Songcrafters.org

Hey- I just clicked on several links to listen to my ol buddy Rene (cos I love his live performances) and instead of a link to a YT vid, I see this;

ERROR: No MP3 file found.

All topics in the Post Your Work boards must have either an mp3 file attached or include a link to an external mp3 file ([singlemp3] tags) in the message body.

What gives?  Aren't external links allowed anymore unless they contain an MP3?
That sux!!
 >:( John B

I'm not an admin, so I can't say what is or isn't allowed, but if MP3s or links to one are required now, I'm for it.

One of the things that make this community work is the jukeboxes – the ability to listen to "Latest Songs," "On This Day," "Overlooked Gems," festival jukeboxes, or an individual's jukebox. That and (to a lesser extent) the ability to easily download songs to our own musical libraries.

There's no reason a member can't upload an MP3 and also post a YouTube video of the same songs. Many members here do that.

If someone doesn't want to post an MP3 because they want to monetize their music elsewhere, then elsewhere is where they should focus their attention.

I'm not even speculating. I have no inside info on this. But if I were an admin, those would be my reasons.

I agree .
Videos are great to watch but mp3s are a great way to personally keep an audio record of your journey on songcrafters.
Plus it lets the songcrafters community download your stuff.

I enjoy the occasional video, but I'm a big fan of the jukeboxes. I lament that some of my much older tunes were linked to a Google site.

Blooby

Quote from: Blooby on September 03, 2022, 02:11:37 PMI lament that some of my much older tunes were linked to a Google site.

Old timers will recall the time that we were briefly required to host our MP3s off site – or use a service like SoundClick – because of hosting costs. That may have been before the jukebox innovation.

"The Jukebox Way" quietly took over how we organize and experience music on this site. I was slow to catch on – very slow – even though I was still uploading MP3s. At first the jukeboxes seemed like a cute frill, but not very important. Now I get it.

In a way, the forum topics are just an interface for uploading the MP3s, song info, and comments. The jukebox is where the listening happens. But it's a little clunky to work that way. It's understandable that some people listen in the forum topics and not the jukeboxes; it's how SMF is designed, and it probably does seem weird that we have become fanatical about MP3s as the primary way to contribute music.

It seems like we need a "How To Get the Most Out of Songcrafters" guide that helps new and even old users see the flow, without having to discover it on their own. People do like to be spoon fed.

Quote from: Ted on September 03, 2022, 09:06:35 AMOne of the things that make this community work is the jukeboxes – the ability to listen to "Latest Songs," "On This Day," "Overlooked Gems," festival jukeboxes, or an individual's jukebox. That and (to a lesser extent) the ability to easily download songs to our own musical libraries.

There's no reason a member can't upload an MP3 and also post a YouTube video of the same songs. Many members here do that.

If someone doesn't want to post an MP3 because they want to monetize their music elsewhere, then elsewhere is where they should focus their attention.

Exactly right, Ted. I couldn't have said it better myself.

Quote from: Blooby on September 03, 2022, 02:11:37 PMI lament that some of my much older tunes were linked to a Google site.

I just had a look at those posts. There are 45 of them and the ones that I looked at used our [singlemp3] tags to link directly to your mp3 file on Google. That should work. The problem is with Google rather than with Songcrafters. It seems that they've changed something and you now have to login to Google before you can access the mp3 file.

For example, in your posts of Ain't No Sunshine (https://songcrafters.org/forum/index.php?topic=6518.0) and Dear Mr. Fantasy (https://songcrafters.org/forum/index.php?topic=6517), the urls between the [singlemp3][/singlemp3] tags are as follows:

http://sites.google.com/site/moomarch42010/previous-jams/Ain%27tNoSunshine.mp3?attredirects=0&d=1 (http://sites.google.com/site/moomarch42010/previous-jams/Ain%27tNoSunshine.mp3?attredirects=0&d=1)

http://sites.google.com/site/moomarch42010/previous-jams/DearMrFantasyEdit.mp3?attredirects=0&d=1 (http://sites.google.com/site/moomarch42010/previous-jams/DearMrFantasyEdit.mp3?attredirects=0&d=1)

If you click on those links, you'll see that Google redirects them to their Sign in page. Since our mp3 player can't sign in to Google, it can't play your songs.

You might be able to fix it on Google by changing the sharing options for your mp3 files. I don't know what options are available on Google but I assume there's something like Private or Public. It must be defaulting to Private now. If you can change those files to Public, then our player and jukeboxes should work with your Google songs.

If you can't find any way to make the Google links public, then I'd suggest hosting them somewhere else or simply attaching the mp3 files to your posts. Currently, the best places I know of for hosting your mp3 files offsite and that work with our player are alonetone and OneDrive. To find out more about using alonetone and OneDrive in your Songcrafters posts, see this page:

https://songcrafters.org/forum/index.php?topic=32212.0 (https://songcrafters.org/forum/index.php?topic=32212.0)

The advantage of hosting files offsite is that there's no file size limit. So if you want to post that 17-minute cover of In-a-Gadda-da-Vida at 320kbps, you can.  :)

Having said that, you shouldn't be getting the "No MP3 file found" error on your posts. That's a bug in my code which is probably caused by the "?attredirects=0&d=1" at the end of your urls. I'll fix that in the next day or two.

Quote from: 64Guitars on September 03, 2022, 06:03:36 PMHaving said that, you shouldn't be getting the "No MP3 file found" error on your posts. That's a bug in my code which is probably caused by the "?attredirects=0&d=1" at the end of your urls. I'll fix that in the next day or two.

This bug is now fixed, so posts with a valid mp3 URL between [singlemp3][/singlemp3] tags should no longer produce the "No MP3 file found" error.

However, Blooby, your old songs still won't play in our mp3 player or jukeboxes because of the Google sharing problem described in my previous message in this topic.

Quote from: 64Guitars on September 03, 2022, 11:15:49 PM

Quote from: 64Guitars on September 03, 2022, 06:03:36 PMHaving said that, you shouldn't be getting the "No MP3 file found" error on your posts. That's a bug in my code which is probably caused by the "?attredirects=0&d=1" at the end of your urls. I'll fix that in the next day or two.

This bug is now fixed, so posts with a valid mp3 URL between [singlemp3][/singlemp3] tags should no longer produce the "No MP3 file found" error.

However, Blooby, your old songs still won't play in our mp3 player or jukeboxes because of the Google sharing problem described in my previous message in this topic.

I will take a look-see when I get a minute. Your input and knowledge is always appreciated. Can't tell you how much I am thankful for the heads up when my operating system got corrupted. Again, thank you.

Blooby

There may be people here who actually don't know how to generate an MP3; they just point their phone at themselves and post directly to YouTube.

I realized that I had a song posted in Original Songs where I had only posted a YouTube video. I went and found it, and, sure enough...

Quote from: Johnbee on September 03, 2022, 07:26:36 AMERROR: No MP3 file found.

So I went to your new best friend...

Seconds later I had an MP3 of the song I could upload to the original post (https://songcrafters.org/forum/index.php?topic=28569.0). As soon as I did that and saved the post, the error went away, and the YouTube video embed was restored.

---

Unlike other sites that convert YouTube videos to MP3s, Youtube-DL doesn't have any monetization on it, or try to get you to download some sketchy software. It is simply a web UI for the popular youtube-dl open source command-line tool (https://youtube-dl.org/). And, yes, it's legal. The developers even fought a DMCA takedown and won (https://github.blog/2020-11-16-standing-up-for-developers-youtube-dl-is-back/).

Sorry I seemed to have hit a raw nerve among some of the regulars here. :-[. It was just a bit of a shock though, but I usually upload MP3s anyway so it's no big deal.  Having said that, I  used to enjoy the jukebox feature very much.  I think it's interesting to go back on some of the tunes I posted 10 plus years ago. There are some things on my jukebox that I haven't heard in years and it's kinda neat to revisit what I was doing back then.  My feelings have changed over the past few years though. For many years I posted my songs on Soundclick and always allowed free downloads. I  really thought it was cool to think that there were at least a small handful of people in the world  enjoying my music on their iPad or other devices.  Then, a few years ago some idiot on one of the other music sites thought it would be acceptable to download my stuff, load it into their DAW and take liberties with it and desecrate it without my knowledge or permission.  It wasn't many-just one or two but it was enough to make me paranoid enough to decide to go stream only. Now, I don't really mind the jukebox here and I accept the fact that when I upload here it goes on my jukebox.  You people here I could never imagine would stoop so low as to abuse someone else's work like that. I  won't name the forum here but it still exists to this day and just recently someone there took liberties with my lyrics.  This is why I'm paranoid to allow anybody access to my music beyond streaming.

:) JB

Quote from: Johnbee on September 04, 2022, 11:54:19 AMThen, a few years ago some idiot on one of the other music sites thought it would be acceptable to download my stuff, load it into their DAW and take liberties with it and desecrate it without my knowledge or permission. ... This is why I'm paranoid to allow anybody access to my music beyond streaming.

Sorry you had such a bad experience. A long time ago – back when this site was called BossBr.net – Tharek swore he saw a video for my song "Anarchist Heart (https://songcrafters.org/forum/index.php?topic=3804.0)," (not this one (https://youtu.be/PKVXkEBID2k)). He even described the video in detail. I got a little obsessed and flattered. I never did find or see the video. But my main concern was that someone might be profiting from my music, because I sure as hell wasn't.

Anyway: I get it.

If I really wanted to monetize my music, I wouldn't post it here – or I'd post super low bitrate versions, or demo versions, or some other degraded version of the actual product.

And I also get why posting YouTube videos (without an MP3) goes against how this community works. If that's "hitting a nerve" then it's not a particularly sensitive nerve.

Funny story: Years ago (maybe before MP3s were invented) I met Cameroonian musician named Prince Afo Akom (https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince_Afo_Akom) who was about to release a new album on cassette. He was kind of paranoid about giving me an advance copy. He knew that he would make most of the money off of his cassette the day of the big release event, and after that tape duping decks would ensure that he'd never make any money off selling his cassettes again. But he had a backup plan: He actually sold advertising space in the middle of some of this songs. So, right in the middle of a catchy makossa dance song Afo Akom starts talking about a great place to buy tires in Bamenda. It was hilarious. If I had an MP3 of that song, I would unironically upload it to this thread.

So there's an idea: Right in the middle of your song announce "For high-bitrate version of this song, without interruption, please visit my page on BandCamp."

It's just the reality of creating and sharing music today. The only way to prevent your music from being appropriated is to never share it. Streaming-only won't stop your music from being snatched by someone who wants to snatch it. Nothing will, short of withholding it entirely.

I have a friend – the best songwriter I know in fact – who takes this strategy. It's a shame. Rather than risking losing a little (or a lot) of control over his music, he gives his music no exposure at all. He plays small venues in the town where he lives. I don't have a recording of a single song of his. The world is poorer because his songs aren't out there for us to experience.