How about something straight to the wire for a friendly mix off? Like, mmmm, The ccMixter Amen Breaks Mixoff!?

:-D

Being remixers, I’m guessing most people here have some idea of how central the Amen Break has been to the development of hiphop and techno.

Anyone wanna buy in?

*meow*

Quote: Being remixers, I’m guessing most people here have some idea of how central the Amen Break has been to the development of hiphop and techno.

Just in case someone *isn’t* familiar with the Amen Break:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wik...

The link about the history of the beat (at the end of the article) gives a very good overview and an great idea of how the break is used and abused. Though, I admit it gets a bit anti-copyright preachy towards the end.

*meow*

Honestly I’d like to see some production battling going on…I’ve seen some remix contests go very loose on guidelines and not really pan out though…but I’ve not seen a straight battle styled after hip hop emcees or turntablists, pitted against one another.

rapbattles.com is doing it but the focus there is more on lyrical styling than it is on production fundamentals.

I guess my basic outline for a battle would be

The same sample pack provided to the two artists paired off against one another.

Each producer has 1 week to download and put together a mix (with a time limit) based on that sample pack, incorporating sound production techniques, vocal samples to diss an opponent, etc…tracks are then posted and opened to voting.

Each winner would advance to the next round…

The winners can be treated a couple of ways…both producers could either

Depending on how many producers register for the contest has alot to do with how many sample packs would actually be needed

but essentially it would be NCAA March Madness style tourney a 32 or 16 producer tourney would approximately take 1 month to month and 1/2 start to finish.

- Winners are paired off and then must use the opponents sample pack(s) to mix against them. As producers progress through the contest they accumulate a larger and larger sample library to use against their opponent. -

anyway that’s the general idea…dialogue on this would be cool before anything is set in stone.

if we all do agree on a structure, the site may be able to support it in code to give it some structure.

so you see the pairing as random? is there a sign up sheet?

Hi. : )

Random pairing would probably be the most fair way to handle it. Let’s say 32 slots open and a bracket style competition. Everybody who joins is assigned a seed at random until all the slots are filled. It might easier to code it sequentially though. Think of it as fantasy sports with mp3 enabled uploads, streaming, and voting.

You’d have to expect that people would get their friends to vote for them, but it would probably be some good exposure for the site. Ideally you would want the interface for the bracket to be all on one page so that it’s easier for people (listeners and producers) to all be involved in the battle.

repbattles.com has something similar but people post links to thier Mp3s in a forum and you have to search through the forums to find their link (which isn’t always a direct link) then you have to find the other guy and locate his file then you have to go back to the forum and vote…it’s really tedious, which is why their final tally ends up in single digits. But if their was a link on the ccmixter main page for "CCMixter Producer Battle Bracket" and everything was done on that one page. The listener/voter turnout would be much better and the fact that the idea is so fresh would be an easy pr sell to other sites, source magazine, etc…How many simultaneous users can CCmixter servers support?

That’s great. I especially like the ‘all in one page’ approach, totally doable. Not worried about random seeding, also straighforward. Buddy voting is what it is, I’ll make sure to put a [!] (report a problem) link in every bracket to alert admins of a gross violation.

The server can handle a lot more traffic my code ;) Slashdot killed us and we have perf work scheduled but it just got deprioritized to make way for this crazy mixoff idea ;)

If my counting is correct and there are 32 brackets the winner will have submitted 6 remixes in order to win which seems like quite the commitment and the battle itself would last very long (months?) — making a whole remix is a little more complicated than dropping 12 lines

my personal preference would be to keep it down, at least at first, a mini-mixoff with 8 (or even four) brackets to see how the community repsonds.

Proposed entry/mixoff rules:
[list=1]
[*] You must have an upload to ccMixter in order to enter — 3 minutes of white noise doesn’t count, it has to be a substantial, usuable sample-able thing.

[*] In a mixoff itself, you must use at least one recognizable sample from your opponent’s uploads to ccMixter, plus one other sample from the site *

[*] Entries must be at least 60 sec but no more than 3 min (maybe 2:30) **
[/list]

* to encourage site digging
** The shorter the pieces the more likely people will sit through them and vote

The hardest thing for me to figure out is how long the entry windows should be. iow, how long do we give an entrant to come up with a remix? (don’t say an hour, this board isn’t exactly packed with unemployed 15 year olds). And how long should the voting period be? Longer for the first rounds since there’s more music to listen to?

Just to make progress let’s call them window1 and window2.

Proposed process:

[list=1]
[*]sign-up sheet is posted, open for a few days, entrants don’t know their slot until…

[*]slots are revealed, entrants have window1 to submit an entry

[*]Voting starts as soon as all entries are in, lasts for window2, votes are not published until polls are closed then…

[*]winners are revealed and paired up with other winner, they have to upload the next entry using samples from their new opponents

[*]repeat previous two steps until end
[/list]

Is this in line with how you pictured it too?

On a technical it occurs to me writing all this out that a mixoff should have a feed people can subscribe to so they are notified of every event that occurs.

VS

I wasn’t thinking 32 brackets (way too much)…I was thinking 32 producers… (4 brackets) 8 in each bracket. Total of five mixes for those who make final mixoff. The number of total mixes should be equal to the the power that two is raised to in order to reach the total number of producers. i.e. 2^5 = 32 total producers…5 mixes for the two finalists. If a round is completed in a week, you’ve got the whole competition complete in a month to a month and a half.

I like the idea to encourage the site digging using a sample from an opponent plus one other sample from the site. Excellent approach…

I’m thinking entry windows would be Monday through Thursday voting can begin once both entries for a mixoff are submitted…or Friday through Sunday. That way a round is finished in 1 weeks time. Each Monday the results and next opponent shows up on the
‘battle board’. Any other suggestions on time windows for entering vs. voting?

I’d expect the time limit on a mix entry should be no more than 2 minutes to 2min30sec tops…but definitely have to be at least a minute. 3 minutes is probably too long.

Questions:

Would a review forum be enabled where people can discuss who they voted for and why? (linked from the battle matchup?)

yea, ok, I mispoke, I did the same math but panicked and added one for good measure. Still 32 is a lot (I think) especially for the first one (32 * 2:30 = >1 hour of listening for voters) — My initial preference is to start much smaller so we can all wrap our heads around it — like maybe 16 or even 8 remixers — that’ll allow us to make adjustments quicker. If you don’t think that’s worth it we can try for the bigger numbers…

About 70% of our uploads are on the weekend, which tells me everyone is rushing home on Friday, mixing and uploading Sat. and Sun. I also know a lot of folks listen in their cubicles at work. It make sense to then have voting Mon-Thurs, then Thursday night reveal who advances and Fri/Sat/Sun is left for remixers with the new uploads, like you say, showing up on Mon morning.

The uploads are going to look like every other upload on the site, all the rating, reviewing features will be there.

The difference (I’m just riffing here) are they have a general ‘mixoff’ tag, a specific mixoff tag (e.g. ‘mixoff_jan_06’) and the winner will have a ‘mixoff_winner’ tag. They will be ‘unpublished’ (not visible to the public) until it’s time to vote. And of course they’ll be listed in the special new mixoff pages organized by bracket.

something like that…

VS

yeah 16 would probably be much more manageable…start off smaller for the first one and see how it goes.

Eventually I see this easily becoming ‘DMC championship style battles’ on the internet. Remix contests are going on daily…but all the listening and judging is offline…and nothing like a straight up battle style competition where the judging is all out in the open.

One way perhaps to lend some credibility to the voting would be to ‘invite’ some respected musicians/djays/producers to be judges and be a part of judging a bracket and posting a review of some sort…and have some judging criteria laid out.

I used to throw DJ battle contests back in the late nineties and the scoring categories were based on beat jugglin’, scratchin’, creativity + uniqueness, style, and delivery.

Having an established scoring criteria really helped to bring up the quality of the DJs mixes who battled…honestly the battles we threw…had more quality than some of the early DMC heats I’ve been too where you can tell the DJs competing put no planning or thought into their set whatsoever. I’ve seen cats show up to DMC battles thinking it was like Djaying at a friend’s party and you knew dude was totally out of his element. At our battles everyone came out with their ‘A’ game cuz they knew what the judges and crowd expected.

Some thougths 1-5 scale for each aspect
one low five high like current song rating system

Overall Production aesthetics 1-5
Beat mashing 1-5
Uniqueness 1-5
rhythm + timing 1-5
Melodic quality 1-5
Message 1-5

Total points overall wins the match. Making a point system is another way to lend some credibility to the overall voting…not sure if it’s doable. But an idea…

sorry to butt in, but just an idea,

the two finalist that go head to head, if they had enough mixes posted, can only use their oponents mixes and remixes to make their final mix, to be judged by the public,,,
that would promote both artists, as well as encourage real originality,


just an idea.

Quote: sorry to butt in, but just an idea,

the two finalist that go head to head, if they had enough mixes posted, can only use their oponents mixes and remixes to make their final mix, to be judged by the public,,,
that would promote both artists, as well as encourage real originality,


just an idea.

I think that was the general idea for every mixoff…unless you’re saying the two finalists can not use any other samples at all from the site.

This would kind of open up the can of worms of sample "ownership through posting" issues we may or may not want to…if they had sampled someone elses work for a remix then reused that same sample later would this be allowed or not?

For example could the "sampled portions" of my mixes not be used by my opponent because I it originally belonged to someone else who had posted the material or not?

This also reminds me of the question of the flute sample I used for ill majai…I gave Zikweb credit for it cuz I sampled his track to get the flute sample I used…but he had sampled the flute elsewhere. I’m not sure where he got it…but regardless I had sampled Zikweb’s track to get the flute so I credited him in the remix upload.

A good idea and good to think this all through before a contest is set up in stone…

of course all credit will be due in cases of sampling, but the oponents may only use eachothers
remixes, giving total credit to each artist would also promote the artists that were sampled..
hopefully making people and mixters look a little deeper at how much music is actually here at ccmixter.

Quote: Overall Production aesthetics 1-5
Beat mashing 1-5
Uniqueness 1-5
rhythm + timing 1-5
Melodic quality 1-5
Message 1-5


I think the key word in your post may be ‘eventually’ — for now just straight voting by ccMixter members - you pick which one you liked best of the two in a given mixoff, mixer with most votes advances — will have to do. (btw, you want to check out http://remixfight.org — just a small group of friendly mixers who mix it up every couple of weeks)

Quote: the two finalist that go head to head, if they had enough mixes posted,

I’m just not sure if that’s really "fair" if you (cdk) ended up against tru_ski (who has one uplaod as I write this) it seems like he would have a pretty huge advantage, no?

Quote: For example could the "sampled portions" of my mixes not be used by my opponent because I it originally belonged to someone else who had posted the material or not?


to be honest I read this three times and I’m still not 100% sure I know what you mean.

I think the "standard rules of engagement" on ccMixter, and Creative Commons in general, are just fine — if I download something from you and I sample it, I’m sampling you and give credit to you in the submit form. If you had sampled someone else, that’s kind of irrelevant. (Even if I’m using your previous bracket’s entry as my source.) If I’m not using the sample in an original way, I’m assuming the voting (and certainly the commentary) will reflect that and I’ll lose the mixoff.

Quote:
I’m just not sure if that’s really "fair" if you (cdk) ended up against tru_ski (who has one uplaod as I write this) it seems like he would have a pretty huge advantage, no?


Well if CDK ended up against tru_ski in the final Tru_ski would’ve had to submit four other mixes…total of five mixes for final to work from. But the point remains. 5 uploads to work from verses 20 uploads to work from is a vast difference in available material…and also limits how you can attack or diss your opponent.

Quote:
to be honest I read this three times and I’m still not 100% sure I know what you mean.

I think the "standard rules of engagement" on ccMixter, and Creative Commons in general, are just fine — if I download something from you and I sample it, I’m sampling you and give credit to you in the submit form. If you had sampled someone else, that’s kind of irrelevant.

Sorry, sometimes my posts get so long I don’t understand what the hell I’m saying. But you got it. You answered my questions. I agree with your assessment the whole site should be fair game at all times.

heh, not a problem.

And I would really encourage anybody and everybody to jump in here… I’d prefer to hash these things out before the coding part of the service begins.

1) I like the idea of a starting sample pack for the first round of face offs. It starts everyone in the same place and I like that. Perhaps a further limitation could be set in a theme? (Like say Amen Breaks, Chill Room, Rough and Raw, House and Bounce, etc.?)

2) Would we have a pair of mixers facing off for the final or would we do a best of four?

3) Perhaps the final round could require the mixers to upload any additional tracks or samples they drew from outside of ccMixter (in the public domain or otherwise accomodating to a CC license) or their own that they created/reused for the mixoff. Their opponents would then have to create a mix from what they used during the course of previous rounds. Thoughts? (I’m somewhat opposed to any requirements to remix an opponents track without source files as that heavily favors technical wizards and mashup mixers.)

4) I strongly favor a requirement to incorporate an additional ccMixter sample/track/acapella.

Regardless, count me in! I may not win, but I’d certainly have a lot of fun at this. I might even learn a few things along the way. ;)

*meow*

Quote: 1) I like the idea of a starting sample pack for the first round of face offs. It starts everyone in the same place and I like that. Perhaps a further limitation could be set in a theme? (Like say Amen Breaks, Chill Room, Rough and Raw, House and Bounce, etc.?)

2) Would we have a pair of mixers facing off for the final or would we do a best of four?

3) Perhaps the final round could require the mixers to upload any additional tracks or samples they drew from outside of ccMixter (in the public domain or otherwise accomodating to a CC license) or their own that they created/reused for the mixoff. Their opponents would then have to create a mix from what they used during the course of previous rounds. Thoughts? (I’m somewhat opposed to any requirements to remix an opponents track without source files as that heavily favors technical wizards and mashup mixers.)

4) I strongly favor a requirement to incorporate an additional ccMixter sample/track/acapella.

Regardless, count me in! I may not win, but I’d certainly have a lot of fun at this. I might even learn a few things along the way. ;)

*meow*

Regardless of whether it’s four or two left…the finalists should have a time extension 3 minutes.

Quote: Perhaps the final round could require the mixers to upload any additional tracks or samples they drew from outside of ccMixter

As the admin and self-appointed sample curator I love this idea because it will only add more cool stuff to the site. But… one of the main things I like about the way we’ve been talking about is that in order to participate in the mixoff a member of ccMixter doesn’t do anything a whole different than what you’re kind of already supposed to be doing (i.e. using samples from around the site and uploading) with the twist being you have to use a recognizable sample from one or two specific sources.

As to the rest, my gut feeling is to keep things loose and chill easy going. Not to be too dramatic about it but I don’t want to punish folks for making it to final round by making them do extra work.

Quote: 4) I strongly favor a requirement to incorporate an additional ccMixter sample/track/acapella.

A different one at every round? I think ok, makes it a little more for the mixoff moderator but that’s ok.

So at every level you have to:

1) Use a sample from your opponent
2) use a sample of the moderator’s chosing
3) non-final round entries must be between 1 min. and 2:30
4) final round entries must be 3min

Does this sound cool?

I won’t be ready to start coding for a while so we can hash/thrash a little longer if we have other ideas to float?

So at every level you have to:

1) Use a sample from your opponent
2) use a sample of the moderator’s chosing
3) non-final round entries must be between 1 min. and 2:30
4) final round entries must be 3min

Does this sound cool?

sounds perfect….

Quote: Quote: 4) I strongly favor a requirement to incorporate an additional ccMixter sample/track/acapella.

A different one at every round? I think ok, makes it a little more for the mixoff moderator but that’s ok.

So at every level you have to:

1) Use a sample from your opponent
2) use a sample of the moderator’s chosing
3) non-final round entries must be between 1 min. and 2:30
4) final round entries must be 3min

Does this sound cool?

I won’t be ready to start coding for a while so we can hash/thrash a little longer if we have other ideas to float?

If it would be a bit much work for the moderator to require a fresh sample from ccMixter each round, I’d understand completely. If it would be an acceptable burden, I believe it would really press the mixers to both show some skills and do some serious site digging. :)

The 4 "rules" sound great in general, but I will raise a concern someone else did that if a newcomer with one or two mixes goes up against someone like cdk, the newcomer would have a distinct advantage. If the opponents must use each other’s samples, there should be some minimum number of remixes/samples/acapellas uploaded to qualify for entry. In turn, this would concern me that some people might just "sample spam" to qualify. I’m not entirely sure how to balance the concerns. Thoughts?

*meow*

How about - use a sample from anyone entered besides yourself?

Quote: How about - use a sample from anyone entered besides yourself?

That is a very simple way to balance the concerns …. and absolutely perfect.

*meow*

I don’t think it’s huge deal for the moderator to have to come up with ONE sample (or archive) on the site per round, we’re talking about 10 minutes of browsing the site if they are effecient at all.

I just don’t want to lose track of the real reason to do this: FUN. Which bring me to:Quote:
teru wrote:
How about - use a sample from anyone entered besides yourself?


That is a very simple way to balance the concerns …. and absolutely perfect.

I guess — that just makes it seem all the more arbitrary to me (you know, more than it is under any circumstances) — it seem takes a little bit of the head-to-head part out of the fun, no?

Is it really that big a hurdle to say you have to use ANY recognizable sample from your opponent’s upload(s)? How about this: consider that most of the people who have uploaded a lot of things (pat, cdk, ashwan, teru…) would make for crazy opponent. I mean, are you saying you would PREFER to go up against them? pffft, not me… I would consider that a BAD draw ;)

Quote: I don’t think it’s huge deal for the moderator to have to come up with ONE sample (or archive) on the site per round, we’re talking about 10 minutes of browsing the site if they are effecient at all.

I just don’t want to lose track of the real reason to do this: FUN. Which bring me to:Quote:
teru wrote:
How about - use a sample from anyone entered besides yourself?


That is a very simple way to balance the concerns …. and absolutely perfect.

I guess — that just makes it seem all the more arbitrary to me (you know, more than it is under any circumstances) — it seem takes a little bit of the head-to-head part out of the fun, no?

Is it really that big a hurdle to say you have to use ANY recognizable sample from your opponent’s upload(s)? How about this: consider that most of the people who have uploaded a lot of things (pat, cdk, ashwan, teru…) would make for crazy opponent. I mean, are you saying you would PREFER to go up against them? pffft, not me… I would consider that a BAD draw ;)

Having more tracks/samples/remixes up does leave you more open to gettin yourself dissed hard in a mixoff…but on the other hand it does level the playing field somewhat if you do get that bad draw. I would agree with Victor’s assessment going up against one of the "senior mixters" might be a bad draw…but take it in stride. Honestly, I think not sampling an opponents work in a mixoff would be a mistake, perhaps too much of one to overcome.

I want to make this clear because I think shag and I are of one mind here:

- While on the face of it, it may seem "unfair" to get a draw against someone with few uploads, if you were to draw someone with a lot of uploads chances are they are a pretty decent remixer and on balance you may be sorry for what you ask for.

- a "mixoff" without head-to-head mano-a-mano sample trading seems like less fun that a more "anything goes" compromise

If it makes people feel better I could set it up so that in the first round you’d be matched with someone with "comparable" number of uploads rather than totally random. (Basically, I would sort by number of uploads on top of running the randomizer making sure the same two people weren’t matched up in multiple mixoffs.)

Forces at work here (in no particular order):

- everybody should have fun
- challenge the entrants
- promote the site externally
- promote good behavior on the site (uploads remixes or works sampled from the site)
- make the music and samples on the site better
- make the competition fair to everybody

The last point can be interpreted as "we are all subject to the same randomizing algorithm"

VS

Well if you include the "sample your opponent" rule, the one big up-side is, even if you loose, you still win. In fact a big reason for wanting to get to next round is you get to hear another remix of one of your own tracks.

Agreed. This will increase the fun factor. : )

But just to clarify, if someone were to face me for example . Can they sample the sources I used? Does that count? Or does it have to be based on the remix?

IMO that’s something that should be clear in the rules.

My understanding is anything that you’ve sampled is fair game…

1) the whole site is fair game anyway…

2) if B samples A and C samples it from B… it doesn’t matter where the sample came from originally becuase B was sampled by C and C didn’t sample it raw from A.

If that doesn’t make sense, it’s cuz it’s friday night and I’ve had a few glasses a cabernet…

#2 has to be the worst explanation of anything I have ever read. ; )

#1 was pretty clear.

yeah one day Ima wakeup and be one of those crazy, ramblin old men

Quote: But just to clarify, if someone were to face me for example . Can they sample the sources I used? Does that count? Or does it have to be based on the remix?

The idea is to sample YOU, it is not relevant if you sampled someone else. Your opponent has to use a recognizable sample from one of your uploads. That’s idea anyway.

I’m going to go ahead and assume shag’s #2 says the same thing.

Any updates cap’n? :)

Just had to ask!

*meow*

absolutely still happening other stuff, however has come up including a new contest about to start ;) so I had to stop working on it temporarily.

still on the todo list for sure, turned out to be quite a big feature btw, won’t go in for a while.

Quote: absolutely still happening other stuff, however has come up including a new contest about to start ;) so i had to stop working on it temporarily.

still on the todo list for sure, turned out to be quite a big feature btw, won’t go in for a while.

No problem. What’s been done so far is great. :)

I have some patience, so I can wait for the mix-offs. I don’t plan on going anywhere for a while, you poor SOBs. :-P

*meow*