, who find/ are shown the artists that don't get noticed for their exceptional talent, who want to offer listeners a selection of choices that make it easier to find the latest tracks they could be missing out on.

We want to be a valuable service to both musicians and listeners alike. We would like to be a group that works for each other. We want to be able to use other media outlets as one of our sources of exceptional content, and in turn be used by other sites to help broaden the spectrum of what makes up a quality music showcase. With this idea in mind, we can hopefully renew interest in the music community to do their best as musicians knowing that there is a greater chance for their music to reach out to interested listeners. Those people that know where great music exists, but don't know where to share their discovery now have an outlet with which to come to that can potentially help support any understated and/or undiscovered great artists. In turn, this can hopefully also become the place for the community by and large to find the wonderful music that may be lying right beneath the surface.

This is just one aspect of our vision for FIMMusic, though it is to be the largest of all the other content we plan to host. We would like to make it possible for spotlight artists to have interviews or articles of them. Other things include (but not limited to, and subject to change):

- An up-to-date Community Calendar of Events, listing album submission deadlines, release dates, community projects, etc (much like what I believe mcmiag does)

- Reblogs of music-related posts from other groups and individuals that have a key relevancy to the current music scenes in the fandom.

- Tutorials on various aspects of music composition and performance (DJ'ing included), ranging from beginner to advanced (dependent on resources available).

- Behind the scenes looks at how various popular artists go about making their music, the equipment they use, methods they employ, techniques they have developed or learned from others, etc. (dependent on resources available)

- Convention talk as to who is performing where and what their sets are like. What does it take to be an Audio/ Video specialist at these venues, and other talks of this nature.

Although a lot is still to be decided on, we are determined to try our best at being a high quality service for the community. As for right now, you can see we are beginning to come together with all of the ideas and a form for what we want is taking shape. The part we are currently at is seeing how at least a single post can look like so that way we may have a basic template to follow for any and all future postings. As this is going to be the main carrier holding the most seen type of content to come from the blog, it is highly important we have a flexible yet simple canvas to organize material onto. If anyone would like to contribute a basic layout for us to consider, please feel free. Just please keep in mind of how this will be hosted on tumblr and will likely have more than just one song per post. Here is a small idea of what we might like to see:

POST: SONG (GENRE) - ARTIST
DESCRIPTION (Read More button if need be)
written by: So & So


We also have a VERY EARLY mock-up of what the finished site will be formed out of that can be seen here: http://skintestalycs.tumblr.com/

TL;DR VERSION We're making a music blog that finds music from lesser known areas and we're all like "hey, check this out this sounds cool", and then we do some other stuff like show off how radical making music is and everybody can have loads of fun and want to be happy (yay) and want to help each other because we're friends. we need help with what at least a post will look like, so make a thing if your smart if not that's ok too


NOTE: If I missed any bits of information or completely missed the mission statements, then don't I look like just a giant dork, huh?

[ChocolateChicken]

It seems like not such a good idea for reasons including what 4thimpulse has stated already on his most recent post on this thread. Also, moving the music community to tumblr is a bad idea because it lessens the purpose of MLR altogether, as well as the purpose of EQD music posts. EQD is already a central hub of content recognition in the brony community, and making a different website for music recognition will only serve to divide the fandom and the fandom musicians even further. Your idea is for musicians and by musicians, so you completely ignore the fact that people besides musicians like to listen to music and talk to people who are musicians, and that also makes that website idea a huge musician's circlejerk and very isolated.

So why can't MLR do any of the things you guys are talking about? What is even the point of MLR anymore? Circuitfry I think it's time to delete MLR.

[ganondox]

We are going to be one of the ONLY great brony music sites on tumblr is my aim.

Just on a random note Daisy has a brony music tumblr, think we should try to contact her?
http://ponymusicposts.tumblr.com/

[Nine Volt]

So why can't MLR do any of the things you guys are talking about? What is even the point of MLR anymore? Circuitfry I think it's time to delete MLR.

Circuitfry isn't coming back. However I do agree with both your post and 4th's post (and Biggsy's post earlier).

To start, a generalization of our goal, or purpose of existence if you will, is to be a music blog. The primary content will be the presentation of the music that many of the talented artists we know of in and around the fandom are making on a day-to-day basis.

And how do you plan on getting this music blog out to the members of the brony fandom? Don't just say "EQD" because we both know that's unlikely given EQD's current state.

This blog will deliver content not based on any specific criteria other than what the staff and/or volunteers believe to be exceptional to listen to. This will be followed by a description/ short article as to why we made our choice or why others did. If it pleases us enough, or if it pleases a lot of other people enough, then we believe we should have that which pleases shown to our guests via our blog website.

Liking something is all well and good, but what qualifications do you expect the prelisteners to have? Are you really willing to decide whether or not a song is good enough based on the opinion of, say, a new producer listening in on $10 earbuds? Hate to say it (no I don't), but that probably won't cut it if you plan to get any kind of recognition amongst the actual producer side at the very least.

What makes us unique from what many other sites are doing already isn't what we are trying to do better. It's what we are trying to do differently.

Ask yourself: is there any point to really being different just for the sake of being different? If you're not trying to be different in order to be better than it's really a case of trying to fix what isn't broken just to say "look at us! we're different!". Think of all those "brony promotion sites" like EQReverb or whatever (that's the right name right? i don't remember). Remember that they failed despite the fact that they are/were different but not better (or even in some cases they were better but not better enough)?

We are wanting to be a central hub for users of tumblr and elsewhere to find a larger variety of fantastic music.

Tumblr has plenty of music blogs and apparently a brony one as well (someone said it, probably in the post above this or something). Why can't MLR be a hub for a larger variety of "fantastic music"? I don't mean to be melodramatic, but MLR has lost its purpose.

This music is chosen by people who are themselves musicians, who find/ are shown the artists that don't get noticed for their exceptional talent, who want to offer listeners a selection of choices that make it easier to find the latest tracks they could be missing out on.

Musician =/= good at choosing "fantastic" tracks.
You need to have more requirements for the prelisteners other than just "must be a musician". How about some kind of standards or quality control? And how will the musicians themselves find these "exceptional[ly] talent[ed]" artists?

We want to be a valuable service to both musicians and listeners alike. We would like to be a group that works for each other. We want to be able to use other media outlets as one of our sources of exceptional content, and in turn be used by other sites to help broaden the spectrum of what makes up a quality music showcase.

I ask again, what is the point of MLR in this scenario? Are we just a hub of cynical assholes (I mean that in the nicest way possible) brought together ostensibly by a show that many of us either no longer even watch or more commonly don't make music pertaining to? Yes you can branch out to social media but why even have MLR if this hypothetical tumblr is taking all of the site's functions?

With this idea in mind, we can hopefully renew interest in the music community to do their best as musicians knowing that there is a greater chance for their music to reach out to interested listeners. Those people that know where great music exists, but don't know where to share their discovery now have an outlet with which to come to that can potentially help support any understated and/or undiscovered great artists. In turn, this can hopefully also become the place for the community by and large to find the wonderful music that may be lying right beneath the surface.

But is there even enough of a demand for musical output in the brony fandom anymore? The fandom as a whole is dying down (whether or not you think it's explicitly "dying" is irrelevant; you cannot argue that it isn't exactly flourishing).

We would like to make it possible for spotlight artists to have interviews or articles of them.

Yes but do people really care about that?

- An up-to-date Community Calendar of Events, listing album submission deadlines, release dates, community projects, etc (much like what I believe mcmiag does)

What is the point of this if we already have it (like you explicitly fucking pointed out)?

- Reblogs of music-related posts from other groups and individuals that have a key relevancy to the current music scenes in the fandom.

Ok, this is fine as long as you're not reposting stupid bullshit.

- Tutorials on various aspects of music composition and performance (DJ'ing included), ranging from beginner to advanced (dependent on resources available).

THIS IS WHAT MLR IS FOR.
Well, part of at least.
Not to mention the literal thousands of tutorials already in existence about nearly every fucking musical topic in existence.

- Behind the scenes looks at how various popular artists go about making their music, the equipment they use, methods they employ, techniques they have developed or learned from others, etc. (dependent on resources available)

Again, I point to the thousands of tutorials in existence. But besides that, do people really care? Is this "helping out newer musicians" or is this encouraging plagiarism?

- Convention talk as to who is performing where and what their sets are like. What does it take to be an Audio/ Video specialist at these venues, and other talks of this nature.

Is there enough of an interest in conventions to really be basically advertising for them?

Although a lot is still to be decided on, we are determined to try our best at being a high quality service for the community.

Why can't MLR be a high quality service for the community? Isn't that what Makkon had in mind?

[ganondox]

Words

Okay, three things I disagree with:

1. The talk about this replacing MLR is complete and utter nonsense. This is a tumblr, here we are on a forum. They are completely different things for completely different purposes. A tumblr blog isn't a community, it's a blog that showcases thing.

2. The fandom may or may not be shrinking (I think technically it's growing, but at a slower rate, and veterens are producing/consuming less content, but still consuming it all the same). As long as it's not dead there is no reason to kill it. While I think the community is more important than the actual ponies, the community is not dead yet, there is still demand for ponies, so we can try to supply. Later we can discuss on possibly moving away from ponies, but right now it's only dead if we say it's dead.

3. I disagree with the need for tighter quality control. We aren't just trying to be another EQD, there is absolutely no point in that. I find tighter quality control problematic as it's biased towards technicality over composition as that's easier to objectively measure. If the kid with the earbuds likes it, then it is to some degree a good song, period.