15 Years of MIDIs!

[Yaginuma]

Today (December 19) is the 15th anniversary of the founding of the Video Game Music Archive! Our new-files keep streaming in. Thanks for the continued interest and support! This coming year, we'd like to build in user feedback on songs to help us review new submissions, as well as quality check our existing files (point our songs assigned to incorrect games, etc.). Currently pondering the best way of doing this. Twitter? Google Plus? Google Docs? Facebook? Surveymonkey? One possibility is to have a "song of the day" and have the community give feedback, then the next day the song is approved or notification is sent back to the submitter for correction. Let us know what you think would work best. Another possibility is build a mobile app (Android and/or iOS) and let people rate songs and give feedback interactively. This could even be turned into a game (multiple choice name the song). If anyone has experience if making music apps, please let us know.

[TurquoiseStar]

Building in user feedback is a fantastic idea. I'm not the best person to think up suggestions, but my thought is that maybe each MIDI has a link next to it which goes to a page where people can comment and maybe even rate.

As for updates, I'm not sure about that one.

[DrZaius]

Do all of the things!

[TurquoiseStar]

There was one other suggestion, which I mentioned on the IRC, but I'll post it here too, and that is to have a way for everyone to hear a MIDI if it is in XG, etc.

[Kiopineapple]

(Unimportant) Oh wow. This site was made when I was 2... O_o

[solis]

Do all of the things!

Pretty much this. Making it open to people of all spectrums is the best way of action.

Also, happy 15th birthday to the site.

[Yaginuma]

So far I looked into a couple avenues:

Twitter: No one really seems to be paying attention to the @vgmusic twitter account.

Google Plus / Google +1: I found a way to add +1 buttons for every new and existing midi, but there is no way automatically create and link to a comment thread.

phpBB: Looks like a script could be put together to automatically create a new thread of conversation (and polls) per song. I'll just need some time to implement it (unless someone out there is a good PHP coder and can offer me help).
http://phpbbmodders.net/articles/3.0/create_post/
http://www.phpbb.com/community/viewtopi ... 1&t=574199
http://wiki.phpbb.com/Using_phpBB3's_Basic_Functions

Ultimately, I'm looking for a like/dislike voting system (and other poll questions if possible) per song, and also comment thread so people can supply other comments. A reddit.com subreddit would be ideal. But would it make sense to post each song as a subreddit story?
http://www.reddit.com/buttons/

[DrZaius]

Wouldn't using Youtube simplify some of this? I think, if not for every sequence being added, there should still be some kind of official vgmusic.com youtube account that can help advertise the website.

If you're going to use Reddit, try a weekly thing. Every Sunday, put up a post with all the latest sequences being added or something? Or maybe there could be an e-mail list people can join for weekly newsletters with updates on what's been added.

[Bahamut X]

Whatever you decide to choose for rating new midis, I definitely want to help be a part of it, at least for the game music I know

What about existing midis? I've been listening to MIDIs from the website off and on from work using the XG midi plug-in, and sometimes I'll notice that some titles are named incorrectly or are listed multiple places. If there was a simple way to help change or make a log, I'd be happy to help with that too as I listen to music here

[Bahamut X]

So far I looked into a couple avenues:

Twitter: No one really seems to be paying attention to the @vgmusic twitter account.

Google Plus / Google +1: I found a way to add +1 buttons for every new and existing midi, but there is no way automatically create and link to a comment thread.

phpBB: Looks like a script could be put together to automatically create a new thread of conversation (and polls) per song. I'll just need some time to implement it (unless someone out there is a good PHP coder and can offer me help).
http://phpbbmodders.net/articles/3.0/create_post/
http://www.phpbb.com/community/viewtopi ... 1&t=574199
http://wiki.phpbb.com/Using_phpBB3's_Basic_Functions

Ultimately, I'm looking for a like/dislike voting system (and other poll questions if possible) per song, and also comment thread so people can supply other comments. A reddit.com subreddit would be ideal. But would it make sense to post each song as a subreddit story?
http://www.reddit.com/buttons/

I think you could do something simple like a reddit, a small icon to vote a song up/down with a current score next to it. Probably a key question is do you want to have it generate a forum thread to talk about the song or not? I do see the cool factor to talk about a song, but with how many midis are on the site, that would be tons of threads. Perhaps you could set it up so that a midi only has a thread if someone votes on it or have another side button like "start discussion".

I really like your idea to give this website new life. Maybe you could look to other music websites too for ideas like ocremix or 8bc.org (I love 8bc.org).

[shalpp]

If an Android app is made I'm hoping for soundfont support. Listening to MIDIS on Android kinda sucks with a snare that's barely audible.

[luigi127]

Why not making it on facebook as a music guessing game?

[Merit Celaire]

But isn't there a Quality Control section of the VGMusic staff, if I'm not mistaken? If situations call for it in terms of user feedback, maybe more folks interested for that part of the process can join in as well. I do agree we need improvement on what gets in officially and what gets rejected.

[asharca]

I was a fan of the Final Fantasy VI MIDIs myself. I am very happy for find 15th birthday to the site.