This thread will be dedicated to all what is related to Renoise contests.
Post here all your questions / remarks / suggestions / ideas / links / whatever: it’s a brainstorming!
Here are a few examples below.
Who can vote? Contributors? Non-contributors? Both?
Who can win? Contributors who vote? All contributors?
Random winners? Winners by points?
VST allowed or All native? Free VST? Paying VST?
XRNS for extra points?
Speed compo? Mutant Breaks? Remix Contest? Other?
Do we need to make some noise on other social networks?
Do we need to find sponsorships to have bigger prices?
Duration for contest? Duration for voting? Once per year?
I think whoever starts a contest can put whatever parameters, rules, or restrictions on it they want. If someone wants to make a contest, they should make a contest! There’s really nothing holding anyone back… and the more contests/competitions/collaborations, the better, imo.
If I were to organize then extra points would only be given to incentivize people for voting, giving reviews and providing the XRNS. I’m sure we all have different opinions on this so as MrZen says it’s up to the organizer really as anything is better than nothin but plz try make people vote.
I’d simply do something like this:
Votes are hidden until deadline
To incentivize voting participants who vote gets +3 points
Providing XRNS gets +2 votes
Reviews of your Top-5 gets +2 points
There would be a few awards for “Best mix”, “Best drums” to vote for?
If anything, I think MBC (especially) should be all about the renoise.
If we’re going to have competitions based solely on the merit of the song, great. But MBC (at least as I see it) is kinda like a family reunion or yearly check-in for sharing knowledge and xrns’s
but, again, this thing isn’t monolithic. I’ve only been running em because no one else was and it had been a few years (I think?) between MBC 12 and 13. So, anyone could take it over as far as I’m concerned and we could start on MBC 15 today if someone felt inspired. It is traditionally the most disorganized comp, and I’d hate to break with that tradition
AND, other/more song contests/competitions would be dope
The original, official, Renoise competition was called: BeatBattle.
The last one was BeatBattle 5. Theme: Underwater. In 2007. Roughly 16 years ago.
Disclaimer: I was a huge pain. A combination of troll, drama queen, and on the team. The origins of MBC were me putting my own prizes into BeatBattle competitions so that breakcore would win something instead of (what I considered at the time) cheesy tracker music.
It took so long to run a BeatBattle, with lots of web development time on elaborate custom branded voting websites, so the first MBCs were a reaction to these. I thought that it would be funnier if there was no voting system instead I’d just use celebrity judges to pick music I liked, no website just a thread.
Later a worse voting system where everyone voted on each other with surprise random elements and participation points became the standard. (because I was a new dad and too lazy to work on these now). Anything to spite the original BeatBattle format, favour breakcore derivatives.
Eventually I was so out-of-touch that people did the contest for me. MBC somehow became the Renoise contest, but in the process it pushed away some of the original contributors with nonsense that I brought to the backstage.
The SDCompo type of contest was great in my opinion so:
Who can vote? - Contributors only (and they have to give a vote)
Who can win? - Contributors who vote
Winners by points? - Yes (every contributor picks 5 favourite tunes and gives them 5 different scores from 1 to 5, the rest receive 0 obviously). That baby picks up a random winner was the most demotivating thing ever, sorry
All native, samples and theme (and maybe even a genre) should provide the contest owner
Do we need to make some noise on other social networks? - If they are related to tracker music then why not
Do we need to find sponsorships to have bigger prices? - The Wall of Fame is more than enough (bonuses are extra)
Duration for contest? Duration for voting? Once per year? - Once per year for the big contest (The Renoise Official), once per quarter for the small ones. Speed compos are great too, they were used to be on IRC, not sure if the IRC still up or people have moved to discord)
Renoise only (providing the xrns is mandatory for evidence)
VSTs are allowed
Samples are allowed except loops (like breakbeats)
Only participants can vote and voting is mandatory (1st place 5 points, 2nd place 3 points, 3rd place 1 point),
Voting for yourself is forbidden and those who don’t vote will be disqualified
Votes are hidden until deadline (voting via PM)
5 bonus points for reviewing every single song (just a few words, no novel)
The one who receives the most points wins
Every participant has to contribute something to the prize pool, which is the entrance ticket to the competition at the same time, and the winner takes it all
Special prizes for side quests like “Best mix”
I think this is quite the opposite of MBC, but that’s how I imagine a competition within a community just like this forum. MBC remains an event for those who adore Breakbeat, Breakcore, any other breaks and loops, (Renoise) tracker nerdism and native sound design.
Has anyone been on battleofthebits? It’s a solely an informal competition website for uploading different audio and image formats. Here’s some points we could either adopt or reject:
No physical prizes (just bragging rights. Users get badges next to their user names)
format restrictions
separate “format” competitions that have greater flexibility (i.e. use of plugins)
Themes
Contests that involve “bitpacks” that limit competitors to only a given set of samples
voting isn’t monitored. Any user can vote or not, regardless of whether they are competing.
voting categories are usually nonsensical (and again category winners still only get bragging rights)
This is purely for discussion purposes, I’m not saying we should try to copy this. However I like the idea of have competitions that get everyone to work with the same samples, or having to include a particular sample or .xrni. Personally I’m not here to win anything, just to learn, so I couldn’t really care about prizes.
Very interesting things here.
I like the idea of one contest per quarter by @stoiximan.
I also understand the MBC spirit, as explained by @Conner_Bw.
There could be 4 contests per year:
Mutant Breaks Unorganized, random winners, fun/weird themes, the thing we know.
Mutant Breaks Remix Compo Based on the previous MBC, could be everything we want while there are obvious references to the remixed tracks. This has been done for the 2 last MBC and I hope for a 3rd opus in 2023.
All Native In this one, no VST, but should include a mandatory sample pack. I think there has been such a contest a few years ago.
TechNoise (name given as example) In this one, there would be each year a very restrictive rule, like: exactely 3 minutes, max 4 columns, exactely -14 LUFS, odd signatures, make FM synthesis inside Renoise, make granular synthesis inside Renoise, use random LFO everywhere, and so on…
You suggest 4 contests, but most things you mention here should be part of “All Native” (native sound design) or MBC (odd signatures etc.). And why -14 LUFS? Is anybody interested in posting this stuff on Spotify? If you ask me loudness doesn’t matter. Imagine a beginner without a clou would like to participate… And let’s face it, a tune which is shorter than 3 minutes is not a song. Personally I clearly would prefer a contest without nerdy restrictions like 4 columns max. Instead I would prefer some given themes in terms of music, just like the cat theme in MBC14. It’s only about the music!
I tried to imagine 4 completly different contests.
I’m myself not interested with technical hard challenges.
But some here could be interested, I don’t know.
And there is still a very complex point over all that:
How to find 4 (un)organizers to (un)organize all that?
All Native In this one, no VST, but should include a mandatory sample pack. I think there has been such a contest a few years ago.
I would be very up for this. It would be great to see the entries’ .XRNS and how they mangled and manipulated the original samples to their liking! I also appreciate though that it would take more effort upfront to create a samplepack.
I think having everyone contributing to the prize will limit participation and having more compos per year will dilute participation and we’ll end up with fewer than 10 participants. So one or maybe two compos per year will be ideal I think and prizes can be as simple as a virtual trophy you can use for a bit of instagram action.
@Garf
Maybe you’re right, furthermore I assume there aren’t enough people who are currently creating music AND watching this forum now and then AND are interested in partcipating. And those who are posting now and then prefer different styles and different approaches of composing, therefore the expectations for a competition differ, too. But nevertheless I think no one gets hurt by contributing around 2-3 € to the prize pool for having some fun and doing something nice. Even if there were only 10 participants the prize could be a good VST like this. Of course the prize could also be nothing but glory and honor. Anytime. Which is cool, but I think it’s cooler to get glory and honor and a good VST or a shirt or whatever. And to be honest, I personally think it’s even more fun to give than to receive. You could experience both within one competition.
Those who want it have to work for it, otherwise it won’t happen. It’s as simple as that,
Hope we are going to have two compos going forward because the old MBC is dedicated to craziness which I won’t partake in anymore, too old for that, I just want a regular compo where it’s about the music and Renoise.
