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 Music Contest 6 Update 2 - 10 Jul 1998               Entry Applications : 458
                                                      Voter Applications : 144
                                                        Entries Verified : 212

>------------------------------------------------------------------ Contents --

         Introduction
         Articles
           Thought Nuggets ............................... Snowman
           On the Map .................................... GD
         Closing

>-------------------------------------------------------------- Introduction --

 Thank you for your feedback on the first Updates Newsletter.  Your ideas
 will help us give you better information, and make the newsletter more
 enjoyable.  :)

 _____Upload Processing

 Snowman has *really* stepped things up!  After you upload your song, it
 will take no longer than 5 minutes for it to be checked.  You will
 immediately be sent an email, which explains the results of the entry
 checking.  This process is completely automated.  Snowman doesn't need to
 be awake, alert, or even clothed -- your entry will be processed
 regardless!

 _____Judging

 Rate the entries.  Decide who wins.

 Does this interest you?  Then it's time to register as an MC6 judge!
 Typically, each judge will rate 15-20 songs per round, and there's two
 rounds.  If you vote, you help decide who wins!

 For more information on judging, be sure to read the judging guidelines
 on the MC6 web page.  It is a complete guide to the Music Contest judging
 process.

 You can register to vote on the MC6 web page.

 _____Don't Miss the Deadline

 Don't miss the entry deadline!  In fact, don't even cut it close.  Some
 uploads are coming to us with problems.  Uploads with problems can be
 re-uploaded, but if you wait until the last minute, you will not have
 that opportunity.

 We want to make it easy for your entry to be verified!  So, please take
 the time to review the rules before uploading.  Use the "checkit" program
 to check your entry.  You can download "checkit" from the MC6 resources
 web page.

 _____Entrant Registration Deadline Extended

 You can now register to enter up until the upload deadline!  The entry
 registration and upload deadline is 15 July 1998, 00:00GMT.  See the MC6
 web page for the complete contest schedule.

 _____Conclusion

 Your support of Music Contest is what keeps the contest going.  Thank you
 for your interest and participation!

 GD / Hornet - [e-mail]

>------------------------------------------------------------------ Articles --

 :: "Thought Nuggets"
 :: Snowman / Hornet - [e-mail]

 _____Don't Disqualify, Recycle!

 As a result of positive feedback, we are taking a new approach to MC6
 entries.  Last year we had to disqualify a lot of entries because the
 songs were over size limit, contained sample text, or were corrupt.  In
 almost all of these situations, the problem was small.  Ideally, the
 entrant would have corrected the entry and uploaded it again.  However,
 we did not have the technology to make this possible.  This year, we
 have a new environmentally conscious motto; "Don't disqualify, Recycle!"

 When you upload your entry, we perform many tests on it.  We check to
 see if the file is corrupt, contains sample text, has the correct song
 title and filename, etc.  With the help of our Checkit and Cleanit
 programs, we are able to detect almost every possible problem.  We are
 even able to fix some problems ourselves!  Even if there is something
 wrong with your entry that we can not fix, we will immediately send you
 an email about the problem.  You will then have a chance to reupload a
 fixed version of your entry.

 Note: Just because we are detecting and fixing some problems, it doesn't
 mean you should try to upload a song that breaks rules!  After all, your
 song might have a problem we've never seen before.  :)

 Last year, only 75% of people who registered for Music Contest 5 were
 able to enter a song.  This year, we want to have over 90%.  With only a
 few days left to upload songs, we expect the /incoming directory to
 remain busy.  Fortunately, we should be able to process your song
 quickly, even if 300 people are trying to upload at the same time.

 [Secret message starts here.]

 Make this weekend your Music Contest 6 weekend.

 Finish your song this weekend.

 Upload your song this weekend.

 This Sunday is a worldwide holiday called the "MC Songfest".

 [Secret message ends here.]

 _____Check and Clean

 Jean-Paul Mikkers and Jeffrey Lim.  If you don't already know the
 names, learn them now.  Jean-Paul Mikkers (also known as MikMak) is the
 coder of Mikmod and MikIT, the most operating-system-portable players in
 the scene today.  Jeffrey Lim (also known as Pulse) is the author of
 Impulse Tracker.

 Part of our job as Music Contest organizers is to make sure that your
 entry is processed quickly after being uploaded.  It is easy to say that
 we should do this, but it is somewhat difficult to actually make it
 happen.

 Since MC6 is an anonymous contest, text is not allowed in your entry.
 We needed a utility that would detect sample text, sample filenames,
 instrument text, instrument filenames, and song text.  I sat down with a
 copy of the .IT and .XM file specs before the contest began and started
 to code this utility.  I had trouble with one of the struct definitions
 for .IT so I found MikMak on #trax and asked him some questions.  Within
 minutes, he offered to write the utility himself.  Within a few days, he
 had finished Checkit.

 Music Contest 6 started.  People started uploading their entries.  The
 Checkit utility was very good at detecting sample, instrument, and song
 text.  However, it started finding problems with many .IT modules...
 problems with sample filenames that were in the module but didn't even
 show up within Impulse Tracker.  Checkit was almost TOO careful.

 We desperately needed a utility that would REMOVE text from entries.  I
 sent a quick email to Jeffrey Lim and asked him if he could write
 Cleanit.  He told us that he was taking exams for University, but
 somehow he managed to write the utility in less than 24 hours!  Even
 more incredible was the fact that cleanit.c compiled cleanly under
 both DJGPP (DOS) and gcc (FreeBSD).  Now we could clean entries after
 they had been uploaded, AND make cleanit.exe available to you.

 Cleanit is saving 1 out of every 5 entries!

 _____Automated Entry Processing

 This year, we've pressured ourselves to improve the uploading process.
 With the help of Checkit, Cleanit, and a fancy new database system, your
 entry is processed within 5 minutes!  If something needs to be fixed
 with your song, you will immediately be emailed about it so that you can
 get a fixed version online.

 This system would not have been possible without all the feedback you
 gave us from MC5.  As a direct result of your suggestions, we have
 custom-built our emails to you so that they are easier to understand and
 make your Music Contest experience a more enjoyable one.

 We are very happy with this new system.  We think you will be too!

 _____Stats

 Using a new Perl graphing library, we are now able to generate some
 fancy pie and bar charts from our database.  If you have not done so
 already, check out the Statistics page.  You can see which countries are
 entering the most entries, and what the distribution is between rookie,
 intermediate, and veteran songs.

 We have some other ideas for fun graphs.  Keep checking back to see
 what they are.

 _____F√n W∩th LΘttΘrs

 In MC5, our database could not handle international characters.  Many
 people had to change the spelling of their names to something like
 "Wedoe", "Stephane", "Hakon", and "Gabor", when they should have been
 "Wed°e", "StΘphane", "Hσkon", and "Gßbor".  This year, we encourage
 everyone to spell their name the way it should be spelled.  [I can't
 think of a better way to say this. :)]

 One of our checking utilities has a subroutine that checks names for
 funky punctuation, like people who say their name is "-=-=*John*=-=-"
 instead of "John".  Unfortunately, this same subroutine also destroyed
 many international characters.  We found and fixed this bug early in MC6
 entrant / judge registration, but there may be a few of you who have a
 name in our database that needs fixing.

 Please check over your registration email and let us know if there is a
 problem.  Email us and we will correct the spelling of your name.  Even
 with a contest as big as Music Contest 6, we are very considerate of
 dδtΓφls.

 _____Goal For 500 Entries

 This year, it is our goal have over 500 active entrants in MC6.  Based
 on how many entries we had last year, we are expecting to reach this
 goal... but not by much.  Our calculations indicate that we can probably
 expect 504 or 505 entries to be uploaded and processed correctly.  For
 some reason, most people wait until there are less than 3 days left
 before they upload their song.  Maybe some world event happens on July
 12th that inspires everyone to track more (MC Songfest?).  :)

 It is a good idea to get your song uploaded as soon as you can.  The
 earlier you upload, the greater your chances are that we can help you if
 you get stuck.  If you wait until the last day, we may not be able to
 help you personally if there are problems.

 The entry deadline is coming soon!

 _____Hard Entry Deadline

 All songs for MC6 must be uploaded by 15 July 1998, 00:00GMT.  Although
 we hope that everyone uploads their tune by that time, many of you might
 miss the deadline.  We can not say it strongly enough... if your song is
 not uploaded AND processed correctly by this time, you will not be entered
 into Music Contest 6.

 For example, say that it is 14 July 1998, 23:59GMT and you are from
 Argentina.  You try to upload your song, but your connection to
 ftp.hornet.org is too slow.  You try to send us an email, but it is too
 late.  You are not entering MC6.  If you are concerned about this
 happening to you, try to find a friend with a better internet connection
 (who is not entering or judging MC6!) to upload your song for you.

 On 16 Jul 1998, I will be attending a 10 day long business conference
 in Brazil.  I will be leaving less than 24 hours after the entry
 deadline.  As a result, entry processing must finish very quickly.
 There is a watchdog utility that will shut off uploading permissions for
 /incoming/MC6/entries at the proper time.  Shortly after that, I will
 break contact with my email for almost 2 weeks.  If you ask us for help
 after the deadline has passed, it will already be too late.

=-----------------------------------------------------------------------------=

 :: "On the Map"
 :: GD / Hornet - [e-mail]

 _____Introduction

 If you have uploaded your entry, and it has been approved, then you are
 on our map.

 _____The Map

 One night, after staying late at work to handle MC6 matters, Snowman and
 I had the idea for our map.  It would be a map of the world, hung on
 a wall, with a small pin showing where every entry came from.

 We went looking for a map, but we couldn't find the right size.  Finally
 we found one that was "good enough."  The map needed to be on something;
 we couldn't tape it to the wall and push a bunch of pins through the
 plaster.  More searching led us to a foam mounting board, which we would
 glue the map to.  So, now we had a map, mounting board, and glue.  We
 went home and started to assemble it.

 The mounting board had a fold-out feature.  We had to fold it out
 completely to fit the map on.  This meant that the map could be
 accidentally bent and folded if we were not careful.  We couldn't have
 that!  We bought eight wooden rulers and taped them to the back of the
 mounting board to keep it from folding.  The wooden rulers also gave us a
 place to tie the mounting wire.  The mounting wire could be hung from a
 nail, and all would be good.  :)

 There was a problem with the map: duplication!  The map showed some
 countries twice, on the far left and far right.  To avoid confusion, the
 sides of the map had to be cut so countries like India and Pakistan
 appeared only once on the map.

 In some circumstances, like with the country of Russia, there was nothing
 we could do to avoid splitting it.  In these cases, we just chose one
 side or the other.

 We carefully measured the map to be sure it was centered on the
 mounting board.  The map is no more than 1 millimeter off center.  :)

 _____Completion?

 The map was mounted.  We hung it on the wall.  Our map was done ...
 except it was empty!

 Do you know how difficult it is to find good map pins in Northern
 California?  Very difficult!  We went to several stores in the area
 looking for small pins that had colored plastique tops on them.  It was
 important that the pin tops were the same color.  There were plenty of
 boxes of pins that were random colors, but no single-color boxes.

 Finally we found the pins we needed in a drug store in Walnut Creek.  We
 bought exactly 525 pins.  Remember, we want to have over 500 entries this
 year.  :)

 Every night we listen to new entries that were uploaded.  Then we put
 pins on the map where the entries were from.

 As more and more entries came in, the pin clusters started to take shape.
 There's a big cluster in America, Europe, and even Russia.  There are
 a few isolated pins in Australia, Brazil, Asia, and South Africa.

 _____What We Discovered

 Yes, the USA has a lot of entries.  Not many other countries come close.
 But, Europe as a whole has more entries than North America.  In fact,
 before this map was set up, we didn't understand this very well.  The map
 clearly shows that Europe is much more densely populated with MC6
 entrants than North America.

 The map project has also been a good geography refresher.  Did you know
 about the disputed border between India and Pakistan?  Did you know that
 Los Angeles, CA, USA and Baghdad, Iraq are on roughly the same latitide?
 Could you easily find these countries: Uzbekistan, Kazhakstan, Sierra
 Leone, and Uruguay?

 _____Conclusion

 This map has allowed us to visualize, in a way that a database never
 could, just how global Music Contest is.

>------------------------------------------------------------------- Closing --

 _____Contact Information

 Before contacting us,

 - read the rules
 - read the schedule
 - read the frequently asked questions

 (or your email will not be answered!)

 The rules, schedule, and frequently asked questions are on the MC6 web
 page: http://www.hornet.org/ha/pages/mc/mc6.html

 Brett Neely (GD / Hornet) - [e-mail]
   General questions and comments

 Christopher Mann (Snowman / Hornet) - [e-mail]
   Registration, entry processing, and voting mechanics

 Jeremy Rice (JRice) - [e-mail]
   Entering hints and judging guidelines

 _____How to Subscribe to "MC6 Updates"

 Mail to : [e-mail]
 Body    : subscribe mc6-updates first_name last_name

 Be sure to substitute your real name for first_name last_name.  The
 listserver will send the MC6 Newsletter to your e-mail's return address.

EOMC6UPD