This post had a massive shitfest with formatting due to an embed not being whitelisted, then totally screwing up everything when I removed it. It should be fixed now, but please let me know if something looks weird. It's really hard to read typos when you're not quite sure what order all the words were in to begin with! Lol.

I was encouraged to share this by @Troisnyx earlier today, and boy am I excited!

'"[Why are there so few] music videos here on Newgrounds based on tracks from the audio portal? It would be such a great opportunity for both musicians and animators to be known more, and it would also be a great way to experiment... [So] many interesting tracks go undiscovered until someone has a visual reference to [work with]." -@ForgottenDawn

@ForgottenDawn made a post here that brought up an interesting idea -- a prospective competition for animators: make music videos for music on Newgrounds. I want to see this happen. If you do too, check out the nifty little poll on that newspost and make yourself heard. Depending on the outcome, there will either be a collab or contest! Exciting!

@TomFulp has weighed in down in the comment section about the possibility that if there were such a competition, we may be able to get some third-parties to do promotionals for us, which sounds absolutely fantastic. If this turns out to be a thing, I will certainly make a podcast and share to my Twitter/FB crowd, so that's a good 2-3k people, more if I ask my friends to share, who will know about this competition.

Just remember not to try and embed it if you choose to share as well, because it isn't in the whitelist and it will be frustrating, as it was for me a minute ago when the embed fouled up and wrecked my post formatting, forcing me to rewrite my entire post like I just had to a minute ago, lol. Instead, just link directly. Some good music to be discovered in the process, as well.

Please spread the word to those you think would be interested. Mention people in comments, tweet it, send carrier pidgeons, w/e. Everyone on ForgottenDawn's post will certainly thank you!

Also, and speaking of Tom, there's a question for you down there somewhere below that giant white picture but before I start talking about XBL Rewards. @NightRaid-NG, you were excited about that Xbox embed I tested last post I wrote, so you might like this!

Beyond this point, I'll be talking about upcoming projects and what I've been up to lately -- how I've been making money while I sleep, play Skyrim, and otherwise do nothing... Literally, I made 3 cents while I warmed up my coffee, so stick around if you have some room in your wallet for a few extra dollars or at least want to know a little bit about how I do it. I won't be posting scams or sites that require you to enter your credit card information either, and I will only cover sites I use daily.

First, projects, since this is relatively short. I've got 2 podcasts recorded, one, my NG AP Mod podcast which I'm editing -- I'm waaay late grinding this one out; absolutely insane week involving feeding a homeless kitten some sauer kraut-y sausage at freak o'clock one night -- the other, an interesting little tidbit about Microsoft rewards, a popular sort of GPT/PTC program that offers giftcards in exchange for using Bing search for a few minutes daily. 

Just need to finalize the edits and post. Someone kick me until I do. I've had one of these on my mind for so long. I'm gonna drop a little sneak peek or 3 down below.

Note the Amazon gift card in this image, which you can get on MS Rewards with a little patience and a Windows Live ID -- and I don't mean grinding your ass off all day long at the PC kind of patience and an actual Windows machine. It just takes a few minutes a day to rack up free moolah with Bing. If you're looking for stuff from the Windows store or Xbox, note that any Microsoft products are at a 10% discount once you reach level 2, comparison below.

Just don't be lured into spending any money at their store for the paltry 1 point per dollar spent in the Windows store (1 cent for every 10 dollars) and you'll be on track to savings and freebies. I've scored gift cards this way for less than 10 minutes a day. No worthless spam emails, either. 9/10 emails are spritzed with free money you can get as simple as opening a link in a new tab. In fact, I racked up most of the 3,755 points you see above from emails alone.

It's a sweet deal, considering it's another several dollars every month toward my earnings with practically no effort from my part except for things I was already going to do anyway. I don't think MS has blacklisted Newgrounds, so there's that.

@TomFulp, now that I mentioned it, do you think Bing Ads might be a good alternative for NG?

I know we've been orphaned countless times by ad companies partnering up with AdSense, and I think the last people to do that might be Google's rival, MS. It look like Bing Ads has some adult advertisers, and doesn't seem to discourage teh pron, which I think you mentioned was a problem with Google that we had a while back. I could be wrong, but it's an exciting prospect to me.

Moving on but still on the subject of Microsoft programs, if you play Xbox, check out Xbox Live Rewards. If you don't get sucked into spending anything on the cashback gimmick side of the site, it becomes a small but guaranteed risk free income for your MS account with some perks like product discounts if you're a gold member.

This combined with Microsoft Rewards has been my saving grace since 2010. Every penny helps in this age of overpriced 99 cent tack-on prices, and if Microsoft is willing to pay us to use its products and support the game devs and publishers we want in the process, let it.

I always set a calendar reminder to check once a month and do the minute long survey for 25 cents every month. This, despite being a paltry $3 dollars per year by itself has really come in handy. Plus, MS actually seems to pay attention to the results of the surveys and the overall quality of the program has improved substantially in the past 7 years.

My Advice: If you like saving every penny possible, this is an absolute must. If you're already a heavy spender on XBL, it might cut you some costs too with all sorts of discounts and cash back. Just make sure you have it credit as soon as you reach 1000 accumulated credits ($1) so you don't end up patiently waiting longer than the usual 4 months to see your 3.4 minutes of clicking go to work.

Now, if we're talking "money for nothing", I'll be honest, my stress level is down from the past few months now that I have some relatively passive extra income -- passive being, the stuff runs all day while I go about my life, practically forgetting about it unless I'm coming back to check earnings maybe every hour and a half and sure nothing died. If I'm feeling adventurous, I might actually put in some effort and help it along a little.

Now, you might be wondering, how does anyone get paid not to work? Celebrities excluded?

Well, it's pretty simple. I'm using several GPT sites on extra devices, ipads, computers, old cellphones with wifi capability, etc., so I don't have to switch tabs or worry about offers not crediting because they're not "visible" onscreen or whatever bs GPT sites are cooking up these days thanks to ad companies being extra scroogey. No surveys, no trial offer crap that could land me in deep monetary doo-doo, or worse, get my identity stolen.

Still, several people have asked how I do it, what it's like, how much I'm making, etc., because they're doing all of these things and more to try and make money, but they're still making diddly squat, and worse, they're burning out, sometimes before they even get paid.

Now, I'll tell you, between several sites, I'm actually making a pretty good amount, certainly not enough to buy a yacht, but enough to do what I want to with it, with less than an hour of actual work per day. If I were working a day job 5 days a week, actually putting in effort, or doing stupid surveys I hate, the wages would be awful, but this runs relatively continuously, all day and all night, and I have all the time in the world to spend on work, play, or whatever crazy home improvement project I deem fit. In fact, once I can afford hosting, I plan to run my own website -- the official kind, not the Weebly or Webs or Wix-ever else kind of freemium stuff is out there.

Meantime, my spare computer/tablet/phones sit untouched while I do whatever I want, and all they do is take up some bandwidth, sitting on mute with the screensavers and timers off, waiting on me to see fit to check them. Even if you only have one or two devices, nothing's stopping you from letting this stuff run while you sleep, work, or go to school, anything.

Take this sample from letting my junk computer run one site all day below. $12.24 in a couple days, just running in the background, and 11 more cents in the time it took me to type this section. This is just one site out of many that I've found easy to take advantage of the perks -- namely, 17 cents worth of bonus cash daily that you can get in minutes just by checking your email and doing a PTC that, while you have to wait a minute or two, is easy to do first thing when you wake up, and you can even check the weather through it or start it up earning you money until the PTC is ready to credit.

You'll notice almost all of my credits are videos aside from the daily bonuses, a ton of them, actually. There's a reason behind that, and it certainly isn't because I sat through all! It was an absolute eureka, finally-something-really-works, slap your grandma kind of moment, especially after so many other GPT's have given me the runaround or outright treated me like dirt, or just flat out not had anything decent to offer.

Before FusionCash, I was so tired of GPT sites, PTC bullshit that didn't credit, sites like Points2Shop and CrowdFlower that denied me payment or closed my account for bogus reasons even after I proved my identity, good will, etc., I was hopeless, until I took some advice from a blogger with a pseud that read something like "no-bs-getpaidto", and went on to sign up for  with his referral link. Through this referral and my hatred of surveys, slideshows, tasks, and dangerous spam app installs, I discovered a miracle I wouldn't have otherwise.

I'm going to walk you through it.

If you click the picture, it'll take you to the FC signup, where you can make a couple extra dollars without touching your computer more than a few times a day -- obviously more if you have more than one device, feel like messing around with more sites, or if you can figure out some that will auto refresh without checking if the pages are on top or some other nonsense on other sites. This is exactly what I love about the method I use with FusionCash; they don't pester me and we both get paid, except I don't have to be present because of that first part.

If you just signed up, go ahead and set up your account real quick with either your Paypal info or address, and when you finish, you're ready to earn. After you get your $5 signup bonus, go to Earn Cash >> Videos. You'll see a teal play button pop up. Click it.

This will open a new window. Scroll down and click the teal button, which will open another window. Slide the first popup so that you can see the timer under the second one, resize both as necessary, and click the tab without the timer so that it thinks it's on top. This is so you can make sure you're going to be credited and everything is proceeding normally. If the timer isn't going and the page isn't auto-refreshing, it's not working.

Note, sometimes it's a holy terror and insists on being a certain size or being on top of every tab despite being fully visible. This is why I just started using it on a spare device on mute that I absolutely do not touch except to check that it's still making me money whenever I feel like it, which turned out to be a pretty nice arrangement once I got past the minor annoyance, and it's a great addition to my GPT empire.

Tip: If I'm feeling like being more involved, I set a 30 minute timer to enter a CAPTCHA every so often on "radio loyalty" which I leave running on the closest device to me for an extra 6 cents an hour; it does add up in the scheme of things, and it has the bonus of helping me keep track of time. I turn off this timer while I sleep, obviously.

That's pretty much the same principle I apply to all the other sites. Anything that doesn't auto refresh itself, I don't do. If it does refresh itself but checks if I'm paying attention, I measure how long it takes to do that the next time I start it up and set timers accordingly -- If I feel like it. Otherwise, I keep my devices close to me on mute and use multiple sites, and just sorta let them go until they're done. Some of these sites have caps on each opportunity, most of which increase after meeting them a couple days in a row, and after they cap out, I check what else there is to do, if there are any bonuses, etc. There's been plenty of times I woke up from a nap or went shopping and came back to some dollars.

Just imagine, if every hour of the day for the rest of your life you were finding a couple dollars on the ground everywhere you went. Wouldn't that be sweet? Imagine that on top of a decent paying job, and all you have to do is get out of bed and have an email, paypal, etc., to get it. That's what this is like.

Just remember, never do two offers from the same affiliate company across two GPT sites or you could get banned by that affiliate, thus missing out on earnings, and never do two offers at the same exact time on the same exact site, same reasoning, only you could lose everything you earned. If you do everything right and still somehow manage get screwed with this method (has never happened to me as long as I followed those two rules in over 10 years), if the only thing you invest is a couple minutes of setting up something to run all day while you don't pay it any mind, you haven't lost anything, imo.

Now, I think I've rattled on enough about things I think are cool. Do check out @ForgottenDawn's post and spread the word if you like, do know I'm working on those damn belated podcasts, and if you feel like you could use some extra money, do join FusionCash. I simply shared it since I feel it's one of the fairest, easiest sites to work, and I haven't run into a single offer that it was FusionCash's fault that I wasn't credited for, unlike Points2Shop and several other sites that scammed me out of my time and took my money.

If people would like me to do an actual review or a how-to of this or other sites, lemme know, and yes, feel free to refer me to sites if you think they're good!

Also, happy shamrock celebration month. For your pleasure, something a little more or less cool (pun) than the weather, depending on where you live -- and certainly no less commercialized if the ads on the weather channel are any indicator...

McDonalds has some sweet frappes special right now that on the surface seem shitty and wildly overpriced (c'mon, it's McD's) but I actually enjoyed -- mint chocolate chip or something with little green sprinkles for Saint Patty's Day. Apparently I was the first one to order this where I live because the high school students working for minimum wage in there spent a good 10 minutes trying to figure out how the fuck to make it and even had to get on the phone at one point. Check it!

For now, this is a placeholder as part of my and @JK-FlipFlop's Masterpost of Audio Engineering Resources. Hell, I may as well call it a community project by now, haha. Several posts to be coming up in the week. Will be recording another podcasts in a day or so as I have time. Been a busy week.

Tutorials will be spaced out according to level of mastery. So far, one, but definitely open to recommendations, shameless self-plugs included! Will include guitar building as well! After all, part of playing an instrument is understanding its parts!

I present to you...

A(N EVENTUAL) CRAPLOAD OF QUALITY GUITAR TUTORIALS

Beginner:

Foreword: Chasing gear at this point is a lot less important than mastering fundamentals. You'll want to find an instrument that's both functional and suited to your budget. In other words, don't buy a flying V or a Taylor until you know you won't be tossing it into storage in a couple months, and remember that good technique outshines fancy equipment almost every time.

No combination of guitars, amps, line-ins, DI boxes, etc., is going to instantly poof you into Marti Friedman, Paul Gilbert, etc. Guitars don't come stamped with the genres they're capable of lending to either, with few exceptions. You can djent it up on a wire guitar with passive pickups, or play country on a Schechter. Everything comes out in the wash with appropriate technique and setup, which takes time.

Aaand going to find some good tutorials to put here, but beginner tutorials can be really generic and hard to disseminate good from bad. If you're a beginner and find something helped you, drop a comment.

Intermediate:

Tune Your Guitar Perfectly By Ear! - Chances are, if you're using the 55545 tuning method, you'll notice it's a little off. Check out this video and you'll find out how to do it using your guitar's natural harmonics.

Advanced:

Expert:

DIY GUITAR BUILDING

Builds:

WHAT'S WRONG WITH MY GUITAR AND HOW CAN I FIX IT?

String Buzz: Check your guitar's action, nut, and bridge, in order of most to least likelihood, depending where the buzz is occurring, and make sure the strings are not sitting too low as a result of whatever configuration you have.

You may have to adjust the action or truss rod or re-file the nut in the case of overly deep notches causing the strings to sit too low and vibrate against the fretboard. Low tunings are prone to this on shorter scale lengths and often perform either poorly or unpredictably with the lower string tension inherent in more extreme drop tunings. If you suspect this is the problem, the solution may be as simple as heading to the nearest shop and having your guitar set up for heavier gauge strings.

RETURN TO MASTERLIST >>

EDM364's Audio Portal Mod Diary, Entry 14

New podcast is out, and I don't have a migraine! Close to half asleep though. Links on the submission page. Contents, stats, news, discussion, and some wacky storytelling. Check it.

Stats: 34 stolen songs. 1 screamer. 17 users banned. 2.059 infraction rate.

Subscriptions: @littlemisfortune @maorrichan @RealFaction @Xtrullor

Thank you!

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EDM364's AP Mod Diary #13

Now in podcast format!

Update, Crown of Thorns has been released! Fans and critics welcome!  

Week's statistics: ≈ 110 illegitimate submissions, ≈ 60 submitters, for an infraction rate of 1.8333 per capita.

Record keeping was not as strict this week. Check out that podcast. If you go direct to the page, the mentioned links are in the description, and I mention some of the worst offenders, as well as the usual life junk. I do talk about @RealFaction and @JK-FlipFlop lots too, you know... for reals. I have a migraine. Can you tell?

Subscribers: @littlemisfortune @maorrichan @realfaction @xtrullor

Thank you!

<< PREVIOUS ENTRY - NEXT PAGE >>

For now, this is a placeholder. What will go here are links to other lists, newsposts, and tutorials for better music making, podcasts, etc. Anyone can submit a link or a list BUT I request you also link back to this masterpost at the end of the post if you're drafting it yourself. Some of us are mobile users and it's really inconvenient to cycle through news posts with the back button. Not to mention it can use up a lot of data.

Categories are in order of importance and/or specificity.

TO COME:

• Integration of superlists and aggregation of their content
• Table of contents, better formatting
• Integrated playlists for some categories, and also on some of my own posts

INSTRUMENT SPECIFIC TUTORIALS

BASS:

BRASS: @sorohanro's Trumpet Lessons

DRUMS:

GUITAR: My Guitar Masterlist, <your post here>

PIANO:

WORLD:

Request an instrument in the comments!

DIGITAL AUDIO WORKSTATIONS (DAW)

"The DAW by itself isn't your money maker when it comes to music, podcasts, backing tracks... You are."

A good DAW is everything. Whether it's Pro Tools, Mixcraft, or Reaper, free or paid, what matters most is what you actually intend to do with it, not the name or the price... Well, unless you're broke, in which case don't worry, we've got you covered.

FREE:

• @Agitat0r's Crash Course!

PAID:

Tell us about a DAW we missed!

VIRTUAL INSTRUMENTS AND FX (VST & VFX)

FREE VSTs

• @SnowTeddy's Linked List!

PAID VSTs

Send us a VST!

WRITING AND COMPOSITION

How do you get your songwriting ideas?

SOUND DESIGN AND MIXING

PREMASTERING

• The -6 dB headroom myth - Justin Perkins, theproaudiofiles.com.

Request a topic!

GENRE SPECIFIC TUTORIALS (A-Z)

Main genres bolded. Subgenres will be linked.

BLUES:

CLASSICAL:

CINEMATIC:

DRUM AND BASS:

DUBSTEP: Brostep (American), Drumstep, Eurostyle

ELECTRONICA:

HIP-HOP: Olskool, RnB, Trap

METAL: Black Metal, Symphonic Metal, Synth Metal

ROCK:

SKA:

VIDEOGAME: Chiptune, Sega Genesis, etc.

Request a genre!

POST PRODUCTION/PROCESSING

With Audacity:

• @JK-FlipFlop: Cutting Perfect Loops in Audacity

Happy hunting/writing/mixing/composing!

Special Thanks To: @BlueAlpha14 @JK-FlipFlop @SnowTeddy @sorohanro

For those of you hoping for my semi-daily diary, this is not it, however I am keeping record of that and will post tomorrow or the next day with the appropriate dating. This isn't because theft has slowed down or anything. There's still plenty of stuff. I'm just spending a lot of time on mixing.

I've got Creator's Club tomorrow too, and that symphonic slash videogame slash cinematic metal I've been working on has been taking up tons of time -- a lot of it spending time trying to think "how the hell am I going to write this track when my guitar rig is a ball of ass, my amp is exploded, and my sample library doesn't like the key of Am.

Most of my time the past few days has been digging through what free low-tuned metal guitar sample libraries I can find and stuffing those in my DAW. I've got some good dry samples I made myself but getting those into a workable format is gonna take some serious work.

Those in my boat, you might wanna check this out, from Chernobyl Studios -- a sick tutorial on getting a sicker metal guitar sound.

This is what I've been studying. It's pretty lit. Anyone, any DAW, these plugins are great, and the video brings up a ton of good points. Tag anybody you think might dig it.

EDM364's Mod Diary, Page 12

No news here, people are still stealing shit and trying to hack Geometry Dash. Not five minutes after @Xtrullor reenabled his songs for DL, someone who didn't understand how NG works or care about the artists behind the music tried to steal from his catalog. Got 'em though thanks to our very own AP Cleanup elves.

Here's hoping the embeds lower down don't mess up formatting.

SLICE OF LIFE:
Quite literally don't remember much about yesterday. My A key is sticking. I spent most of yesterday on Newgrounds, drinking coffee and modding -- and oh, my mom came to visit and listened to my latest two tracks. She was busy though, so she spent most of the time flitting around the house. Meant a lot in one way and a total bummer in another.

I was up for a grand total of 37 hours yesterday while I worked on my latest track and was unable to sleep. Otherwise, uneventful. I did however work on some lyrics for an upcoming song and arguing with hateful imbeciles on Twitter.

Time is running out
The star streaked sky plummets to the ground
Born midst a hail of lies
Freedom screams in a world deaf to cries
of pain, of shame

For a long lost brother she bore
The kingdom suffers evermore

Lost in a cold system
but found again in adherent religion
They call it liberty
under mantle of hypocrisy
enmity

For a long lost brother she bore
The kingdom suffers evermore

The caress of this half life
traipsed 'pon liberty
the paths of fear we tread

Democracy dies with every tongue lying silent
Theocracy thrives with every lie and act of violence
In the NAME OF GOD
In the NAME OF GOD
IN the NAME OF GOD
STOP THIS MADNESS

Truth in Christ compells compassion
Politics reduce to ashes

Tears of blood shed in vain
Who can say they know his name?

For a long lost brother she bore
The kingdom suffers evermore
For a long lost brother she bore
The kingdom suffers evermore
The kingdom suffers evermore
and bears at last his crown of thorns

@Cank may make an appearance on these vocals, also, and I'm looking forward to collaborating with @Teqneek on other works as well. Thinking of reaching out to @RealFaction -- if you have time, of course -- because I need someone who can program guitar work really. There's just this edge that I can't get with the library I've got.

MOD PERFORMANCE:
Stolen: 64
Non-remix: 3
Total: 67
Ban: 38
Per capita: 1.76

BREAKDOWN:
Busy, busy, busy! 64 stolen songs and 3 non-remixes for a total of 67 illegitimate submissions per 38 users banned. That amounts to a more moderate 1.76 infractions per capita, compared to yesterdays absolutely insane ratio, despite one user with a catalog of 17 stolen songs all labelled "test" or some iteration in Spanish.

Almost all infractions were in the past 4 days, with some in 2016. Some appeared reactionary blowover from @Troisnyx's petition, which called out not only the game's non-existent artist compensation but also the uglier side of the GD userbase stealing music. If you read my previous post, you'll see what they had to say in return, lots of death threats and more threats to vandalize the site. I'm going to take a moment to share the choice picks from todays crop.

Early on, some idiot tried to pass off the internet sensation colloquially known as "Owen Was Her" as his own work. For those not familiar with the song, here. This has happened about 5 times since I became a mod.

Some are only aware of this tune because of the McRoll version, but it's probably one of the most popular, most remixed videogame themes I know of.

So, facepalm out of the way, I actually ran into a pleasant surprise -- and a blast from the past. Another user tried to say "Every Little Earthquake" - Little Boots was their own work. Albeit a horribly distorted ear-rapey remix, I immediately recognized it and promptly thanked @Tebiri for mailing that one to me. It had been a long time.

This was legit the sound-track to a couple relationships I'm not going to even talk about -- and, exes reading this, if you think I'm talking about you, trust me, I'm probably not. It's been a LONG time. I was very naive once upon a time.

The Rolling Sky Soundtrack was very popular today, and I've heard it around from thieves. It's... meh. Also had some appearances of Trivago commercials, which apparently is a meme for the South American GD fanbase. Oh well, got to go; those break 3 rules -- advertisement, spam, AND stolen.

Of course, it didn't take too long before some disrespectful asshole was uploading @Xtrullor's hard work despite his explicit wishes not to have some of his tracks ingame at least until RobTop updated to give artists the choice whether they wanted their tracks or not. Some moron just couldn't wait and uploaded a rip of @Xtrullor's "Supernova", which has been vastly used in GD if you look at how many more downloads than it has plays. If you haven't already heard, check it out. The drops are SICK. My GOD.

The harmonics got me like damn on those falls.

CONCLUSION:
I don't think Rob's update is going to completely fix the theft issue here, HOWEVER, it will help keep stolen songs out of Geometry Dash, seeing as only artists currently approved for GD will be able to get their songs in-game, and RobTop will have to manually approve others. The only way to get stolen songs in game now will be for users to use the "play iTunes over the game" hack, which will be incredibly inconvenient. This is a good change. Add in that users such as myself will be able to allow/deny usage of our songs, and this is what should have happened to begin with.

SUBSCRIPTIONS: @littlemisfortune @maorrichan @RealFaction @Xtrullor

Thank you!

<< PREVIOUS ENTRY - NEXT POST >>

EDM364's Mod Diary, Page 11

EDIT: I realized I cut off part of the post because @Xtrullor asked to subscribe, as he would be referring users to this page presumably rather than have to explain all of this to the rather ungrateful users that give him hell -- I refuse to call them fans. Subscribers portion appended and links put into place. Blushing a bit.

UPDATE: RobTop has made an official announcement presumably in response to events of late, as well as changes to come, so parts of this post are moot. Not once does he acknowledge that he's been profiting all this time off of our non-commercial CC licensed music, or that he's been incredibly lazy updating until illegally monetizing said music was threatened, however. Suddenly, after Troisnyx's petition, communication with Tom picked up, and we were made aware changes are on the horizon.

What IS confirmed is that the changes we lobbied for ARE going to happen. Artists will have the option to allow and disallow tracks for use in GD, and GD abusers will no longer be able to get ANY new stolen tracks to work in GD. Artists will have to be manually approved by RobTop, which will only happen on a selective basis, to ensure the artists are both legitimate and worth listening to.

Picture a pristine portal. No more daily mass thefts! No more annoying How-To spam! That's a win-win as far as I'm concerned, and the burden will be put squarely on Rob, not us, to review these people. This is what should have been done to begin with, and I will say he's earned brownie points in my eyes for taking that one on the chin. Here's high hopes for the 1% of abusers getting with the program and realizing their days are over, and their attempts are futile, and users like @BlueAlpha14 and @Tebiri luck sniffing out the last GD thefts this portal may ever see -- oh, and that my Audio Flagging Guide becomes obselete.

So, as you undoubtedly all know, shockwaves were felt 'round the web in the advent of Geometry Dash being pulled from Steam to address copyright infringement issues, as well as, we assume, multiple reports of Geometry Dash breaking Creative Commons license, as well as DMCA takedowns. This is what I gather from my daily web stroll. RobTop has responded to hate-mongering players via Twitter.

I've been working with Newgrounds for a long time to improve the music process. They did not have anything to do with the problem on Steam. - RobTop Games, January 31, 2017

Interesting -- since angry GD players have come out of the woodwork with undue threats of bodily harm to @Troisnyx and @RealFaction and Newgrounds as a whole for breaking their toy, and have figured out that Newgrounds and Rob are working on hotfixes to the game. I've even got some choice mails myself, and @Cank has had some assholes plying their vitriol on YT.

Here's some choice words from users on Steam. Trigger warning: cancerous community that doesn't care about music artists insisting things like Troisnyx et. al. should die over a petition to remove a GAME from stores that wasn't even submitted, to my knowledge. Let that sink in a second, then click that link.

@BlueAlpha14 makes an interesting point; thefts have been practically muted in the past two days since GD was removed from stores, at least in comparison to the past 3 years of shit. The portal is the closest to 2007's lean-mean running form as I've seen it since GD 1.9, but I have seen some rule breaking and sticks in the mud, to be fair. Just reminds me how great it'd be if all the GD abusers just made like Nebula and kept their copyright/CC License infringing to themselves rather than passing it onto us. That way, at least Rob wouldn't be the one responsible for our music being trampled on to line his pockets.

Speaking of copyright infringement, @Jackho finds it a bit strange the game was DMCA'ed by Nintendo for copyrighted achievement avatars, not for the rampant abuse of music without artists' consent, and so do I, but if @Troisnyx's petition was never submitted, it can't be the reason either, unlike the GD side of the kitty pool is quick to assume here.

In addition to the copyrighted images and in spite of RobTop's assertion otherwise, it does indeed seem that the game was removed for breaking the various Creative Commons licenses of artists on Newgrounds, and by extension, the law -- YES, Geometry Dash was judiciously removed by Steam staff because RobTop was making money off of music used in custom levels, which violated the intellectual property rights of users such as myself, @Xtrullor, @Troisnyx, and @RealFaction, who require in our CC licenses that any commercial use of our music be discussed with us in EXPLICIT detail before it is used; thus Steam saw this through NG artists' flags and removed the game on the basis of intellectual property rights violation. This is briefly glossed over on Reddit, if anyone wants to go over there and give their side of the story. We've certainly gotten enough hate for it.

Now, @TomFulp himself has stated the removal of Geometry Dash from any stores wasn't the solution he hoped for, and that it should only happen as a last resort. Many others of us have said we never wanted the game removed to begin with -- we just wanted CHANGE, change that now appears to be on the horizon.

On that note, @Troisnyx has updated her petition newspost to reflect our collective hope that this hullaballoo ultimately leads to a better Geometry Dash for everyone involved, content creators included -- that we won't have to alienate our fanbase by disabling downloads and/or host our content elsewhere if we don't want our songs used in a paid app that uses our portal as a hosting service, and that theft can be minimized, if not eliminated entirely. This would be a massive improvement, either way it goes.

The problem as we know it exists in the implementation of the custom levels, through which our communities are intertwined. Our music, the Newgrounds Audio Portal, has been used like a cheap whore. It's not a lot to ask for RobTop to sticky something across Steam, Apple Store, and the Play Store for his players to abide by our TOS, not steal shit, etc., and respect artists -- and more importantly, not to treat the site in general as a tool for Geometry Dash. We've been here since before half the GD playerbase was born, and we certainly don't owe our popularity, success, and longevity to one singular game! We gave birth to the viral internet plague that was Numa Numa, for Christ's sake! The GD community is by and large completely ignorant of this and the rampant abuse; most just come to our site, scan the AP for the most popular songs or upload junk, then disappear, if that. Many don't even know we're being taken for a ride in the process.

As with all of this ignorance of our community as a whole, there are those that will say our reaction to all of the problems associated with GD is extreme, that it shouldn't have been taken down, that our petition was disrespectful, that we owe RobTop, that not ALL GD players are the problem and they don't deserve this.

Let me just say that, for one, anyone who hasn't been living under a rock knows the broad abuse of this platform is what lead to our collective outrage, not the law abiding garden variety players, who don't leave a large footprint on the site. For two, it's one thing for all this to happen as a result of a free app, but a paid app that also breaks our non-commercial use Creative Commons licenses, which exist to protect our rights as artists, and this has been happening for 3 years, combined with all the vitriolic sludge defecated all over our community in the process? We've been more than kind, patient, courteous, and accommodating. I think I'll leave it right there.

Regarding the GD takedown and his own reasonings, @RealFaction is expected to release his own statement later, but these newsposts, this diary, this is mine. I don't give a damn whether the game comes back or not; it probably will, and I hope for the thousands of innocent players that enjoy the game that it does, but I will not side idly by so long as it enables -- no, encourages degenerates to abuse our music for pay. My hope is that @Zhenmuron, @BrenTheMan, and @TomFulp are able to put their heads together and make a better, more thoughtful, more legal Geometry Dash for all involved, not just the few featured in the official levels and RobTop himself profiting.

So yes, I did sign the petition and flag all the versions of Geometry Dash which violate my non-commercial Creative Commons Licenses. No, I'm not sorry something got done about it. The game isn't gone forever unless RobTop decides to take the money, run, and prove all the people that think he doesn't care about NG or the GD community right. I just hope something good comes of this, and the idiots making @Troisnyx, @Cank, @Xtrullor, @RealFaction, and anyone else feel bad for standing up, speaking truth, and doing the right thing get their comeuppance.

/end rant

SLICE OF LIFE:
The past few days have been mind numbingly busy. Sunday night, we heard that my friend was getting kicked off of campus the following day by 2 o'clock (thankfully a friend's family got him out of that jam), so @littlemisfortune and I packed up and headed for Scooba. Once there, we hung out with him and a couple friends for what we thought was going to be the last time, sitting on the stage on campus. It was freezing, but an otherwise decent night. Later, we drove out down a country road and made a faltering campfire that would last a good 30 minutes before we'd have to gather up leaves and sticks again. Would have had a party with sparse alcohol if Scooba sold it past 10 PM on a Sunday; however, with the coyote howls that sent us scampering into our vehicles later, it's probably a good thing none of us drank..

Creator's Club met 7 PM the next day in the library and @littlemisfortune had classes, so we did have to turn in pretty early. Ended up sleeping in a car parked in front of a friend's house overnight because her parents were asleep amid notable protest (not from the sleeping parents lol). Ivy, a friend, left us a blanket and some "I wish you would listen to me" facial expressions. Regret not just ponying up 5 bucks to stay in either Women's Honors or G.A. for the night.

Monday morning, woke up feeling like my spine was falling out of my body, lotioned up ye olde psoriasis issues, ate an orange for breakfast which toothpaste made me regret instantly, and headed off to the library wearing the same clothes from yesterday. Other than that, felt like a commuter. I couldn't find an outlet for a bit, so I logged onto NG on one of the school computers, which I still had my login for -- and which surprisingly worked. I figured. My wifi key still did as well on the laptop.

Did my moderating for the day until @littlemisfortune came out of piano lab and gave me some coffee, still hot. No idea where the fuck it came from but it was good, and sweeter than saccharine. Had me wired, so I started on a new song. Last one I worked on in the same vein is embedded below. It's, er, well, about my dad, who passed May 14, 2016, on my also deceased step-dad's birthday. Funny how all that shit works out.

Pretty much the rest of the day was consumed with hanging out with friends on campus, getting bum rushed with people hugging me, eating oranges and nasty protein bars, and awkwardly chatting with old acquaintances, some of which I don't even remember names because that's just an issue with me. After I graduated, things just sort of faded around the edges apart from band. Always remember faces though.

Did the whole Creator's Club jive at 7:05. Most everyone who hadn't quit came. Really a shame the old "friend group" feel and drama cut down on our size. I played my 7 minute magnum opus of a song, 2 other songs were shared, a couple drawings were shown, and 3 or 4 stories were read. Discussed Valentines day stuff, like commission poems, etc. Still have to finalize things to become an official club because our last president left some things off the list, or we can't do any funky trips. I'm hoping the club gets bigger, and I may make a website for it on something like Weebly or Wix. Weebly allows you to edit the html of the page, which I'm decent at, although I might need someone more intelligent like @Mich to borrow for advice, hahah.

Came home late last night. Woke up late today, missed a couple deposits, and here we are.

MOD PERFORMANCE:
Stolens: 97
Non-remix: 8
Total: 105
Bans: 42
Per capita: 2.5

BREAKDOWN:
97 stolen submissions and 8 non-remixes were unpublished for a total of 105 offenses on my paper logs. 42 bans were recorded. This amounts to a 2.5 infraction rate per capita.

CONCLUSION:
My record keeping is a bit of an abysmal underestimate for the past 3 days. This isn't counting a large portion of what I handled on mobile. Considering I had virtually nothing to do but moderate for the past few days, that's a lot of stolen and rule-breaking shit. Infraction rate was higher due to several users submitting large catalogs. So, the infraction rate would have been somewhat lower had I been able to record every infraction, but not because there were less infractions, certainly.

Hoping to keep a more active and accurate record next time I take a trip, for sure.

SUBSCRIPTIONS: @littlemisfortune @maorrichan @RealFaction @Xtrullor

Thank you!

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Okay, right now I'm still on EMCC campus, so my mod diary is gonna be a little delayed. Probably getting home super late because of Creator's Club. Good news, the friend I was talking about isn't getting kicked out of school so though my voyage is rendered moderately pointless, it's really fantastic news and I'm happy I came. Chilling in the library. Also updated that list of VSTs and will link that here when I've got @Mich's updates in.

<3

EDM364's AP Mod Diary, Page 10

Having some issues with blood pressure today, slept 24 hours. Still entirely hacked about the Geo Dash situation but have some news to cover. Herein this long ass section will be an overview of @Troisnyx's petition, why it was made, my own thoughts, and word from Tom regarding the future handling of the relationship between Geometry Dash and our Audio Portal to come, as well as how the game itself is a catastrophe of intellectual property rights' violation in its present state. Also some advice for those of you who choose to disable downloads on your tracks until this is all dealt with appropriately.

Last time you heard from me I linked @Troisnyx's petition to remove Geometry Dash from app stores, which netted an absolutely explosive response from Newgrounders, Geometry Dash players, mods, and staff alike. It probably could have directed its ire better, since it's not just the community that's the problem; it's the shitty mangled tether that hitches us together, the custom song feature, the abuse of which endangers our site, and the profiting from which also violates a lot of CC licenses in the process -- but it said quite a few things which needed to be said, imo.

I've made my position clear: I don't care whether GD gets removed or not so long as something gets done, which has since been promised. The jury is out whether Rob will hold up his end of the bargain, but no one can deny that Newgrounds staff has been exceedingly cooperative and accomodating in spite of everything and this has been a long time coming.

Since I signed the petition, an additional 60 some odd signatures have accrued ranging from reluctant to enthusiastic to vehemently angry yet all very much disillusioned with the 3 years of shit the Newgrounds community has put up with. There are now 100+ comments on @Troisnyx's post, ranging from full support to vehement opposition and offense. I don't speak for @Troisnyx or anyone else, but I figure I should clarify the actual purpose of that petition -- to actually get a response, which it did -- and why I myself signed.

No, it wasn't because I think the entire GD community is represented by the thousand flecks of shit that wreck our site and endanger our future. I signed that petition because I can't stand the idea that RobTop gets to take advantage of musicians like me every time someone puts up a level, and most GD players I've encountered seem to think we all should be grateful for the strain @Zhenmuron's irresponsible implementation of these levels has put on us, as if all of our popularity and prestige is owed to this stupid game and we should be happy to see our art treated like dollar store cologne. Someone tried to tell me today that @Dimrain47 owed his popularity to GD, too. Bullshit.

Now, ad revenue from the free version might go to one or two musicians partnered with the ad companies, but you know as well as I do, Rob is making bank after GD 2.0+, and the musicians by and large are not making jack shit. NG isn't even getting compensation for the broad use and abuse of the entire Audio Portal as a hosting service -- and certainly not the users working on custom levels so he can keep selling the game indefinitely as is, without having to make any additional levels.

Let me explain how and why this is a problem. All music on NG is released under a CC license, meaning all songs on NG are licensed property of the submitter. Stolen content of course voids this license entirely, i.e. copyrighted music or NCS music submitted by someone other than the creator, but this isn't what I'm getting at. There are all types of CC licenses on Newgrounds, many of which are NON-COMMERCIAL USE ONLY. Use in Geometry Dash completely violates the terms of these licenses, since RobTop is making money off of Geometry Dash, meaning USE IN GD IS NOT FAIR USE!

So, Rob is making MONEY off of misery, violation of intellectual property rights, as well as his players' collective naivete about the mechanics of music and $$$. Until now, most of us were under the impression that next to nothing was being done about this. Fortunately, we were wrong; it's just that it's happening VERY slowly.

The NG staff and purportedly Rob are working together to fix the current theft issues, as well as the annoying need to disable downloads entirely if you don't want your hard work used to line someone else's pocket or worry about broken licenses you'll never see compensation for -- many of our users have been forced into this, such as @Xtrullor, as an extreme example. He has faced ridiculous abuse from the GD community.

For some like @Dj-Nate, however, it's not as much an issue; they don't mind their having their music featured in a paid game pro-bono, or haven't had the misfortune to find out about it. On this note I'd like to clarify that if GD were totally free, with no ads, I'd have no problem having my music featured, same as I don't mind having my music featured in works on NG because Newgrounds benefits from the ad revenue. I'm NOT okay with Rob getting ad revenue from levels using my work without flipping NG or myself a single penny, especially with all the damage his community is doing to us, and the disrespect that has been shown to our site's artists, all while I'm not making a dime, myself!

And let's not dismiss that if Rob were profiting off of music from some big wig like Skrillex, the lawsuits would be quick, and GD would be dead.

That, or the Big 3 would seize the rights to it like they did to Grooveshark. Go ahead and Google that if you didn't already hear. It's pretty spooky, especially if you recall that Grooveshark's creator ended up myseriously dying not long after he pledged to keep fighting the record labels' monopoly on music, after plenty of lawsuits which held him liable for offenses committed by his users. Don't think Rob wouldn't get treated the same.

We at NG don't have the kind of money to pursue lawsuits or fight them. If we did, it would be put to use funding the artists we have on site instead. However, with GD players uploading Skrillex songs to our portal by the day and the fact just a couple DMCA's and some follow-up lawsuits could put us under, it becomes abundantly clear GD has not been and probably will not ever be a good thing for us if things don't change. We will be the ones that get sued to death for hosting the content Rob is making bank off of!

That's why I signed the petition, not because I hate GD players or RobTop himself, but I hate the way in which custom songs were implemented so thoughtlessly as to not only completely take advantage of our site without any consideration to how our CC licenses work -- rather than just "oh, music I won't have to shell out a penny for monetizing!" -- but also without explaining beforehand to his community, who knows nothing about us or our contributions to the net as a whole, that their disregard for our rules and regulations could break not only our banks and the site as a whole but also the cash cow he's been riding for the past 3 years in the process. They don't know the legal implications of what's happening here!

Now, in regards to the petition, we all know full-well it's unlikely the game actually gets taken down, and that might actually be a good thing, but if threatening that cash cow was the only way to get change, fast, before it kicks us in the ass for good, it's worth the trouble. Better than sitting idle with our thumbs stuck up our asses complaining.

Now, all being said, some changes @TomFulp and @BrentheMan been thinking aloud about on our end to help users like @Xtrullor and @RealFaction, who have had to disable downloads on their own tracks rather than have them used/abused, is an in-built option for AP submitters to enable or disable tracks for use in GD, sort of how our CC licenses work, since notably, disabling certain IDs in GD alone has not stopped the theft and reupload of tracks, and shady users seem to just steal whatever they can get their hands on anyway. Unfortunately currently, that change is not possible without entirely disabling downloads until future updates from RobTop's end.

This has apparently been in the works for quite a while but atm we're in the dark. @TomFulp has said on the issue, "However if GD updated to use a JSON call we set up for it a few months back, then we can use that to control access - waiting to hear if it is using that currently or not, otherwise it's something that could go into future updates." He also mentioned a bulk feature to work for our compositions, so we don't have to go one by one and disable or re-enable. This should be handy for users like me who have a pretty big body of work.

Others have mentioned that NG is going to face a lot of backlash from ungrateful twits over on the GD side of the kitty pool, so with that in mind, I have a little something to say... I mean, other than that those users can go fuck themselves into a less entitled state, realize we have a right to do whatever we want with our content, that NG is not a file-dump for GD, and before dropping that scathing 0 star review, they should probably read this.

USERS WHO DISABLE DOWNLOADS ON YOUR TRACKS: Please be aware that if you're getting reviews from GD players giving you shit for it, you CAN and SHOULD flag them abusive. Users are supposed to be reviewing your track, not your CC license or advertising that some site, game, or app exists, and reviews like "FUCK YOU FOR DISABLING USE IN GD GAEEM!1!1!" are all kinds of rule breaking!

Back to GD, we're also hoping RobTop will implement some banners and questionaires on his end in English AND Spanish to let his users know that it isn't cool to steal songs just because they aren't already here, how to properly use the Portal, etc. I'm not sure how the hell anyone could miss this one here, but who knows.

I'm slightly less optimistic about more banners and popups users can click through since most users, even the Spanish speakers (most of whom are taught English in primary school), seem to be just trying to disguise their theft rather than not knowing it's against the rules. HOWEVER, getting them to understand that they aren't going to just magically GET AWAY WITH IT BY BEING SCOUTED might help.

Ultimately, my hope is that some power is given to the Portal. It's our songs being used and often abused, and we deserve a say in how that happens just as much with third-party apps as we have here. If something as simple as this can happen, maybe I'll start thinking that we don't need that petition. As long as we don't have that option and Rob is still turning our hard work into his $$$, not only is the community wrecking our site, but the game is also robbing us and breaking the law (in the case of non-commercial CC licenses). That's not acceptable.

Now, moving onto my day.

SLICE OF LIFE:
Not much doing. Have spent most of the past couple of days sleeping. Losing appetite. Did however get some video editing done. Went to bed yesterday around 8 PM. Woke up today at 4:47 PM.

MOD PERFORMANCE:
No. Thefts: 44
Music Maker Jam: 3
Ear-Rape: 2
Total: 49
Bans: 36
Per capita: 1.361

BREAKDOWN:
Of 44 thefts, 43 were for GD. 3 Music Maker Jam tracks were also for GD and used the same dubstep bassline sample. 2 submissions were ear rape "How-To" songs. Most users were one-off, fire and forget offenders, with most giving incriminating or gibberish descriptions. A few obscured names. 49 offenses per 36 offenders equates to 1.361 offenses per capita, which would seem like a marked decrease in theft but in actuality is about the same judging off of what I've seen @Exedor go through.

CONCLUSION:
Same shit, different day, just hoping to bring light to the situation.

SUBSCRIPTIONS: @littlemisfortune @maorrichan @RealFaction

Thank you!

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