EVALUATION GUIDELINES - SYSTEM "POPULAR VOTE":
The Songwriting Competition will adapt the so called "Popular Vote" system. Please get acquainted with the following paragraphs.
General Evaluation Guidelines
- The voting period will happen after the competition has ended (24 days). The voting phase is usually/roughly 5 days long, or until the 1st of the next month (see next point). The start of this process will be announced as part of a post with all collected entries. Please take note of the challenge time frames.
- Voting ends 23:59 UTC+1/CET or 23:59 UTC+2/CEST on each 1st day of the following month. Voting can end sooner, if all participants gave their final feedback and cast their vote before the end of the deadline. Results do not show up automatically!
- Each participant must(!) vote for ones personal Top 20 favorite compositions
- The voting positioning is in descending order (most-favorite position being No. 1 = highest points, proceed downward to the lowest position)
- If there are less than 10 entries, please proceed the same way (No. 1 position = 10 points, proceed downward to the lowest position)
- The ranking plus any received bonus points will effectively be summed together and result in a final numeric score. The top three highest scores declare the winners podium
- the Winners Podium size (itself) is declared by the participation amount
- 1-position Winners Podium -- if there have been eight or fewer (number: <=8) participants in the current running game
- 3-position Winners Podium -- if there have been nine or more (number: >=9) participants in the current running game
- if there are less than four (number: 4) participants, the Mix Challenge community staff will step in with additional feedback and a vote. An additional random-vote modifier is used. This is to add a bit more balance to the votes, especially if the participants collaborated in some form with each other
- In the case of equal scores after voting, entries will be separated by how many 10 points (or higher with more entries, i.e. how many No 1 votes) they received. Should they match up, then the next lower number will be counted. Unless one entry has higher votes.
- Important: it is mandatory for everyone to participate in the voting process. If you do not give final feedback and/or cast your vote, your entry will be disqualified from the final results
- No voting for yourself, if you do, your entry will be disqualified from the final results
- There will be no votes by non-participants. This is to prevent possible vote manipulation due to mass-vote-request outside of the forum community (rare exception: see above for less-than-4 participants)
- Please include the forum username of the composer and not just the composition name. This will help speed up the scoring process
- Giving final thoughts/feedback on the productions are mandatory. Even if you have already been active during the submission period. While this might feel foreign and uncomfortable to you, this user/participant back-and-forth stems from the idea to encourage interaction. You can learn how to give and/or receive, not to mention maintain constructive criticism. See what can be expanded/improved upon ones creation. Feedback to own productions is always wanted, but it's often left short on plenty of audio communities. Here, it's part of the game.
- please give constructive feedback to everyone. If the competition exceeds 20 entries, then you are free to only give feedback to your top 20 productions.
- your created Top 20 list should ideally have the backdrop upon "technical flaws" rather than personal issues with a certain instrument, genre or (worst case) even the participating person.
- please be objective and encouraging, have a focus on the overall production and technical stuff. For example: "please look out for possible issues in the following frequency ranges", or "while this is a great melody, and unless it was planned this way, some notes might clash with the chord progressions. Maybe shift some notes around a bit on time-stamp 0:00min". Maybe even "I like these vocals, but maybe consider adding a bit more reverb to let them fit better into the production".
- Please do not be averse to doing the voting process. In order to be able to address bonus content (software/sample licenses), we need to have a mechanic that declares a Winners Podium in a fair manner. It is fine having a momentary personal ranking at the time of your post. Please always remember: Everyone joining the Songwriting Competition is a winner - you are not worth less by getting an overall lower score on the score sheet.
- Vote Results will usually be posted about 48-72 hours after the voting period has ended - this is not an automated process
Voting examples
Assuming we have 15 participants, that means that each participant can vote for 14 tracks except his/her own. In case of less than 10 participants, the chart will be truncated accordingly of course (example: 7 participants, 6 places can be given, with values from 10 pts to 5 pts)
A Top 20 list (or in case of the example, top 14) can look something like this:
01 (14 pts) - Mr Moon
02 (13 pts) - Mr Sun
03 (12 pts) - Mrs Venus
04 (11 pts) - Mr Mars and his companions
05 (10 pts) - Mr Hale-Bopp
06 (9 pts) - The Rings of Saturn
07 (8 pts) - Mrs Gaia
08 (7 pts) - Cassini–Huygens
09 (6 pts) - Mr Pluto (I feel sorry for you)
10 (5 pts) - "Planet Nine"
11 (4 pts) - Alpha Centauri
12 (3 pts) - Proxima Centauri
13 (2 pts) - Barnard's Star
14 (1 pts) - Wise 1049-5319
A Top 7 list can look something like this:
01 (10 pts) - Mr Moon
02 (9 pts) - Mr Sun
03 (8 pts) - Mrs Venus
04 (7 pts) - Mr Mars and his companions
...
Please cast your vote in "hidden form". This feature has already been implemented into the forum in the form of the spoiler text bbcode.
Code: Select all
[spoil]
Position 1: participant C
Position 2: participant H
Position 3: participant B
...[/spoil]
This would result in the following block of text:
► Show Spoiler
Position 1: participant C
Position 2: participant H
Position 3: participant B
...
Bonus Point Mechanic
Participants of the Songwriting Competition can score up to thirty (number: 30) global bonus points on the score sheet for the following situations
- 1 bonus point for properly naming your files (file consistency) and making them downloadable by the time the deadline has ended, or up until the "submission summary" has been collected and posted (usually happening between 6-12 hours after the submission period has ended)
- 2 bonus points each (up to 4 points max) for submitting a mix equal or lower than -14,0 LUFS ILk (+-0 LU Integrated) and -1,00 dBTP max -- if you only got 2 points, your track either exceeded -14,0 LUFS ILk or it clipped ( > -1,00 dBTP max).
- up to 5 bonus points for properly documenting what equipment was used during the production (you don't have to go into super detail regarding plugins per channel), and what your idea behind the production was
- up to 20 bonus points for creating your "top 20 entries" during the voting process (part of the "Winners Podium" mechanic to get a chance to win bonus software licenses). One point per participant. If there are less than 20 participants, then only as many points as there were entries, excluding your own (example: 12 participants, then 1 point per vote, result: 11 bonus points)
You can also loose points (-5 points each) however. One example would be, if you missed the deadline of the voting process, but you still post your feedback/vote within the first 24 hours of going over the clock.
The "Bonus Point Mechanic" offers an additional dynamic to the game, where "not adhering to given rules" does not result in instant disqualification (only exception: not voting for ones personal Top 20), but instead offers an incentive to pay attention to detail. Sometimes one missing extra point can have a drastic influence on the final score sheet.
IMPORTANT: The winners of a corresponding competition might be considered for a future challenge on the community forum. The winners might also be presented in a possible future Podcast. It is recommended to all participants to practice good editing/workflow techniques for potential follow-up projects.
General questions and feedback, rule debates, praise and harsh/negative criticism, shall please be addressed in the
Gossip forum section in order to not derail the competition thread.