Production forum IS a place for feedback (again)

[legend4ry]

After much back and forth discussion - we've started back up WIP's thread.. Please use it well and don't let me see it just being used for 3 - 1 sentences comments so you can get feedback.

- Legend4ry.

[-[2]DAY_-]

This is the way it always ought to have been

Production and Dubs/Feedback should be VERY closely linked
I don't really feel like i have the clout to say this, but its true... there's a lot of nonsense on Dubs, and some great stuff gets overlooked/overthrown by more shit. Would be nice to see more familiar faces on it regularly and lose the feedback traffic on this forum.

[badger]

yeah the idea is to try and revitalise the dubs forum. it used to be fantastic and it's gone a bit shit lately as i'm sure you've all noticed but i think we can turn it around. it's a great community in production so let's get the same over in dubs with everyone helping each other with feedback etc

there are direct links between the forums in the rules section at the top of the forums now so you can quickly navigate between them

if anyone's got any ideas for improvements then please let us know and we'll see what we can do

[dubmatters]

....

[paravrais]

It's
About
Time.

That's all that needs to be said really.

[Ongelegen]

[deadly_habit]

good riddance

[3za]

Yes, most, if not all of you will be a bit pissed off

So why do it then?

Them feedback threads worked, here is what I liked about them;

1. Everyone was guaranteed feedback.
2. People who would not normal leave feedback would have to, if they wanted to receive feedback.
3. It was a place for producers to discuss their work amongst themselves.
4. Some of the new posters in the production forum start posting in them threads, and are now active members in the production forum.
5. They were some of the busiest thread in the production forum. getting to 30+ pages a month, even threads of people bitching about skrilex struggle to do that.

Feel free to give us some feedback and what you would like to see to make dubs and production more linked and we will see what we can do!

make the dubs forum have all my points above.

I can see a place for a dubs forum, and the feedback threads. The dubs should be for dj/listeners to hear music, and get 320 ( maybe free20's only people love free stuff, and would be like flies to shit) The feedback threads were for the producers, to see what other producers thing. these are two total different things, and trying to combined the two will never run as smooth as they would separately.

it used to be fantastic and it's gone a bit shit lately

can you explain why it use to be fantastic? and is now a bit shit? surly that they way of fixing it...

I would like to say big up on the demo panel its one of the best things to happen around here for a while, but its noway a trade for what the feedback threads where.

I don't know why the mods have always wanted to get rid of them, probably cause none of them every used them actively, but surly you could see they were working from how busy they were?

/rant over

[legend4ry]

If it don't work and we get enough negative feedback things will change, just the same as we get positive feedback.

[dubmatters]

SNIP....

Dubs section is just a spam fest, like its always been since I first visited dsf.

How will people get decent feedback when their thread gets demoted to the bottom within a day or so? Apart from bumping it every 12 hours?

10 Threads in the first page of the dubs section currently have got more than 10 posts. How many are just the OP bumping it?

There is about 100 threads in total on the first page of the dubs section in my browser.

POOR SHOW GUYS

Absolutely pointless posting a track for feedback unless your willing to SPAM SPAM SPAM which is what you guys wanted to avoid?????

PS, has anyone got the time to open numerous different threads and give feedback for each track, when the one thread enabled people to comment on multiple tracks easily?

[dubmatters]

helpful lama post is helpful

[bigfootspartan]

I actually like this move, i found quite a bit of the feedback in the feedback threads was generic, assumably just so people could get feedback on their tune.

However, i think there has to be some managing of the dubs thread. There's such a mass of junk in there. I mean, Jakes posted a free track, as of now it has 5 replies and 59 views... I'M not blaming anyone, but the spew of 'first track could you tell me everything about producing pls because this doesn't sound massive enough to get me laid' is quite frustrating. As much as i know you guys don't like sub forums this is one case where i might recommend one. A sub for WIP, a sub for feedback, a sub for free tunes.

The icons are a good move though. I like being able to scroll through and tell what's a free tune, what's a feedback etc. Overall a good move, just frustrating at times haha.

[fragments]

I've been trying to pay more attention to the Dubs/WIP thread and gotta say I like the idea of subforums--though the use of icons is a move in that direction. It kind does feel like sifting through a lot of "junk" to get to what I'm looking for. Though I do agree that I never posted anything in the WIP thread when it was in the production forum because generally speaking it seemed people left crappy one sentence responses just so they could say they commented. Didn't seem worth my time to actually put in the time when likely all I'm getting back is: "nice job. dig teh bass bruv! safe!"

I don't think you are going to stop the mass of "this is my first dub tell me everything about productiong NOWNOWNOW!!!!" threads.

Perhaps posting an example of a good feedback post and a list of things to think about when commenting on somebody's song would help a tad? I kind of use a mental checklist when I comment. It might also be useful to remind people that feedback DOES NOT mean that anybody is going to take the time to walk you step by step through fixing what they've pointed out what may need fixed and that checking the production forum after they get feedback would be a place to start--though that may in turn increase the number of "dumb posts" in production.

Though I do agree it's going to be difficult to get 90% of people to leave genuine, useful feedback no matter what you do. But again, part of the poor feedback is that you do have a lot of newbies who don't have the language nor the ear to leave very useful feedback.

[badger]

glad it's not just negative responses! it's never going to be 100% smooth sailing when changes like this are made but the proof is in the pudding as they say

it used to be fantastic and it's gone a bit shit lately

can you explain why it use to be fantastic? and is now a bit shit? surly that they way of fixing it.

the dubs forum was a place where a lot of current biggish name producers put out their stuff before being discovered and it was a treasure trove of great tunes. i'm not saying that there's not gold still to be found there but there's a definite leaning towards people spamming their tunes and of others posting their clearly unfinished work (by anyone's standards but their own) and then complaining when someone says it needs work doing on it.... but there's no reason we can't all make things better again. it's unlikely it'll ever be the same again but there's no point in harking back to past glories on forums because things change, and who knows it might even end up better

as for all of the points you raised there's no reason they can't be replicated on the other forum. the whole idea of this isn't to remove things from production but to add to dubs/feedback so don't see it as being a negative move. regarding the comment about threads being 30+ pages - is that actually a good thing?

How will people get decent feedback when their thread gets demoted to the bottom within a day or so? Apart from bumping it every 12 hours?

hopefully if everyone gets involved in leaving feedback that won't happen

However, i think there has to be some managing of the dubs thread. There's such a mass of junk in there. I mean, Jakes posted a free track, as of now it has 5 replies and 59 views... I'M not blaming anyone, but the spew of 'first track could you tell me everything about producing pls because this doesn't sound massive enough to get me laid' is quite frustrating. As much as i know you guys don't like sub forums this is one case where i might recommend one. A sub for WIP, a sub for feedback, a sub for free tunes.

we were thinking of doing a freebies thread under the music forum for bigger name producers and free proper releases (as in from labels etc) but it's a tricky one to get the definition between that and dubs made without it being unfair. might still happen though

we could have a rolling sticky as a kind of "ideas" thread where people post tunes before they're finished or even before the stage of an early draft for feedback if people think that would be helpful? not sure if it's a good idea or not but putting it out there

Though I do agree it's going to be difficult to get 90% of people to leave genuine, useful feedback no matter what you do. But again, part of the poor feedback is that you do have a lot of newbies who don't have the language nor the ear to leave very useful feedback.

that's just the way it is on a forum of this size and there's very little that can be done about it. there'll be plenty of people here purely to promo/spam their stuff and couldn't give a fuck about the community and short of banning them their's nothing we can do about it... and they'll just be replaced by more of the same anyway so that achieves nothing. people clearly taking the piss will be banned but other than that it's something that we have to grin and bear

[drokkr]

This can only be for the better imo.

[badger]

This can only be for the better imo.

something i should have mentioned before is that the aim of this is to bring the two forums together in a way that is mutually beneficial to both - hence the quick links between the two forums. rather than merging them entirely which would have been bad for both forums, or having dubs as a sub-forum of productions, they'll now be more linked without there being duplication of things in here which should be over there etc. by increasing feedback in dubs it'll stop it being what's effectively a bit of a deadzone at times with new producers getting ignored and discouraged when they may well have a lot of potential, and it can only be more beneficial to you guys to have more ears and different opinions on feedback

[bigfootspartan]

we could have a rolling sticky as a kind of "ideas" thread where people post tunes before they're finished or even before the stage of an early draft for feedback if people think that would be helpful? not sure if it's a good idea or not but putting it out there

I think this could potentially alleviate some of the problems. As long as people actually use it I think it could keep the finished tunes that are worth listening to or that are actually finished and need feedback on the first page for a while longer. Also, not sure if it's possible, but could a minimum post count possibly be required to post on there? Not anything huge (I for one know what it's like to be a lurker with just a few posts), but even something as small as 10 posts would require people to actually participate in the community aspect a smidge before spamming. It would also stop people who sign up for the sole purpose of spamming their tune.

[fragments]

Though I do agree it's going to be difficult to get 90% of people to leave genuine, useful feedback no matter what you do. But again, part of the poor feedback is that you do have a lot of newbies who don't have the language nor the ear to leave very useful feedback.

that's just the way it is on a forum of this size and there's very little that can be done about it. there'll be plenty of people here purely to promo/spam their stuff and couldn't give a fuck about the community and short of banning them their's nothing we can do about it... and they'll just be replaced by more of the same anyway so that achieves nothing. people clearly taking the piss will be banned but other than that it's something that we have to grin and bear

I understand. Didn't mean that bit to come off as a complaint rather just stating that I understand this is the way it's going to be on a forum this size (as you state). I do like the rolling sticky "idea" thread idea as well.

I'll also add that I don't think an amount of rearranging or reorganizing the forums is going to improve this (though I personally like the changes and disliked the WIP/Finished Dubs threads in productions for reasons I've previously stated). It is simply going to take a lot of people leading by example. If we want Dubs to be a place were people get real and useful feedback we need to jump in and start giving it at the risk of not seeing it in return. I know it sucks digging through a bunch of threads to find people's work you want to comment on or at worst commenting on a bunch of tunes that probably have no business seeing the light of day.

I guess folks could make the choice not to comment on posts from people who don't appear to be active members of the community if they wanted--clearly one could argue this isn't the most fair way to go about things for a variety of reasons.

It's the fucking internet...bunch of 12 y/os with cracked copies of ableton and massive...what can we expect? There is basically no way to escape it.

[deadly_habit]

there just needs to be some sort of post quota or time limit before starting new threads to weed out the CHECK MUH TUNEZ spam and all the topics that are usually linked in stickies (which often seem to go ignored by these guilty parties)

[fragments]

there just needs to be some sort of post quota or time limit before starting new threads to weed out the CHECK MUH TUNEZ spam and all the topics that are usually linked in stickies (which often seem to go ignored by these guilty parties)

No idea how/who would track and enforce that, but seems like a solid idea.