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All the other sites I've posted music or videos on (Soundclick, MySpace, Songramp, etc.) I've been able to delete or update material myself. If the material was being rated or scored, the update would start from scratch (or zero, score for previous version not counting for new version) on most sites, which seems right. This is the first time I've had to request that the site creators remove old material. This seems kind of primitive.

I haven't received a message from the artist who was spamming me the most. I must have stumbled on a switch to turn him off, assuming OurStage management didn't ban him or something similar.


https://www.stonemarmot.com
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Nouveau retro pop-rock music
Listen to our latest song “I Sing Along” at:
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Well it seems like my song is doing pretty much what I expected.
It is one of those either you like it or you hate it songs. no middle, LOL.
It is hanging right around the middle in the singer songwriter channel. so I'd say its getting about a 50/50 split
But it has only been there for two days. with 17 views.


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Post deleted by TAMERA64

Last edited by TAMERA64; 04/19/08 03:08 PM.
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Hi Tammy, I copied this from the "Terms And Conditions" sub-section "Posting Submitted Content"

No Illegal, Infringing or Abusive Message Content: You understand and acknowledge that you are responsible for your Submitted Content, and agree not to post any content that is unlawful, harmful, tortious, defamatory, libelous, obscene, invasive of the privacy of another person, threatening, harassing, abusive, hateful, racist, infringing, pornographic, violent or otherwise objectionable or inappropriate as determined by OurStage.

The words obscene, pornographic, objectionable and inappropriate are there but they are determined by OurStage. So bringing this to their attention seems appropriate. I wouldn't think that the artist in question could know who reported them. Maybe Danny can give a definite answer. Ben


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Tammy,
It's Ok to report abusive/offensive things as well as Off Topic. I think the adminstrators will know which "judge" reported, but our identity will not be shared with the offending parties, so it's completely safe to offer any helpful & honest feedback.

I think it's important to immediately report anything offensive or off topic, etc. Let's keep on doing the right thing. It helps keep the site cleaner and operating more effectively for the great majority of artists and fans.

Michael


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Thanks Michael, I thought I should but I thought they could see. Someone said they were seen for doing that. I will have to find where I saw that and show ya.

Tammy

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I uploaded a few tracks last week, in different categories. So far, Please Emmalene has fared the best. Last I checked it was #6 on the folk channel.
Plenty of time for it to plummet though!

http://www.steverobinsonmusic.com/

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I've seen some unexpected shifts in some categories in the last 24 hours including some songs that came totally out of nowhere to the top of one channel when I hadn't seen then even in the running (i.e. the top 100) all month. That seems very bizarre. I am curious if it's temporary or if they will stay. Especially in the cases where songs aren't that good and still rocket to the top.

I think it's really going to take some time for genres to clear up, people to understand what belongs where and of course for Ourstage to grow and adjust to that growth. I think they are very responsive and don't shy away from tough questions. Do they do everything the way I (or anyone else for that matter) would do it? Of course not. And I do things with JPF that few agree with as well. In the end, they've gotta serve their needs so they can move forward as a company. There are always going to be times where compromises have to be made and things can't be perfect. But as long as their heart is in the right place, I think they'd continue to be a more and more important and useful tool for everyone.

Brian


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Brian,
What about this point that Tammy is asking about judges giving feedback to OurStage? The "feedback" in this case is for reporting Off-topic songs or Offensive words in the lyrics during the judging process. I'm pretty sure it's anonymous and only for the administration to have to deal with, otherwise everyone would be afraid to volunteer their honest feedback/reporting on these issues.

I'm thinking there may be other sites that do let everyone see the comments, but that sounds more like open forums and not a quality control tool that's used strictly on an administration level.

I'm pretty sure we'll figure this out and put it to rest. If not, we may need to ask Daniel Palmer for some clarification.

Thanks,
Michael


There's nothing remarkable about it. All one has to do is hit the right keys at the right time and the instrument plays itself. -- Johann Sebastian Bach

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I don't know. But I have no problem with people knowing I reported them being off topic or violating copyrights. A fact is a fact. Now I am sure that some people don't really understand the genres and may falsely report something, or they simply may not like something and report it. For example, certain genres often include profanity (Gangsta Rap for example) and it would be pointless to report that. I think a way to solve this issue in general is to have a standard that it has to be radio friendly. If you don't have that standard, then I can't see how you can reasonably exclude songs for profanity. Frankly. some songs use it well.. others don't. Let's not get into musical censorship.

The genre thing is more straight forward. Every type of song should have a home in a genre and right now they don't quite have enought to cover everything. In those cases, they have no choice but to be very broad in their definition and tolerance. I listened to the Top 10 Pop songs... 7 of the songs are pretty decent, but only 2 of them really qualify as "Pop" as we would define it. Most were some variation of Rock.

I called Daniel about another issue earlier but he's likely swamped with it being a Monday. He's usually in meetings all day and it often takes us a week to connect via phone because one of us is nearly always in a conference call or some meeting.

I think if you're making a solid judgement, then I am not sure what you have to worry about in reporting something. Often folks simply aren't educated in what is what and it may actually help them define their music. Musicians are nearly ALWAYS horrible at choosing what "genre" their music fits into. That's why we don't let artists choose in our awards.

Brian


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Originally Posted by Steve Robinson
I uploaded a few tracks last week, in different categories. So far, Please Emmalene has fared the best. Last I checked it was #6 on the folk channel.
Plenty of time for it to plummet though!

http://www.steverobinsonmusic.com/
I don't think you're going to plummet, Steve...#3 today with only two to go for the quarterfinals.

Now I totally plummeted to #54 after hanging in there in the top 20 for all of last week. So did some others that were solidly in the top ten all month. Folk is an interesting one to watch, as it has fewer entrants...it's easier to see the effects of voting.

Good luck! "Please Emmalene" is a rock solid song. smile

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I feel your pain, Lyle. smile

Mine was in the 30's and did a slow climb to as high as 23. Then a couple of days ago I blinked and it fell like a rock to number 59 smile

Hope it sticks too, Steve!

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It is interesting to see the songs rise and fall. Mine was at 20 the other day....then it dropped to 98 and now it had been in the 40's a couple of days. I just try not to keep my hopes up. lol

Tammy

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This is the last day of voting before the quarter finals.. we have quite a few JPF members in striking range. If any of you are going to do more voting, do it before midnight Wednesday to get those votes in before the deadline.

Brian


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Thanks Brian for your input about the "Offensive" and Off topic issue.

And yes, tomorrow is the last day before we head into the quarter finals. It's an exciting time and then we get to vote for the top 20 in each channel we dedice to participate in. There's some tough calls, but it gets even harder during the semi-finals.

By the time we get to the finals it's fairly easy to pick songs because we tend to choose from among our favorite genres/styles, but even then some surprises may pop up! smile

Michael


There's nothing remarkable about it. All one has to do is hit the right keys at the right time and the instrument plays itself. -- Johann Sebastian Bach

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Well I guess my wife was right. She never liked the song, Hah.
The song is at 962 out of 1442 songs. It went to 645 but has been on a steady decline since. But only 28 listens, don't know how many battles.
Is there a way to know how many have judged it?
Of course I doubt anyone went looking for it so most of the plays were probably battles.

Last edited by Bill Robinson; 04/23/08 11:26 AM.

Bill
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"The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not." --Thomas Jefferson didn't say it

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Man, I'm kinda bummed. I was in the top 2 or 3 all month and now I'm #22 in Newport Folk Fest channel. Drat!


"Let the beauty we love be what we do. There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground." - Rumi

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Juliana,

Better get some folks voting. I don't understand why you've dropped so much either. Your song is clearly better than most of the top 10. Maybe there's still a chance to pop back up.

Bill: Those aren't battles. Your number of plays should be fairly the same as all the other songs.. probably off by no more than 1 or 2 compared to any others entered around the same time as yours. I think they go through rotations of voting.

I am happy about a few shifts and disappointed by a few others (such as Juliana who's been at the top all month until the last 24 hours). I can't see how a song can be doing so well all month and then suddenly drop so low (down into the 40's). It seems a little odd to me.

Brian


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Hi Juliana, I voted for your song twice because it was better that the other both times. My song dropped from #22 in Newport to #177 in a few days. I don't get it either. I'll try again next month. Ben

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I still maintain that people are voting draws when there is a song clearly better. This could be just laziness, different tastes in music or possibly tactical. My song A waltz made for two is dropping and to be honest a lot of the songs placed above it are not deserved IMO. I fail to see the need for a draw. There must be something to separate two songs whether it be the arrangemnent, performance, quality of recording or artwork. I think the draw option should be stopped. I deliberately voted some songs the same to test this out and was surprised that a huge percentage agreed.

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If I hear two really bad songs, I usually vote draw. Why give either song a boost if they suck? I bet some feel the same about 2 songs that are really good. The odd thing that has happened in my judging is I rarely get one of the very best songs against one of the very worst songs. It's usually one of the best against another of the best or 2 of the worst.

Jim, are there any songs better than your UNDER your ranking? If so, then you have to say it balances out. I do know that a JPF member, Bob Sima, is all the way up to number 10 in the rankings and he only posted 2 days ago. It will be interesting to see if someone who enters that late can hold onto a top 20 spot. That would certainly suggest that you can enter any time and still make the top 20. I am the most surprised by the fall of Juliana's song so quickly after spending the whole month in the top 5. It seems odd that 1 day of voting could drop a top song all the way down into the 40's and that people suddenly and overwhemlingly started to vote against it, unless it's people trying to trash the top ranked songs on purpose.

Brian


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Originally Posted by Brian Austin Whitney


I am the most surprised by the fall of Juliana's song so quickly after spending the whole month in the top 5. It seems odd that 1 day of voting could drop a top song all the way down into the 40's and that people suddenly and overwhemlingly started to vote against it, unless it's people trying to trash the top ranked songs on purpose.

Brian


Brian,

I think it also might be a case of people really pushing their fans to vote in the last day. I'm guessing that people are voting "draw" or not listening to most of the songs that aren't the one they are looking for, y'know?

Maybe I'll still make my way back up. Who knows.

(Also, I vote the same way if both songs are equally bad. Draw.)


I'm curious about the effects of voting "by far" rather than "slightly more"... does that count more somehow with ranking? I wonder how that's calculated?

I'm also wondering why I've heard some songs more than ten times in battles when there are 403 entries in this channel!

Last edited by Juliana Finch; 04/23/08 05:58 PM.

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Originally Posted by Brian Austin Whitney
I am the most surprised by the fall of Juliana's song so quickly after spending the whole month in the top 5. It seems odd that 1 day of voting could drop a top song all the way down into the 40's and that people suddenly and overwhemlingly started to vote against it, unless it's people trying to trash the top ranked songs on purpose.


It looks like that happened to a number of us. In my case, my song didn't get any additional plays over the time it fell - so it moved because people were voting on other songs. Makes sense - it's a bowl of jello smile

Let me repeat myself that Ourstage is the best system I've seen. But I also think that any system can be gamed. I suspect with a few months experience, it would be possible to do enough experiments to figure out how to maximize your song's chances. I won't do so because that's not where my interests lie. But I do think it would be interesting to see what effect, if any, the following would have:

(1) Don't let people know where they stand. Or, maybe let them know where they stand but not where anyone else stands. This would eliminate the temptation to score songs above you lower than those below you.

(2) Do not allow to vote "same". I think Juliana has a point. It seems to me that if you rate your own song higher when it comes up (as rare as that may be) and rate every other battle equal, then you can maximize your song's rating.

(3) Require listens of 30 sec rather than 15. For people who enjoy listening to music, this isn't asking much. But it would probably lower the effect of gamers.

Again, none of us are privy to the algorithm they use. But there is one. And if there is one, it can be determined empirically. smile

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Quote


"(3) Require listens of 30 sec rather than 15. For people who enjoy listening to music, this isn't asking much. But it would probably lower the effect of gamers."




I think this is a great idea. 15 seconds can tell you some, but not much, about the overall quality of a song.


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Ironically I'm making those exact suggestions today to Daniel. (i.e. not having the Top 10 listed overall... but I have a twist on that.. because if you don't list the top 10, then what do people see when they want to hear good music.. I have an idea on that). The 30 seconds also may be effective in some ways, but would also likely drop the voting... it's clear that when you have 1000 or more songs in the running, they need a LOT of judging to cycle through the system and get credible results. We were on the phone most of yesterday it seemed discussion a lot of these issues and how to address them and we came up with a lot of ideas some of which will start being implemented next month. This is still a young company with a young model. They are tweaking it constantly to fix areas that can be improved.

I agree, it's impossible to have a "game proof" system. They certainly have one that CARES if they are gamed and is doing what they can to stop it. And that's far more than other sites with rankings and contests bother to do. They really WANT to find the best music.

Brian


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Originally Posted by Brian Austin Whitney
If I hear two really bad songs, I usually vote draw. Why give either song a boost if they suck? I bet some feel the same about 2 songs that are really good. The odd thing that has happened in my judging is I rarely get one of the very best songs against one of the very worst songs. It's usually one of the best against another of the best or 2 of the worst.

Jim, are there any songs better than your UNDER your ranking? If so, then you have to say it balances out. I do know that a JPF member, Bob Sima, is all the way up to number 10 in the rankings and he only posted 2 days ago. It will be interesting to see if someone who enters that late can hold onto a top 20 spot. That would certainly suggest that you can enter any time and still make the top 20. I am the most surprised by the fall of Juliana's song so quickly after spending the whole month in the top 5. It seems odd that 1 day of voting could drop a top song all the way down into the 40's and that people suddenly and overwhemlingly started to vote against it, unless it's people trying to trash the top ranked songs on purpose.

Brian


Brian I am sorry to disagree with you yet again. I am not talking a few dozen places I am talking hundreds.
You judge for yourself. Either I am way off beam here or there is a problem with the voting system when same is allowed. I suspect that the draw, to which you freely admit voting for, has a lot to do with bad placings. Think about it, if a whole stack are voted same same same then a heelava lot of song places are wrong especially in a large entry pool. I wish people would be honest and say that one song even marginally was better or worse than another. Or do only the really good songs count for anything. This practice of voting the same makes a mockery of the minor places and whole concept of the site. Everybody wants to see how accurately there offering is compared to others. It can be a great learning tool. But not if people do not vote fairly.
(Edit)
In the last two hours my song has dropped over two hundred places. That defies any logic except PERHAPS that all of a sudden a vote cast as anything other than same has had a devastating effect. I checked the first 10 songs and there has been a few changes as well. Some of these songs are in no way deserving a top ten place regardless of what method of voting is used. My forty years in the business tells me that. I have judged nearly two thousand battles and have heard most if not all of the songs. I know the difference between good and bad.

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I agree with all of Scott's suggestions, and I might add one more: enforce the minimum listening time even though you've heard it before.

Example, I judged a lot in folk, and since there were only a few hundred entries I eventually heard them all. But once you've done that, you can FLY through the judging, without having to listen to them at all. This allows the competitive types to quickly do what Juliana suggested, just judge "Same" over and over until you see the song you want to vote up. You could whip through dozens of match-ups in minutes. And Newport is another sparsely populated channel...maybe this is what's happening.

Still, I do see Brian's concern: as many votes as possible is a good thing.


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I've offered some serious adjustments in a call today to Daniel which would address 100% of the concerns of everyone involved. I think this open discussion is very helpful and I am happy that the site is willing to adjust based on real world usage. When you build a model for something you base it on how things SHOULD work sometimes without really understanding how things WILL work. It's hard to build in the awareness of cheating and intentionally bad judging to a system that is based on integrity and doing the right thing. But my years in the business and dealing with musicians in the US and Europe has taught me that there's a lot of desire to succeed which will allow folks to sell out their own integrity in order to win something or do well. Ourstage could be the perfect system ever, AS IS, IF and only IF people were honest. Then by the end of voting the songs that most people liked the best would succeed. But we all know that folks simply want to win regardless of how good their song is and just as much, don't want others to do well. So I have offered up a solution to that problem and a way to improve the enjoyment of the voting system AND to also bring more positive attention to the songs which win in a given month. We'll see what they think of those ideas. (I think Daniel is pitching them to the CEO as we speak).

The best part of all of this is that it's costing our folks nothing to participate and we're all finding cool new music and discovering artists we didn't know before. In addition, if you're smart, you're making direct contact (and personal, not generic form letters) to those who seem compatible with your own artistic visions. I think when you folks find an artist you really like, you should invite them to join us back here as well. Let's expand the network. We're bringing our people there, let's bring some of them back to us!

Brian


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That's very cool Brian.

Life is good when we can all be a part of something like this. It's especially nice to see any sort of organization actually respond to...well, anything. grin

I'll try to pull some people in the fold. There are a lot of good musicians out there.

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Yeah, very cool!

It would be fantastic if there was someplace one could go to get a realistic idea of where his/her music stood relative to that of other independent musicians. Ourstage comes closer than most and anything they can do to bring it even closer to this ideal (recognizing that it can probably never be fully met) is a good thing.

Thanks!
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Wow, that's great Brian & Daniel!
Glad to hear that OurStage (which is already very good) still has room for improvement. I think that's a great attitude and will likely help bring even more success and respect over time.

Re: The top 10 - 20 songs that are at the top of each channel during each live contest month could be hidden & replaced by the top 20 (in same channel) from the previous month whose contest has already closed. That way people can always hear the best songs while not having it sway their current voting for the next month's winners.

Just my first impressions without having fully analyzed the rest of the implications, but something like that might work.

Michael


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All kinds of JPF members in the top 20 and in the running for 5K still in a bunch of categories. Very cool!

Brian


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Has anyone else experienced hearing the same song 20 or more times and never hearing others??

After 200 battles, one of my fans *never* heard one of my songs but said he heard others many, many times. How does that work?


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Juliana,

I literally voted over 5000 times in the Newport Channel (we're in a holding pattern on the awards stuff, so I spent the day on conference calls and waiting for follow ups voting). Your songs came up quite a bit and certainly the appropriate number of times as any other. I think there's clearly some fan voting that is causing this.. people are intentionally trashing the top songs in order to move them down to give their favorites a better shot. So the fact you spent all month on top, you had a giant target on you. I did notice you finished in the Top 20 in another category. So focus on that and perhaps you'll win that channel. At this point, there's 190 possible votes in each category which if you finish, will match all the songs against all the others in the running. I've finished 2 categories already. In the Newport Channel, the entire top 6 are JPF members.

Brian


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That's awesome.

Now that I think about it, I think some of the top 20 have probably been in the category for awhile, too. I re-entered for May, so we'll see what happens.


I'm really enjoying the judging, too. I've already gotten in touch with some great musicians about playing together. So it's not like it's all for nothing!

It's a fun way to pass the time at my day job while I work on the computer. smile


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I can't access the judging while I'm at work .. IT'S KILLING ME!!
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My boyfriend's work recently blocked Pandora Radio (Why? NO idea.) so he's dying, too.

Personally, I can't work in silence.


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"Better get some folks voting..."

I've not really investigated the ins and outs of the site and its workings, but one of the reasons that I even uploaded anything was that I was under the impression that the system didn't reward the whole "get all of your friends to vote for you" thing, since I'm not really interested in doing that. Am I wrong?

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The system, if people vote fair, will always reward the best songs. The trouble is that humans will do anything they can to cheat anything. I offered some new ideas being discussed that if adopted, will further protect people from fraudulent (i.e. intentionally not picking the best songs) voting from working. These folks already do more to TRY and keep it honest.. but you have to stay ahead of the scammers and the idiots. It's a sad reality. But if you have fans who like your work, they should vote (and vote honestly) and it will likely help you out because any system of any type will obviously track people's preferences and if your fans are voting for you, you'll do better. The hope is that the other great songs ALSO do better.

I think if there were 10,000,000 voters in every channel.. then the fan thing would have little impact. But the site is new and growing and so I don't think it hurts to get fans involved. Hopefully they'll ALSO find other cool music they like and become fans of other artists. That's really the end point of all this. Finding great new music. I don't love ALL the songs in the top 20 or even agree with who made it, but I always find new songs I really like when I vote from artists I'd never heard of. Those are GREAT people for you all to network with and by voting, you'll hear them.

So, get out the vote.. for many good reasons.

Brian


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By the way, I can't get the Ourstage site to load.. anyone else having trouble?

Brian


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It's OK here, but someone else I know is having trouble. Probably a high server load.

Jillian and myself made it into the quarterfinals again with a co-write, "Red July", in New Age/World. We're very happy! I have a track in the Electronic genre as well, "Throwdown", which I think is really accessible.


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Originally Posted by Juliana Finch
Has anyone else experienced hearing the same song 20 or more times and never hearing others??

After 200 battles, one of my fans *never* heard one of my songs but said he heard others many, many times. How does that work?


Yes I have voted on nearly 2000 battles in rock and singer/songwriter and keep getting the same songs over and over. Some songs I have not heard YET. I make a habit of checking positions after I vote just to see their relevance to each other and whether I agree with the positions. There does not seem to be any logical reason for the same songs cropping up. I may add that some songs are way out of position IMO and are grossly over or under rated sometimes by several hundred places.


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Here's what Brian Bergeron at MySpace is asking his "loyal" fans to do at OurStage:
Quote
This is a call for help unlike any other. I know we've been in contest after contest this year but these opportunities are career changing for us, so if you want to vote, here's how:

1. Sign up for a FREE account on OurStage.com (takes only 1 minute).
2. Click judge up top and select (Radio929 Earthfest1st priority, or Newport Folk Festival2nd priority).
3. You have to listen to listen to each song for 15 seconds but once you listen to it once, you don't have to listen to it again!
4. For artists that aren't us, vote 'same' and when we come up, vote for us "by far". Also, vote against those that are ranked above us! You can see the rankings by clicking "Music Channels" on the homepage and searching for the channels that we're competing in!
5. It's easy! Enjoy some great music but make sure to vote for Brian Bergeron and The Late Greats.
6. Also, be sure to join our 'fan club' on OurStage.com and add us as a friend and 'favorite' our songs!

You can vote up to 190 times IN EACH CHANNEL, which I know seems like a long time but you only have to listen to each song once for 15 seconds. That means only 5 minutes to listen to ALL of the songs. If it takes only 5 seconds to click on each round then you can go through the WHOLE round of voting in less than 20 minutes.


Sort of a shame.

Kevin


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Yep
If you can't win on talent win on a scam. Cool. Just the kind of folks we all want our kids to look up to. A great roll model.

Of course you could turn that around and spend the time to vote AGAINST him


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If this is really happening they should be banned for life. They should start a campaign to expose cheaters on the Internet so everyone knows who they are. How would that be for a "career changing opportunity".

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Ben: I don't know about a lifetime ban, but I think a disqualification for this month is definitely in order. While it doesn't seem to be against any actual rules (yet), it does destroy the spirit of what OurStage is trying to do.

Although, if he did get banned for life, I guess you can say he deserves it.

Kevin


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I haven't researched any of the others but I would bet he is not the only one doing this. Word gets around pretty fast.


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This is a great case for eliminating the "Same" option.

I understand that sometimes you can't decide if one is better than the other...but if you HAD to, you could. And that would take away the effectiveness of this cheap ploy.

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I still don't understand the 15 second ruling.
If you are truly interested in judging I would think more time would be required. Some songs the intro lasts longer than 15 seconds.
I would think in the semi or quarter finals, even the finals more time should be spent.



Bill
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