Throw that idea in the trash and just concentrate on making something short and sweet with no rules in mind.

I already have something lyrically and rhythmically in mind and I have not had a single thought about intros, outros, verse, chorus or number of bars.

{snigger}

Of the nine submissions uploaded to date, I can only download five since some are not mp3 files, and one is an org file (only) which I cannot play

allen

I feel your pain... I listen to these on my car's MP3 player, which doesn't play OGG files. Often times, if there's an OGG-only file, it gets skipped without me even knowing it.

And I third that. I was able to listen to RuediRena's entry, but had to get out of the way to do it (my media player doesn't play oggs either so I had to use SoundForge to open the file and listen to it). Under those circumstances, it may not have as much play as other entries that I place on a playlist and listen to several times during the duration of the contest.

I know the rules do allow for the submission to be in ogg format, and I'm aware of the advantages of this format over mp3, but for better or worse, ogg is not a very widely supported format, specially on portable players, which a lot of people use. .aac (mp4) would actually be a better compression format to submit in on that regard, although the rules do not currently allow that...

I guess I could convert the ogg to a mp3 myself and integrate it into my playlist, but that would be going from a lossy format to another lossy format, further degrading the sound. It'd be better for the composer to produce both formats from the master itself.

On the other hand, peppy197, I didn't have any problems with any of the other submissions... which other gave you trouble?


G.

Struggling with this months entry.

even bumping it up to 140bpm, which gives me 18 bars (16 of music, 2 to fade out) isn't helping....

Might scrap the idea and try again tonight.....

Theortically I like Ogg files, but since I can't listen to them in the car nor Ipod, without converting them to another format, I agree it is a bit of an minor inconvienence, so those tunes will probably only get a single listen, when I do the voting on my PC at the end of the month.

I'm curious about that too. They all work fine here.

On the ogg thing: I can think of two potential fixes (though it's a rare enough problem that maybe it doesn't need much fixing). One: mandatory mp3, supplemental ogg allowed and/or encouraged. Two: a note added to the rules indicating that submitting an mp3 is strongly encouraged even if an ogg is being submitted. Of the two, I favor the latter. Just thinking out loud, feel free to shoot down either or both.

On the difficulty with the theme: I might have a rough idea, finally, but good lord 30 seconds is a short amount of time to work with.

[quote="D.H. Miltz"]

I agree with that. The thing is to make things easy for the voters even if it a pain for the creator....

Guys, it's not hard to find a player that accepts every format - VLC media player is a good cross platform player. There's also a lot of good free format conversion software around too, so it's not hard to download and convert any format.

I guess the issue isn't so much cross-platform to those you can install software on. It's where the "platform" is closed: like a TV set or a car radio/MP3 player. You don't get to install VLC on those too easily.

My heart is behind Ogg/FLAC/Vorbis. But I use MP3 is silent violation of the patents. So I'll go with D.H. Miltz's suggestion.

Very much my position too. At the same time, I point out to people (wherever I can without being too obvious) the advantages of OGG, and if they really have to use mp3, at least use something like LAME with VBR.

P.S.
If you use LAME you are not in breach of the mp3 license anyway.

Lame
Aint
Mp3
Encoding

P.P.S.
My iRiver H320 got a new battery recently. It's still going strong, I haven't got anywhere near filling the hard drive, it plays most common formats.

As others said, the limitation is with hardware devices on which you have no control on the formats they play. ogg is not supported in almost any portable media device.

As for format conversion, yes, it's easy enough to convert from one format to another. However, as I pointed out, going from one lossy format to another is taking steps towards degrading the sound of the track. Therefore, it's in the composer/producer best interest to provide the compressed format versions themselves as originated directly from the master, to make sure they have the best quality possible for the format.



I would lean with option two as well. If someone wants to submit ogg, go ahead, but know that your submission may not be listened to by some people whose listening environments do not support the format.


G.

All files play on my computer.
Good to know some folk dont like ogg
I wanted to change to ogg to in may

I am surprised you didn't try an Easter ogg.



....sorry