An Open Letter to Sethisto, Head of Equestria Daily

[DusK]

http://blog.itstartsatdusk.com/post/449 ... tria-daily

I know a few EqD pre-listeners frequent this site, so I know this could catch some flak, but I also know that some of the very musicians getting screwed by the incompetence detailed in that blog post are here as well.

It's time for brony music to go niche. A site solely dedicated to brony music is growing more necessary by the day. The head of MLP Forums, Feld0, is developing a site to that aim. I've started a blog for reviewing brony music as objectively as possible and featuring it with that same objectivity as a precursor to Pony.fm's music spotlighting system.

Talent suppression is something that should never exist in a music community. By actively engaging in it, EqD harms the very community they outwardly claim to support.

Despite the presence of some of those that are very much at the root of the problem frequenting this forum, it would be a good idea to open discussion here, especially with them. They, like Sethisto, deserve the chance to explain themselves and provide transparency to the brony music community.

[Nine Volt]

"A site solely dedicated to brony music"

*facepalm*

[DusK]

"A site solely dedicated to brony music"

*facepalm*

What an insightful post.

Seriously, though, how is it such a bizarre or bad idea? There's more than enough of it flying around. More brony musicians exist than even those who make the most diligent efforts can keep track of. Looking at the subscriber count of any popular brony musician would yield sufficient proof that a large brony music fan following exists. Hell, look at the forum you're on.

So why not give the phenomenon a site dedicated to delivering that content in a meaningful way? Sites have been launched for less.

[Anonagon]

Pretty sure you aren't getting 9V's joke.

"A site solely dedicated to Brony music"

Aren't you on it?

What you should say is "A site dedicated to exposing Brony music to the public" or something along those lines.

[Nine Volt]

Pretty sure you aren't getting 9V's joke.

"A site solely dedicated to Brony music"

Aren't you on it?

What you should say is "A site dedicated to exposing Brony music to the public" or something along those lines.

[DusK]

Pretty sure you aren't getting 9V's joke.

"A site solely dedicated to Brony music"

Aren't you on it?

What you should say is "A site dedicated to exposing Brony music to the public" or something along those lines.

Well, with Pony.fm, that's not entirely the case. What Feld0's currently working on is a site that would provide hosting and distribution as well, among other things. Taken from the site's front page:

Why Pony.fm?

Unlike popular music hosting sites like Bandcamp and SoundCloud, Pony.fm will offer unlimited bandwidth to its users and is custom-built from scratch by a brony, for bronies. The site is currently under very active development and will be a quality destination for My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic fan music once it launches.

What features will Pony.fm offer?

* FLAC and WAV uploads, which will be auto-tagged and transcoded into MP3 and other formats
* Off-site sharing through an embedded player and beautiful link "badges"
* Detailed stats that tell you where your songs are being played
* A social experience not unlike deviantART's

Actually, until recently, music spotlighting was more of an afterthought. Originally, Feld0 was planning on handling it using statistics to display the most popular songs within certain time periods. I suggested the idea of an judges panel being used either instead, or as an addition.

[Makkon]

I don't entirely know how I'm supposed to respond to this. I guess I don't have to since it has nothing to do with me.

I'll be honest that the vibe I got from your letter is complaining because you got rejected. I know it's more than that, but it was a frequently reoccurring theme. This isn't the way to handle the situation in my opinion, but however you feel is best. That matter doesn't involve me at all.

But what baffles me is that so many bronies have this remarkable stigma that "brony-music" is somehow exclusive from the rest of the music world. That it has to be a niche (if that's even possible), and that the only exposure that these musicians can ever hope to have is through EQD. Is brony music a thing? See, where I come from we just call it music.
What distinguishes brony music from other music? PONIES. And is that factor enough to make it it's own exclusive thing?

No!

If your thing is getting more exposure for your music, try making music for a broader audience!
Try advertising or posting your music on other music sites and forums! I'm a professorial artist, and I get far more exposure posting my artwork on several sites. No sense in limiting your outlet to one site and getting upset that it's not getting you the results you want.
Better yet, make more music that isn't ponies! A great portion of my subscribers are not bronies at all, and they wouldn't be interested if "brony-music" was all I produced. (plus, I don't like making pony music).

But if you want to make music for the sake of getting more exposure, the brony music scene is not the place for you.

I would hope that the reason why people are involved in this or any music community is because they want to be around other musicians who's work they enjoy, improve their craft for the sake of improvement, and to make friends and get connected. EQD is obviously not the place for that either, it's a news blog!


I stand by what I've said so many times. MLR is a music forum first, and an MLP forum second. If I had it my way, it would be an MLP forum last. This is a community centered on music, mastery, and friends. If you have other motives, you won't find this or many other music communities very useful.

[Nine Volt]

I don't entirely know how I'm supposed to respond to this. I guess I don't have to since it has nothing to do with me.

I'll be honest that the vibe I got from your letter is complaining because you got rejected. I know it's more than that, but it was a frequently reoccurring theme. This isn't the way to handle the situation in my opinion, but however you feel is best. That matter doesn't involve me at all.

But what baffles me is that so many bronies have this remarkable stigma that "brony-music" is somehow exclusive from the rest of the music world. That it has to be a niche (if that's even possible), and that the only exposure that these musicians can ever hope to have is through EQD. Is brony music a thing? See, where I come from we just call it music.
What distinguishes brony music from other music? PONIES. And is that factor enough to make it it's own exclusive thing?

No!

If your thing is getting more exposure for your music, try making music for a broader audience!
Try advertising or posting your music on other music sites and forums! I'm a professorial artist, and I get far more exposure posting my artwork on several sites. No sense in limiting your outlet to one site and getting upset that it's not getting you the results you want.
Better yet, make more music that isn't ponies! A great portion of my subscribers are not bronies at all, and they wouldn't be interested if "brony-music" was all I produced. (plus, I don't like making pony music).

But if you want to make music for the sake of getting more exposure, the brony music scene is not the place for you.

I would hope that the reason why people are involved in this or any music community is because they want to be around other musicians who's work they enjoy, improve their craft for the sake of improvement, and to make friends and get connected. EQD is obviously not the place for that either, it's a news blog!


I stand by what I've said so many times. MLR is a music forum first, and an MLP forum second. If I had it my way, it would be an MLP forum last. This is a community centered on music, mastery, and friends. If you have other motives, you won't find this or many other music communities very useful.

THERE IS A GOD!

[DusK]

-snip-

The reason that my rejections are a recurring theme is because it solidified the point that music is getting rejected from EqD that is better than music that's getting posted, even spotlighted. I'm unfortunately unfamiliar with any other similarly well-made yet inexplicably rejected music because if it's not on EqD or parroted on EFR's feed, it's practically invisible within the community. So regarding rejections, I can only work with the examples that I know of -- my own. I've considered putting out a call to other brony musicians that have made good music but have been rejected in the same way to share their music with me so I have more to work with, not only because it would further solidify my point, but also because it would also allow me to listen to great music that I would have otherwised missed (That's one of the reasons I started up Brony Music Spotlight, and so far, it's delivered to that end).

Niche music is and will likely always be a thing. I'm an OC ReMixer, and OC ReMix is a prime example of a successful niche music site that serves both the music distribution and exposure factors as well as providing an environment that satisfies the same self- and community-improvement goals that allow musicians to grow in their music. All the same, it's geared towards a specific appreciation, and brony music really is no different than that. Given that fact, I believe it deserves the same treatment.

I'm not in music simply to gain exposure. I'm simply making music to make music, and that's it. If even only one person enjoyed my music, that would go beyond mission accomplished. But at the same time, I can't ignore that exposure is a very real aspect of music, and manipulation of it in a way that suppresses talent is only harmful to a music community, for both the musicians and the listeners, potential or otherwise. I can't deny that when people appreciate the music I do, I feel more inclined to do it. It becomes a win-win!

Denying other musicians that when they've poured heart and soul into what they do while awarding it to musicians that arguably have done less just isn't right. If you don't distinguish between music, if you "just call it music", even you must see that.

[Nine Volt]

I just read your letter, and yeah you're pretty much just complaining about your song getting rejected. I hate to be blunt (actually I don't) but move on. Nothing personal, broski.

[DusK]

I just read your letter, and yeah you're pretty much just complaining about your song getting rejected.

Then explain my posts critical of EqD's music featuring system during the periods that my music was constantly getting posted. If all you're getting from that open letter is "you're just complaining", you're missing the point.

[Makkon]

Again I want to stress the fact that EQD is a news site, and they have severe bias. It doesn't have the luxury of being able to focus exclusively on music, and it can never adequately satisfy "both the music distribution and exposure factors" as you eloquently put. It's a news site about ponies for goodness sake!

I can't compare brony music to OC Remix even in the slightest. OC remix is geared exclusively to video game music remixes, which by comparison in size and material makes brony-music look microscopic. I can't even call it a niche. Not only do they have an astronomically larger fan base (ALL OF VIDEO GAMES), but they have an endless library of music to remix. We have one show. One single show, and only 3 seasons at that.

If you want your music to get out there, don't use EQD as your distributor. If you're an OC Remixer, STICK WITH THEM. If you love to make music and improve and make friends, then stick with OC and visit us too! Just don't make a mountain out of a molehill about a site that is dedicated to pony news. You are smarter than to do that, and you're articulate enough to find a better solution than to appeal to a broken system.

We don't intend to scare you away or to insult you (well, maybe that's NineVolt's intent). We just don't want you to waste your time. I think it's perfectly fine that someone is making a brony music spotlight sight. I'm still not comfortable with the idea that brony music is different in the aspect that it's sometimes about ponies, or simply made by fans of the show, and I don't think it will ever make sense to me.

At any rate, welcome to the forums, sorry for the harsh welcome. Don't expect a response back from EQD. Instead, focus your effort elsewhere. They post what they want to post, and it's not worth stressing about them anymore.

[Nine Volt]

I just read your letter, and yeah you're pretty much just complaining about your song getting rejected.

Then explain my posts critical of EqD's music featuring system during the periods that my music was constantly getting posted. If all you're getting from that open letter is "you're just complaining", you're missing the point.

Let's address this in a method typical of the SCP Foundation.

For the past few months, I’ve been very vocal about EqD’s music featuring system on my blog, my Twitter, MLP Forums, and various other places around the Internet. Namely, I’ve been critical of how inconsistently the music has been categorized and handled.

You don't tell us which particularities of the system cause it to be inconsistently categorized and handled. To someone unfamiliar with EqD's system, we don't have any context.

Before I continue with those criticisms, IF I continue with these criticisms, I want to get your side of the story, so that I can ensure that I’m being as objective regarding this situation as possible. If EqD’s as compartmentalized as some claim, consider this email an alert to you of your pre-listeners’ incompetence in the off-chance that you’re genuinely unfamiliar with it.

Here, you directly criticize the pre-listeners' abilities as listeners. The pre-listeners, to my knowledge, are intended to consist of judges from all sides of the musical spectrum. They are not intended to grade music based on 'artistic ability' and 'talent'; they are intended to grade it based on how good it sounds.

This isn’t something new, as I learned shortly after my “Smile Song” cover got spotlighted that EqD’s pre-listener panel’s inability to judge music effectively is fairly well-known in certain circles.

Openly and unfairly criticizing a group is typically not the best method of communication, especially when trying to communicate with the head of said group.

To be more personal, I have noticed that not one, but TWO of my tracks were rejected outright (not even being posted to MotD). My most recent rejected track was even better than my first spotlighted track.

This practically screams "I'm angry that my songs didn't get on EqD!!". The latter sentence is also debatable.

Around the same time as those rejections, tracks that were worse from an objective standpoint were spotlighted.

Again, debatable. Have you considered the possibility that you simply didn't like those songs?

The difference in quality was often to a pretty startling degree, such as my “Becoming Popular” collab with Corralfur vs. Tortur’s “Winter Wrap Up” remix.

Frankly, that statement is just rude.

Not only are these rejections in the face of acceptance of the quality (or to be more specific, the lack thereof) of music that’s being featured an affront to me personally as a musician, but more alarmingly, they present the possibility that other talented musicians may have been rejected in the same way.

And here, you are getting offended that the pre-listeners dared to dislike your song. Nobody wanted to offend you personally as a musician, and frankly, nobody cared.

An active suppression of talent runs antithetical to any claim of support for the brony music community.

Do you think the pre-listener panel is some kind of conspiracy designed to keep 'talent' from becoming known? It seems like you do.

It’s already hard for unrecognized talent within the brony music community to get recognized, and the most-frequented site for brony music rejecting good music and spotlighting music that isn’t as good as the music being cast into the sidelines or even rejected does more harm to the brony music community than good.

I agree with the part about unrecognized talent being hard to get recognized. The same is true for all types of music, hell almost anything in life. But for the rest of this portion, see my above statement.

The issue doesn’t stop with me. Throughout my time listening to the music being posted to EqD, both spotlighted and posted to MoTD, I have noticed that on just about any given day, there are tracks in the MotD posts that, once again speaking objectively, are better than tracks being spotlighted.

You don't seem to realize that you are not the one who decides which tracks are better, and so frankly your opinion on the matter is not going to make a difference.

It’s for that reason that the inconsistency of your site’s music featuring system, be it a result of your pre-listeners or otherwise, is so problematic. Because your site is the “go-to” in the brony community for fans of brony music, the utmost standards for quality, consistency, and professionalism should be maintained.

And for the most part, they are. You, on the other hand, just don't like it. And that's just too damn bad.

1. Your pre-listener panel is genuinely incompetent to the point of absurdity. Even if we were to set music composition and production knowledge aside, we’re talking massive differences in quality that only take a functional set of ears to discern. This reflects poorly on your site, and nullifies any suggestion that your site reviews music in an objective and consistent manner.

The fact that you explicitly point out that you believe this is the most likely possibility speaks volumes about you as a person.

2. My music is being rejected because of my past criticisms of EqD’s pre-listener panel. If this is the case, that’s extremely unprofessional; No site where music is claimed to be featured based on quality should accept or omit music for any reason other than quality. Musicians are not the only people who benefit from taking criticism and learning from it rather than shrugging it off and holding grudges. Your site should follow in the same.

They're not going to like you if you're dicks to them. Simple fact of life. Also, I'm almost certain they do not see the artist of the submitted track.

This also isn’t sour grapes; I’ve been spotlighted on EqD three times and MotD’d twice, meaning all of my brony music up until my last two releases were posted to EqD in some fashion. This is purely an objective and straightforward criticism of your site’s ability to consistently feature music, whatever the reasons for preventing that task may be. This featuring actually backs the points I make in my criticisms as well; some of my music that EqD is rejected is better than some of what music of mine has been featured, even spotlighted.

Have you ever, once, considered the fact that your music might not be as good as you think?



My Overall Verdict:
You believe your music to be of a consistently high quality, a belief which is simply that: a belief. Thus, it is subjective and likely influenced by the fact that it's your goddamn music.
You believe EqD's pre-listener panel to be mostly or totally incompetent at judging music, a belief which has partial truth but not nearly to the scale you are suggesting.
Alternatively, you believe that EqD's pre-listener panel maintains a grudge against you as an artist due to your past criticisms, a belief which is invalidated by the fact that the pre-listener panel is not given the artist name of the track they are reviewing.
You believe that there is some form of mass-conspiracy devoted towards shunning 'talent' in the music community, a belief which is invalidated due to the fact that it's just plain fucking stupid.
You believe that your music is of an inherently higher quality than those posted in favor of yours, a belief which is opinionated and subjective at best.

My best advice to you?
Get over yourself and move on. You're not going to change anything.

[Ptepix]

Don't make MLR responsible for this. We want to keep some legitimacy intact. This is just whining.

Sure I don't like my songs getting rejected...make your music better doe mang

[DusK]

Makkon, you'd actually be surprised at the size difference for brony music and VGM remixing. I recall Sethisto saying that EqD gets something like 20+ submissions per day, and the amount of music they post any given day seems to back that claim. OC ReMix usually doesn't even get that many submissions in a month. Maybe that could be due in a larger part to the strictness of OCR's judges panel than I'm perceiving, but I dunno, I can't really say for sure.

The main point that I'm getting at is that the brony music has a severe issue in the fact that the #1 place to find brony music is, as you put it, a news site with a severe bias. That's what this whole thing boils down to; the open letter, my previous criticisms, Pony.fm, all of it. It's a problem, and I believe it can be fixed.

I know you're at least not intending to insult me, Makkon. Disagreement along the lines of what you're posting was something I expected when I made my original post. I also expected insulting posts such as Nine Volt's.

Getting that, Nine Volt, your post throughout hinges on the suggestion that music cannot be evaluated objectively. Nothing could be further from the truth. Composition and production values, especially production values, are something that can be objectively measured. Even EqD's staff knows that much; otherwise, a tiered system of featuring music wouldn't exist on that site. Music, especially recorded music, isn't subjective as you're trying to claim. Hell, if music were as subjective as you're saying, a site like this, geared at musicians helping musicians get better, wouldn't have a purpose. If music is as subjective as you're saying, you're even contradicting yourself in that post the many times you insinuate that my music isn't good, because "good" and "bad" music wouldn't exist. We both know that's not true, so why pretend otherwise?

That aside, even if it were as you say, even if EqD's pre-listener panel is "not intended to grade music based on 'artistic ability' and 'talent'", but rather "how good it sounds", a simple peruse throughout the last few months of posts tagged music shows that even that isn't true. As I said in my email to Sethisto, all it takes to discern quality to the degree that EqD's disparity is observed is a set of functional ears.

I don't need to second guess the quality of my music; I know exactly where it stands. I know who's better (Dear God, I could write books on musicians better than me), and I know who's worse. But I know for sure that I'm good. I'm an OC ReMixer. Over 90% of VGM remixers cannot make that claim. If you're not familiar with the strict standards of OC ReMix's judges panel, I suggest giving this a read.

Music can be listened to and judged without bias. If it couldn't, improvement utilizing the critique of more experienced musicians and producers wouldn't even be a thing.

[Makkon]

At any rate, calling the group of people you are addressing incompetent and incapable of doing their job is not the thing to say in this situation. Or any situation. You're not going to get them on your side like this. Talk to them about the problem, and offer solutions.
Or don't, I think you've already burned this bridge to ashes.

[Viricide Filly]

I think OP is a twit, and I can't be bothered to argue why. EqD gets a shit load of songs sent in every day. Don't complain just because they're not letting YOU in. I've never got in either. But I don't complain about it. I take it as a sign that I need to improve.

[Nine Volt]

I can't see any possible beneficial outcome to this thread, for either of us.

Regardless, my post was not intended to be insulting. My argument does not 'hinge' on the fact that music cannot be judged subjectively; really, it doesn't 'hinge' on anything. The point I'm trying to make, and the point you've been so deftly skirting around, is that your music simply might not be as good as you think. I don't care if you've gotten on before, and I don't care if you're an OC remixer. That doesn't automatically mean your music is inherently better than the music your was denied in favor of.

[itroitnyah]

I think it would be a good idea for a mod to come and lock this thread before it turns into a big shitstorm.

But before that happens, DusK, your music may be good, but perhaps it isn't as good as you think. The prelisteners wouldn't let a song that is good not get featured, so if your songs aren't getting featured, they obviously aren't as good as you think they are. Try hitting up the Tutors thread and finding some people who would be willing to critique your songs before you post them to help you out.

Second, EqD does their best to make sure that everybody gets a fair chance, and I think they're doing a pretty good job at what they're doing. Obviously a lot of other people do too. Don't try and fix something that isn't broken.

[Lavender_Harmony]

I honestly found some aspects of your letter quite insulting. The system isn't perfect, but you really need to learn to look part this, for instance, the reason you are making music. It's nice to have recognition, but the main reason you should be making music is because it's fun, not to become omgbronyfamous.

EqD spotlights outstanding music, and some of the people on the prelisteners, including myself, know what they're doing. I personally have a degree in music and more than 10 years of music production experience, and to call me genuinely incompetent? That's pretty insulting, and to do so publicly isn't going to win you any favours whatsoever.

[Nine Volt]

Exactly my points.

Wake up, this is real life. Nobody's going to give you a spotlight simply because you think you should get it.

[Freewave]

http://blog.itstartsatdusk.com/post/44918422689/an-open-letter-to-sethisto-head-of-equestria-daily

I know a few EqD pre-listeners frequent this site, so I know this could catch some flak, but I also know that some of the very musicians getting screwed by the incompetence detailed in that blog post are here as well.

It's time for brony music to go niche. A site solely dedicated to brony music is growing more necessary by the day. The head of MLP Forums, Feld0, is developing a site to that aim. I've started a blog for reviewing brony music as objectively as possible and featuring it with that same objectivity as a precursor to Pony.fm's music spotlighting system.

Talent suppression is something that should never exist in a music community. By actively engaging in it, EqD harms the very community they outwardly claim to support.

Despite the presence of some of those that are very much at the root of the problem frequenting this forum, it would be a good idea to open discussion here, especially with them. They, like Sethisto, deserve the chance to explain themselves and provide transparency to the brony music community.

I'm a supporter of pony.fm, mlp forums, and feld's efforts to have a more mlp centered community forum (that exists and is a very decent forum), something that can work as a better hosting site then eqbeats (which hasn't really continued to improve), and as a site for highlighting some smaller artists through musical spotlights. But this is really NOT the way to introduce yourself and pony.fm / mlp forums TO the brony musical community. When you ignore 2 years of community building and efforts in MLR that have been built up and openly complain about EQD in the same breath it ruins ANY arguments you may have and any alternatives you may offer. There are many threads already on this site about how EQD works and why it works that way and some of the changes over the years to improve things. EQD is not MLR and vice versa, two completely different sites. Taking a fight to them here is just asinine if you're trying to offer a positive alternative. It's also dis-respectful.

Personally i hope for a thread lock and that feld0 can introduce his site in the positive way at a later time that he initially intended rather than this terrible effort by yourself. You just don't show up at someone's house and pick a fight during your own introduction.

[Raddons]

I firmly believe Seth should stop taking music submissions and feature stuff that he wants to on his own accord.

It's his own blog, and I believe the OP fails to realize that. It's not a platform for his personal "growth" as a musician.

[Ptepix]

I firmly believe Seth should stop taking music submissions and feature stuff that he wants to on his own accord.

It's his own blog, and I believe the OP fails to realize that. It's not a platform for his personal "growth" as a musician.

Yes

[Fimbulin]

EQD's last poll had over 500 people that said they were brony musicians. If they all made one song every two months, that's 250 in a month. That's over 20 a day for one song every two months! Of course people make more music than that; thus people's songs are going to be rejected, based on general mathematics. So if Sim Gretina and Omnipony make songs that day, they will be featured, because they are among the 'top tier' musicians. That's based on the cultural standpoint.

See, it's not feasible for a pop-news site to feature everything submitted, nor would it be good to be 'kind' to the lesser musicians in the fandumb. That kindness would turn people away from EQD. People would be like, "So theres new music from d.notive, but it didn't make the news. Whatever I hate this news site." What's happening now is a very small vocal majority of the 500+ musicians are saying "I hate this news site because they don't feature the 'lesser knowns' of the fandumb." - that just doesn't make sense. Think about it.