Why is the Hollow Sun download page down?

[deleted]

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[Cordelia]

Hey Jonny, do you have a job? If so, it would be nice if you would share your paycheck with me, you know, for the common good and all.

[z15]

touché

[deleted]

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[abi]

you dumb or what? if someone gives you a present once he doesn´t have to give it to you everyday has he?

[M'Snah]

Know I have NO job. Do you see why I dont like the idea of free sevrice disappearing. I'm not saying everything should be free, its just that if something was free, it isnt right to then charge for that thing is it?

There's no logic in that last statement. And although it's nice to have something for free, it does cost money to keep providing it. Not just hollowsun, but kvr as well, servers, diskspace, bandwidth, admins, it al costs money even if it's not ours.

Be happy while it lasts, but realize that we (consumers) do not have rights to expect things for free.

[Failed Muso]

My complaint is that this was a FREE website, now he wants to make money (and yes he does want to make money, not just cover costs, he wants to live off of this) he has withdrawn the free stuff. Thats not good customer relations

You truly have not got a feckin' clue, have you ????

If you think Steve was expecting to make his living from selling what was once free, you seriously need a reality check. If anything, the HS CD sales were to cover the cost of the HS freebies, the CD costs and a bit over for himself. Steve is a multi faceted sound designer, working on many different projects for some of the biggest names in the industry. That is his bread and butter.

You mention that you have a "complaint" and "customer relations". Seeing as you have NEVER paid for any of the Hollow Sun stuff, you neither have the right to complain, nor are you a customer.

Consider yourself lucky that you benefited from Steve's amazing generosity and go find some other site to leech from.

Oh, and if you are, as you say, jobless, it's probably because you neither have the skills or talent to do your own thing, but are happy to suck the life out of others hard work for your own benefit.

[winegums100]

Thought I'd jump onboard with this one...

I've sent a few Akai samples over to Hollowsun in the past to say "thank you" to Steve for his website. He's offered a fantastic service in the past, and spent probably too many hours slaving over hot synths to offer a free download service to all us leachers (me included). I did suggest a few ideas to him on how he could claw some money back too. Unfortunatley for me Steve's current CD's on sale are not what I'm looking for, otherwise £20-30 for a disc isn't a lot to ask for really when comparing prices of other sample CD's... (I do plan to offer some kinda free sample service myself in the near future, but nothing to the scale of Hollowsun)
Have a bit of respect to this guy - people get annoyed when they can't have it for free!

Note to Steve: Will the donations service at Hollowsun still be active? I was planning on sending a few more over, having slaved over hot synths for too many hours myself!

Winegums100

[herodotus]

Many things were suggested at Hollow Sun. Like anybody who buys a CD gets free acsess to all the free stuff. My complaint is that this was a FREE website, now he wants to make money (and yes he does want to make money, not just cover costs, he wants to live off of this) he has withdrawn the free stuff. Thats not good customer relations

Actually, If you just want free stuff without giving anything in return, you aren't a 'customer'.

But if you like the idea of a permanent source of good freebies (for the public good, to promote computer music awareness, or what have you) Put up your own website and go to all the devs you know and ask for contributions. I am sure that many will be happy to help.

But then, of course, you will have to pay for hosting services. Where does this money come from?

[loomchild]

Oh, and if you are, as you say, jobless, it's probably because you neither have the skills or talent to do your own thing, but are happy to suck the life out of others hard work for your own benefit.

A tad speculative I'd say.

[bluelight]

Not only speculative..i´d say it is a bullshit post and the dude should have thought twice about posing it.

The samples are gone?

Well thats life..things are there one minute..the next they arent.

I was lucky to try out the Fairlight and Emu samples a couple of months ago.

I liked them very much.

Thank´s for supplying them.
The one and only suggestion i have for issues like this is:
Try to get a sponsor.The amount of traffic a site like Hollow sun is capable of should normally appeal to advertisers.Not gonna make anyone rich,,but it would keep the wheels rolling and in the long run..things might develop to something bigger.



Bluelight

[Failed Muso]

Not only speculative..i´d say it is a bullshit post and the dude should have thought twice about posing it.

What's so speculative about it ?? The guy said he was jobless. Means one of two things...he's still at school or unemployed.

If he's still at school (which is my guess) it would explain his lack of funds, and awesome lack of knowledge and understanding of the industry and how it works. Jonny and I had this same debate, albeit in a more brief fashion on the HS forum, where he received the same response that myself and many others on here have given him. It's an old and boring argument

Anyway, this thread has gone on too long. My good friend Steve has decided to remove a free service and all some people can do is bitch, bitch, bitch instead of thanking him for the last 3 and a half years of fantastic resource he has provided us.

Get a grip, forget about the technicalities and concentrate on making your music.

[SampleScience]

http://www.akaipro.com/arc_kotw.html

You're just being silly now!

Not only did those sounds come after Hollow Sun but I damned well did them for Akai! The KOTW was my idea to help promote the MPC1000. And very successful it was too!

Hmmmmmm.


Steve

Hi Steve,

I have nothing against you, all I'm saying is that it's possible to get analogue synth & drum machines samples from other sites & that Hollow Sun is not the only one offering these sounds. From what I can see Hollow Sun was probably the only one offering perfectly edited, mapped & looped samples, which is great.

That said, thanks for all the free sounds & I wish you the best in the future for you & your familly.

All the best,

SampleScience

[Jace-BeOS]

These are by far and away the most evocative samples I have ever heard and I regularly load them up and just "jam", creating some sonic landscapes with the pads. But explore beyond the pads, and you will find some thumping basses, divine bells and other glorious sounds.

I'm hoping to be inspired I am focused on sounds more than melody and it's hard to make new material!

BTW, if you're an S6000, I do hope you have signed up at the Akai Pro Users Forum !

I did at some point, I thought... I'll have to check it out again.

P.S. What Yamaha USB interface are you using ? I have a UX256 and it has been one of the soundest investments in my studio....solid, reliable and no fuss at all.

Same one. Are you on Windows or Mac? I didn't have such problems on the Mac, but all my stuff is on PC, so it makes it pretty worthless for me for sysex. I use it for input and routing, but sysex is impossible. I can't use any editors/librarians and I am very mad about that. It's why I bought the thing. I've seen other people complain similarly. I have considered buying an Edirol UM880, but it seems like I'm just giving in and wasting cash on something else that might have the same problem (USB MIDI interfaces supposedly have this trouble a lot).

[hollowsun]

Many things were suggested at Hollow Sun. Like anybody who buys a CD gets free acsess to all the free stuff.

Yes... a nice idea but another level up in website programming (PHP, ASP...whatever). This is a level of programming I am not familiar with (I do vanilla HTML) and I don't have the time to devote to learning all that so I would have to pay someone to handle that aspect for me which, of course, exacerbates my dilemna.

My complaint is that this was a FREE website, now he wants to make money

And? Your point is?

(and yes he does want to make money, not just cover costs, he wants to live off of this)

Is that an unreasonable expectation (i.e. to earn some money from the work I do!)?

Given the ever-growing traffic at the site and the (supposed!) support shown in emails, etc., it was assumed that even with just a 1% take-up there would be a reasonable source of income to be had selling CDs that eclipsed the quality of the free samples.... to help maintain the site and pay for its (not inconsiderable) running costs, to give me some leeway to provide further free sounds, to allow me the time to develop further CDs to sell... etc.. If it provided anything else, that would have been a bonus. But I was wrong - take-up on the CDs has been slower than I (and others) anticipated and so I have had to re-assess my situation. Simple as that.

The fact is that the publicity for the CDs has only achieved one thing - that more people are coming to the site, ignoring the CDs and just going for the freebies! And I can't say I blame them (up to a point) but when the free 'promotional material' is damaging potential sales, you have to think again. And when your freebies are causing the site to be closed down on a regular basis, there is only one solution - withdraw the freebies while you consider how best to proceed.

he has withdrawn the free stuff. Thats not good customer relations

Not quite - what's not good for customer relations is people taking the piss and bleeding my site dry, leeching the freebies with scant (or no) regard to the real-life commercial considerations of the costs involved in providing a free service. Just a dip into the wallet would help... it's not like I am fleecing people for $300 per CD with sub-standard, glitchy (or no!) loops and/or dodgy programming - my CDs were aimed to bring serious quality library to those who don't have tons of $$ to throw around (such as yourself!). I pitched the price of my CDs accordingly (jeeeeez - I doubt you'd get a night out in town with your mates for the price of just one of my CDs!).

But it's not worked out that way (sadly) and so I have to re-consider my situation. Phase 1 of that is to suspend the service because of the damage it is doing to my CD sales and frankly, Jonny, you are not in a position to 'complain' about that or take any stance on it - it's *my* decision driven by serious economic circumstances that affect me here!

As they say : "The Management has the right to refuse admission"

The analogy is relevant.

Steve