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Since the topic came up in the Revision thread where it doesn't belong (thanks Gargaj for reminding us):

<AceMan> Please don't allow using the same content in exe and msx/gfx compos. It's fucking lame.

<dojoe> what AceMan says. I don't like that at all; it feels like cheating others out of their chance at a prize.

<jazzcat> Most ppl vote during the compos, so I can't see how this is a problem? Also - it happened many times in the past and no one ever complained. Go on and tell Moby that he is "fucking lame", because he won TP'93 music compo with Arte soundtrack…

<Triace> Regarding the issues Aceman brought up I say I can understand both sides. But it just feels somehow wrong with me to recycle demo assets to fill other compos. Been there, done that, but I wouldn't do it again. My personal opinion is: you either make a track for a compo or you make a track for a prod. Filling up the compo if there are enough other entries for a decent competition just grabs the spotlight from the other tracks composers worked on hard exclusively for the compo and in the worst case, causes preselection on exclusively written music. Additionally it may spoil things to come in the later demo compos.

<Dascon> added on the 2016-03-28 21:52:21 by gaspode gaspode
Eh, not to be taken wrong, but.. If demo stuff is being spoiled by its music being used in other, previous compos.. It is more a disadvantage for that demos maybe than an advantage the other way round, no? 😉

<yzi> No. Exactly the opposite. Demos should have good groovy listenable music. I don't like unlistenable music in demos. I'm all for demo sound tracks that work in music compos as well.

I think asking for more content disallowing rules is lame. What is it that you'd like to achieve with that anyway.

<Saga Musix>

It goes the other way around - people entering a tune / image they already composed / pixelzed for a demo into a music / graphics compo. That doesn't make the demo soundtrack worse.


It's not about spoiling each other, but rather claiming two trophies for the same thing (which didn't happen this year as far as I'm currently aware but did in previous years).

Plus, I really don't need to hear the same tune or see the same pixels twice at the party.

<Dascon> Come on, I was forced to hear several stuff like a hundred times the last three days and did stand it. Though I guess I will miss the compo jingle to orrow at the office a bit. 😂

<yzi> So you are asking for _rules_ for preventing you from getting bad feelings, displeased with a demo or a song or something? There's this thing called "voting" where people usually tend to channel their feelings if they got bad vibes from prods. Don't vote if you didn't like it. You have a problem with that? Not powerful enough, you need organizers to set rules?

<AceMan>
Ok, maybe " lame" was a little too harsh. I wrote that post during pc demo compo, while watching that awesome unity demo using tune previously played in streaming msx. I got upset (again) and decided to brag about it.

It has been discussed before among people, but i believe nobody said it out loud. I think it's time. Didn't I told you about it before? I should.

As for "why" - what Triace and Saga said.

<Saga Musix> To clarify once more: There is a rule against releasing demos into compos that have already been released in the past. Would you argue the same way that this rule is not needed and "voting should just fix it"? If a large part of the assets of a demo is reused (and I consider already a single soundtrack alone or an iconic still image to be large) at the very same party, I just find it pretty lame and an obvious attempt to just win more compos. This has nothing to do with me feeling bad about a demo - in fact I like all demos at this year's Revision that have content shared in other compos in all other aspects. Why not just be creative and make two entries if you want to enter two compos?

<yzi>

So. Someone made a good song for a demo, and the song is so good that it's actually better than someone else's "proper" music compo entry. The demo song however must not be entered in the music compo, because then the less good song won't be played?

To me it is just obvious, and a scene tradition, to use a demo song or picture in the separate music or graphics compos, as long as it's on the same party. It's "released" only after the party. What is the problem with this. Someone makes a mind-blowingly superb picture. You must choose if you want to put that in a demo or the graphics compo!?? That would be dumb.

IMO, the ultimate thing for a musician or graphician is to both win the music or graphics compo AND have the same piece as part of a winning demo at the same party. Home-run, bullseye.

Yes. It's called "leave some for the others".

I propose a 1.5 x normal sized glöp for opening this thread, and showing responsible scene citizenship.

My reply in the Revision thread: (hey, I'm committing self-quoting?? I guess that must be as bad as self-voting, or masturbation, which proper sceners never do of course)

I don't see any need for banning re-use of assets. Such assets will for sure even get their full score for the music/gfx compo. But it will make the demo feel less like a whole thing as people will recognise that music/gfx and kind of mentally subtract it.

"Leave some for the others."

Nice idea. Like in junior football, everybody gets to play for a little bit. Let's make that a rule in the Champions League. ;)

Is the problem really about (a) not getting your song played because of not getting through jury preselection, or (b) having too many songs in the compo and not being able to stand out, because there are too many entries?

If it's (a) then complain to the jury about their musical taste, and save your entry for some other party.
If it's (b) then complain to the organizers for lack of preselection.


The thing I am against is, releasing songs or pictures or demos that didn't get shown or played, because of jury preselection. If it's not shown on the big screen, you just get more time to finish it and enter it to some other compo. Releasing disqualified entries is like throwing away people's hard work.

Ok so just render all your demos to video and enter them into the animation compo. Then make screenshots and enter them in the gfx compo. Demo soundtrack is a tiny tracked one which is entered with a small player in the executable music compo aswell as in the tracked music compo. And then render everything to MP3 and enter it in the streaming compo...

Yeah, let's allow the Champions League Clubs to play Euro League, too, because they also qualified for that ;)

There's probably no need to have banning. The stigma attached to winning without putting in the effort should be bad enough.

RbR: I'll buy you a beer and quit the scene when that starts to be a problem.

don't see any reason why this should be banned.

yzi: Scene tradition? I see it mostly being done by a small number of people being done consistently over the years, I wouldn't call it a tradition.


You also must choose if you want to enter your demo at Revision 2016 or Assembly 2016. I know it used to be different years ago and the same prods have won the compos at more than one party. Progress doesn't hurt.

I entered the soundtrack to our demo compo entry in the music compo at @Party last year. To be fair, the demo used an abridged version of the track with over a minute of content cut out, and I just wanted to get the full version out there. I still felt like a chump for doing it though; don't think I'll do that again.

Graphics entries are a different thing IMO; if you put a ton of work into a pixel painting it deserves its time in the spotlight rather than five seconds on-screen during the demo. I don't have a problem with that.

"Too many entries in compo"... I think that would be a fantastic problem to have. I'd LOVE to see the day when a party actually has too many entries in a compo. I would be delighted. Check the music compos from Assembly 1995. I'd guess nobody thinks 1995 was a bad year for the demoscene.

Scene.org only seems to have 200+ something entries in the multichannel music folder. I think there were 700? I have the CD-ROM somewhere, and IIRC it has all of the "interesting" works of art.

Saga Musix: honestly, I have always thought it to be a virtue, something to strive for, to make a song that wins both the music compo and the demo compo. Always. Well ok, since 1993 or thereabouts.

Jester's Cyberride, from Pygmy Projects' Extension demo, is one of the best songs ever, not just tracked songs or demoscene songs, just one of the best songs. And it was a demo song. You may have noticed, many of my own songs are structured like that. For example, "Samplepack Disco 2012" and "Ben Johnson Milk Energy Big Band and the Texas Chainsaw Massacre", soundtracks for hypothetical oldskoolish demos. Or "Zoo- ja zorkkatauti", which was actually used in a demo and music compo at the same party. Same style. I don't intend to change that, and don't see a problem.

That's your opinion. It can be simply a question of time. There are 4 music compos at Revision and making a brand new song for each demands lots of work. (How many musicians managed to cover all competitions in the whole history of Revision?) If releasing demo asset was forbidden, I probably wouldn’t find time to make a new track.

Just my 2¢ on it. I don't really mind if people do it, as long as it's not everyone doing it and the majority of a demo isn't broken up and submitted to other compos (soundtrack and all the graphics). If it's one or two people in a compo of at least about 10 songs or so, there's plenty of other "original" content. I really only go "Oh, I've heard this before" for the more noticeable ones when they come up in the demo compos, like Jazzcat's track. I think that's because it was perhaps more memorable than the other ones.

Regardless of whether you are fine with people doing this, or want to ban it, there is a bit of an issue in banning it I think that nobody has really touched upon yet (or I missed it): pre-selection killing all chances of an entry. Hypothetically let's say there was a rule preventing entering a soundtrack from a demo in a music compo. An artist has a great song, they wrote it for a demo, and their group feels their best shot is to release the demo as a whole. Then, the music compos pass, and up come the demo compos. Turns out, their demo got preselected out. Now what? You can't submit it to the music compos, as they passed. Even if not, their deadline likely would have passed. You could submit it to another party, but maybe this is the only one they can visit this year or the one they really wanted to have their work released at.

Rule or no rule, you're going to have issues either way: people annoyed at someone "trying to get paid twice for the same job" or those who feel their best chance at some award might be two submit it to two compos.


Finally, I'd like to echo that I really really really doubt that anyone would

Why wouldn't they? because at that point it'd be cross-posting spam and I think that's a step most people would feel is a step too far to do. Also I think that organizers would preselect, in such compos that do, those entries as it would become obvious what they'd done. Even worse for the submitters, it's possible that even without a rule prohibiting it the organizers would then decide not to show the demo that contained the originals to quash the behavior.


In short, I think it's not that big of a deal unless many people do it and often. It doesn't seem to be causing any harm at the moment. Is there solid evidence of harm? I don't think there's even any evidence people intend to ramp this up and cause harm in the future either, but I'm open to reasonable proof.

Yes, it is my opinion, and this thread and also comments on IRC indicate that I share it with quite a few people.


So?

Please list even a few offenders, and what harm they caused.

It's not my intention to call out people.

Oh yeah, Blueberry used the same effects in the shader showdown. Against demoscene spirit. Re-using the same thing in more than one place. It's not fair.

If that's the only argument you (general you) can bring, I'm outta here.

yzi, I don't think that's against demoscene spirit. People have ripped stuff since the beginning. ;)

@Saga Musix, I do kind of see the point. Do I have this right that you'd prefer there be more original work in the compos and that releasing in a compo be counted as prior art when doing the qualifications for other compos? Also that it would be dishonest to attempt getting two awards for the same work?

I think above to those points, I've noticed a possible issue in my post where if multiple entry was forbidden someone could end up with no attempts for any awards, and not for lack of trying. Perhaps if such a rule were implemented, if deadlines could be so adjusted, someone could be notified if their entry to a particular compo was not going to be shown in time to be able to submit a part to a different compo. Thus removing the possibility of having a good song, but an ok demo, and not being tied to the demo if it were not going to be shown. Alternatively perhaps submitting something to a compo contingent upon it not being submitted as part of something else with automatic removal after acceptance of the other, but this requires more work for the orga's and or improvements to PartyMeister.

As to the shader showdown, I don't think it's quite the same thing... since people have to spend time and effort on stage to do their work in a very different manner from the usual compo entries. We get to see a breakdown of them doing it, and it's far from copy and paste.


Oh, and I think bringing up the effect level of granularity isn't a good "slippery slope" argument to make since that's not what they set out to fix. They're not after ensuring you can't use riffs from a soundtrack ever again, or an effect used in some prior demo in a new one, etc, which someone might claim would follow from adding the prior discussed rule. Honestly if you spent the time to remix an image or soundtrack for release in the appropriate other compo, I think that would be quite fair game to do in addition to the demo compo entry.