Making free samples available...

Sampler and Sampling discussion (techniques, tips and tricks, etc.)
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I commend this to the house as a candidate for a 'sticky'...

I see a lot of threads here that start off the usual way...

"Hey! Look - I've made some samples which you can download here for free. Enjoy!"

And sure enough, there's a link and indeed there are free samples. And very fine many of them are too.

The trouble is, five posts later, the thread has descended into...

"I tried the link but got an error message that the site was unavailable"

"Yeah - me too. Wassup?"

"I had the same problem as well. This is really annoying!"

And so on.

At which point, the original poster ventures back into the fray...

"Sorry about this but it seems that I exceeded my bandwidth so my site's been closed down. I am seeking a solution."

Later...

"Ok - I've put the samples on XYZ freebie file sharing doodah"

Only to be greeted with...

"Oh! This is is a PITA. I have to wait up to two minutes before the download starts and it gets longer for each one I try to get"

"Yeah. Same here too"

"Me too. I had to wait 5 minutes because I've downloaded other stuff from them. And I really wanted to try these. Shame"

Ok - maybe a bit exaggerated but you get the point!

There are good people who are very kindly wanting 'to share'. They have a bit of webspace from their ISP so put their samples up there.

The trouble is, these free webspaces have very limited data transfer bandwidth. They're geared up for people setting up a little private website with family or holiday photos, whatever, to be shared with a handful of friends and relatives. They are NOT geared up to several hundred (or more) visitors downloading hundreds (or more) MB of data. It only takes a few hundred of those (easily achieved with an announcement here - everyone loves a freebie!) and the data transfer can run to GB of data in no time which will not only exceed your free webspace bandwidth in about 5 minutes but might also be in contravention of the TOC you signed.

The fact of the matter is that bandwidth is the precious commodity on the net. Storage is dirt cheap and you may well be able to upload/store 1GB or more of data to your ISP's little webspace. But data transfer bandwidth is the throttle here and your little ISP webspace will have a fixed limit ... and if/when that is exceeded, the site will be shut down.

For example, if you are offering 100MB of samples (not difficult these days) and your bandwidth cap is 1GB (which sounds generous ... and is ... for free), it won't take long from the point of announcing here to your monthly limit being exceeded. Maybe a few day or two? The problem is compounded if blogs pick up on the announcement and publish the link in which case, your bandwidth could be exceeded in a few short hours ... as has been the case very often! Even a 10GB cap could be quickly exceeded (don't forget that every jpeg, MP3 demo, page of text on your site is also a 'download' so it can all add up very quickly).

So what are the options?

Well - the freebie file sharing services offer a solution but these are usually very inconvenient. Geared up to get the downloader to sign up (and pay), they're deliberately convoluted and awkward and typically require the downloader to jump through hoops and wait and fill in text 'captures', etc., to get the freebie sounds such that it's often just not worth it. They waste everyone's time and effort - the person trying to 'share' and the people wanting to download it.

What about web hosting services offering 'Unlimited bandwidth'? Read the small print. Again, they're geared up for small or 'average' data transfers (a typical website of images, text, multi-media, etc.) NOT hundreds (or more) people downloading hundreds (or more) MBs of data. So you may still come unstuck ... as many I know have.

The bottom line is that you simply cannot just bung your samples up on your bit of webspace for the world to share them - I guarantee that your monthly bandwidth allocation will be used up in hours... or less!

If you want to deliver your free samples easily and reliably, you are going to have to pay, maybe handsomely. And the more you make available and the more you announce your freebies here and elsewhere (and/or when the blogs pick up your announcements), the more you will have to pay!

There is a perception that everything on the net is free. For the user, on the whole, that is generally true but not so for the provider and it can be a very costly business providing content for free, the most expensive commodity being data transfer bandwidth!

I say all this with no agenda, merely as a cautionary tale for all those wonderful and altruistic people who may want to share their samples - it's not as straightforward as you might think ... as many have found to their cost ... including myself in the past when I was similarly and hopelessly naive!

There is no such thing as a free lunch - maybe for the users perhaps but not the content providers.

This is meant to help. I hope it does.

Cheers,


Steve

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Hey Steve,

That is a great chunk of advice.

What's your take on torrents?
I find they are a great way to even out the bandwidth.
Unfortunately there is some illegal to share media on them.
Honest people are honest.

Another option is land mail. People could mail SD cards in a self addressed stamped envelopes. :D That goes back a few years.

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oic, we should just give up and buy our samples. anyone here sell samples?

long live torrents!
"Most people who experiment with drugs are not lying in the streets, suffocating on their own vomit. If you want to see some of that, go to the Pub on Saturday night at closing time." ozwest

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while you do have a point, and its good that you posted this, you could probably edit your post down to half its current length (if not considerably less): its very, very long and repetitive as it is and lots of ppl will probably not bother reading it. I only skimmed the 2nd half cos there were too many lines with "(or more)" in.

and this coming from one of the most rambling and long winded posters on here...
Signature blocked until somebody convinces me they aren't utterly pointless

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raintalk wrote:Hey Steve,

That is a great chunk of advice.

What's your take on torrents?
I find they are a great way to even out the bandwidth.
Unfortunately there is some illegal to share media on them.
Honest people are honest.
Wow, that's actually a very good idea! Abandon the standard http/ftp protocols and just upload samples etc via torrent to legaltorrents.com/Any other torrent site.

Not only do you even out the bandwidth, you're not really relying on a single server for the file.

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Yep, torrents are a good way of dealing with bandwidth.

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@hollowsun:

If 2GB space is sufficient, get yourself an account at http://dropbox.com and put the zipped sample files into your public folder. You can get more space by inviting new members. Each file will have a static link that will not change unless you do something with the filename itself. Put this link onto your website as usual.

Since Dropbox uses Amazon as storage provider there should be no speed issues. I haven't found a bandwidth limit in their terms yet, although I have to say, I didn't check them throughout. Maybe someone knows better.

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phazed wrote:If 2GB space is sufficient
Storage isn't the problem - it's bandwidth.

And that was the sole point of this post (which androidlove failed so spectacularly to realise) because so many people make some sounds available for free, announce them here and then wonder why their site is shut down within an hour... because they have exceeded their bandwidth!!

And in response to using torrents, I wouldn't know - I don't have the first clue about them or how to use them and neither, I suspect, do a lot of other people .... other than illegal software, music and films go on them, they are dog slow and littered with false links to dodgy pron sites - I am told ... I really don't have the first clue about them. That doesn't sound like a good delivery method for making sounds available to people.

Cheers,


Steve

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hollowsun wrote:androidlove failed so spectacularly to realise
yea, how could i miss that in your huge repetitive "don't do it" ramble? :dog:
"Most people who experiment with drugs are not lying in the streets, suffocating on their own vomit. If you want to see some of that, go to the Pub on Saturday night at closing time." ozwest

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phazed wrote:@hollowsun:

If 2GB space is sufficient, get yourself an account at http://dropbox.com and put the zipped sample files into your public folder. You can get more space by inviting new members. Each file will have a static link that will not change unless you do something with the filename itself. Put this link onto your website as usual.

Since Dropbox uses Amazon as storage provider there should be no speed issues. I haven't found a bandwidth limit in their terms yet, although I have to say, I didn't check them throughout. Maybe someone knows better.
The Variety of Sounds plugins are hosted there & I have seen the exceeded bandswitch limits "oopss!" screen from dropbox.

On my side I have use megaupload& never had any problems with it. The only problem I have was with people who could not decompress the .rar files because there were on Macs! So I had to provide a new megaupload link with a zip file.

Megaupload & Mediafire are quite good considering you're delivering free samples. If people complain about the ads then it's their problems not mine!

EDIT: I forgot about archive.org, it's a bit slow but it is very convenient to store souund samples for future generations (for a long time!).

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The bandwidht problem is really a problem at the beginning... after some time the free samples should be available from different servers if the author agree for free distribution.

Anyway the bandwidth problem is a serious thing... this is why donations are always welcome.

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my best experience so far is with mediafire. a brilliant free filehosting service.
Bedroom Producers Blog << Free VST Plugins!

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It's a well written post and it's mostly true. Torrents are not a good alternative solution either, because of the piracy associations and because many ISPs actually throttle torrent traffic. But raw bandwidth halves in price faster than memory and CPUs. Moore's Law is a slouch, by comparison. They (the ISPs) just don't pass the savings on. The fact of the matter is that the owners of the bandwidth have very good metering in place and there is not very much pressure, by way of competition or regulation, to provide bandwidth at its true and ever dropping price. We're being milked by what is effectively a bunch of monopolistic gate keepers. I don't know what the solution is, other than smarter overlay networks that are harder for ISPs to throttle or digging holes in the ground and laying your own fibre, as a community or cooperative. But make no mistake about it...the pricing of bandwidth is a racket and they don't have to shovel it!
My music is a fusion of jazz and funk. It's called "Junk"

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I'm more concerned w/mediocre samples, or drum machines from the 1940's but run through tape gear or whatever.
The only site for experimental amp sim freeware & MIDI FX: http://runbeerrun.blogspot.com
https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCprNcvVH6aPTehLv8J5xokA -Youtube jams

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