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Post by Gregory (inactive) on Nov 24, 2020 20:08:17 GMT 1
 United States of Song 2021
Update ThreadHey, everyone! It’s been over two months now since the last edition ended. It’s also getting close to that time last year when we began thinking about the upcoming contest. 2021 will be our 6th contest, and the host state is Minnesota. Although nothing is official, the theme I want to use would tie the current atmosphere of America and the local culture of Minnesota together. Like Alaska, people think of Minnesota as a northerly, cold, Midwestern state with a few cities but mostly farmland and forest. In 2020, people thought of Minnesota for different reasons, and while I will not dive into those things here, you may see subtle references (because it is important to talk about them). So those things will be in mind when the theme is announced. Anyway, the only thing I want to discuss in this first post are some potential changes for 2021. Every year, the contest evolves a little, and hopefully for the better. I want to share some ideas for changes, and if you have any feedback on them, please share below. I won't make big changes without feedback. There’s only one guaranteed change: • As mentioned in the 2020 Final Results video, we will no longer restrict the number of territories that can be present. That means we could have anywhere from 50 to ~56 songs each edition. Territories in the USA include Puerto Rico, District of Columbia, American Samoa, the US Virgin Islands, Guam, and Northern Mariana Islands. - WHY: It just seems fair. With Puerto Rico voting for potential statehood, and with 2020 being a watershed year for inclusivity, I don’t want a contest that forces places to not participate, even if they send an adequate song.
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So, the things listed below are possible, but I wouldn’t do them if they were unpopular or destroyed the contest’s integrity. The reason is, we have another USA-based contest on this forum now that is (almost) full of participants. I previously thought that would be impossible. I thought few people on this forum wanted to be in a contest with all the American states. So, it proves that the contest could be better, and that I could be friendlier toward forum participation. To do that, here are some possibilities. • Perhaps a big change/proposal to the format of the contest: Adopt a similar system to the now-archived USAVision, where you could reserve up to four states for which you would be responsible for deciding the entry. You would still need to confirm your song choices with the contest manager(s), and meet all the guidelines. - WHY: Most states have their songs chosen by me. I’m willing to let go of that insane level of power if it means we could open the contest to more people. It would allow a wider variety of music to be sent, but it could also deteriorate the authenticity/feel of the contest up to this point.
- Unchosen states could still be filled by songs submitted from our song selection committee, so not reaching 50+ wouldn’t happen. However, some users may not like their entries competing against ‘filler entries’.
- You would not need to keep the same states every year.
- We would institute a “Big 5”, like ESC. These five states could not be claimed by a single person, but everyone is open to submit songs to them for state selections. These states would likely be CA, NY, TX, FL, and TN. Unlike ESC, they do not automatically qualify to the Final Round.
• Another format change that could be cool: the winner of the previous contest (in this case, Yoav) has the ‘first refusal’ at choosing a song for Minnesota. - WHY: We could do this even if the above change doesn’t happen. It would give more of a ‘reward’ for winning than there is at the moment.
• Eliminate the minimum song length limit of 3 minutes. - WHY: It’s inconsequential, and songs may be harder to find from this past year.
• Loosen up the Billboard chart requirement rules. - WHY: We ran into an issue last year with a couple songs where Wikipedia was (surprise!) showing inaccurate information. Also, Billboard is losing its efficacy because of how music is listened to, and it could get too difficult in the future to use Billboard to restrict participant song choices.
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The rest of the rules could stay the same, but I’m willing to discuss any other potential changes with you all if it means we can make this a better contest. For example, is the public voting percentage too large? Do we need a committee? Does Greg need to stick to a schedule or be fired from his job?  I will be posting about the contest more prominently on Discord in the future, because I am really proud of what we were able to accomplish last year, despite all the chaos. But I didn’t get to do everything I wanted to do, so it’s time to look for ways to improve. Thanks for your time and be on the lookout for an announcement soon regarding the opening of song submissions. Cheers  |
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Post by eurovisionfan23 on Nov 25, 2020 3:44:06 GMT 1
Awesome
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Sel
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They look at me at, like i'm in a crisis
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Post by Sel on Nov 25, 2020 4:20:56 GMT 1
Yesss
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Chante™
NBU Council
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Aijā, aijā / Saldā miegā
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Post by Chante™ on Nov 25, 2020 5:58:01 GMT 1
i’d love to see where this goes from here
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Post by MaRtIn on Nov 25, 2020 9:35:50 GMT 1
I'm excited to see what changes could/will be made for this!
For an annual contest like this, it's going to run under a lot of commitment. One person being responsible for multiple states is a heavy load. I think creating/expanding the song selection committee could make song selections for every state bearable. They would have to be the most enthusiastic for searching for songs. They would have to pledge that the songs they select would be the absolute best entry to compete in the main contest (to avoid bias). Of course, state selections could be organized by the song selection committee if selecting a song for certain states is just too hard.
Loosening up some requirements for songs would be greatly beneficial, and it would broaden what kinds of songs could be selected.
The one thing that I'm the iffiest about is the voting process. It's so easy for some people (like me) to give into bias, and I wonder how we can figure out a way to avoid that?
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Post by Gregory (inactive) on Nov 28, 2020 0:59:22 GMT 1
Loosening up some requirements for songs would be greatly beneficial, and it would broaden what kinds of songs could be selected. The one thing that I'm the iffiest about is the voting process. It's so easy for some people (like me) to give into bias, and I wonder how we can figure out a way to avoid that? Thanks for the feedback! Using Colorado as an example, if we 'claim' states, then you wouldn't be able to vote for the states you claim any more (RIP). Now the biggest problem to that is songs selected by a committee would have a slight advantage since they don't have a user tied to it. But the other option is to claim one state, or no states at all, or just *not* claim Colorado and then you can 12 it all you want . So the option is to control Colorado's entry but not get to vote for it, or don't choose their entry but be able to send a (possibly) biased vote. I don't think there's a real way to prevent bias in a contest. Eurovision itself can't even escape it. The solution has been to bring the public vote into USoS, because unlike ESC (spoiler) a public voter doesn't know which state an entry belongs to. I just don't want to sacrifice seeing all 50 states compete; similar to ESC itself it always bums me out when a country doesn't compete. |
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Post by Batman Beyond on Nov 28, 2020 18:13:01 GMT 1
if you want to have all 50 states + territories, and don't get 50+ people maybe allow people to have multiple states (but not be allowed to vote for their states)?
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Post by Derek on Nov 29, 2020 17:40:10 GMT 1
• Perhaps a big change/proposal to the format of the contest: Adopt a similar system to the now-archived USAVision, where you could reserve up to four states for which you would be responsible for deciding the entry. You would still need to confirm your song choices with the contest manager(s), and meet all the guidelines.
- WHY: Most states have their songs chosen by me. I’m willing to let go of that insane level of power if it means we could open the contest to more people. It would allow a wider variety of music to be sent, but it could also deteriorate the authenticity/feel of the contest up to this point.
- Unchosen states could still be filled by songs submitted from our song selection committee, so not reaching 50+ wouldn’t happen. However, some users may not like their entries competing against ‘filler entries’.
- You would not need to keep the same states every year.
- We would institute a “Big 5”, like ESC. These five states could not be claimed by a single person, but everyone is open to submit songs to them for state selections. These states would likely be CA, NY, TX, FL, and TN. Unlike ESC, they do not automatically qualify to the Final Round.
One issue I see with this idea is that I think the goal should be to end up with the best possible song for each state, and allowing anyone to suggest songs for any state(s) is more conducive to that than having a single person solely responsible for selecting a state's entry. I suppose that if we did end up going with the idea of reserving/claiming states, it could still be possible for people to suggest songs for any state, and those who have claimed a state could take those suggestions into consideration; but I'm not sure I see an advantage of that over the existing system. I guess another idea for opening up the process of choosing songs would be to have a either a small committee making the decisions, or to have some sort of expanded voting on possible entries for more states, similar to state selections. • Eliminate the minimum song length limit of 3 minutes. - WHY: It’s inconsequential, and songs may be harder to find from this past year.
I like this idea. I don't think the 3 minute minimum is really necessary. |
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Post by Gregory (inactive) on Nov 30, 2020 1:23:06 GMT 1
One issue I see with this idea is that I think the goal should be to end up with the best possible song for each state, and allowing anyone to suggest songs for any state(s) is more conducive to that than having a single person solely responsible for selecting a state's entry. I suppose that if we did end up going with the idea of reserving/claiming states, it could still be possible for people to suggest songs for any state, and those who have claimed a state could take those suggestions into consideration; but I'm not sure I see an advantage of that over the existing system. I guess another idea for opening up the process of choosing songs would be to have a either a small committee making the decisions, or to have some sort of expanded voting on possible entries for more states, similar to state selections. • Eliminate the minimum song length limit of 3 minutes. - WHY: It’s inconsequential, and songs may be harder to find from this past year.
I like this idea. I don't think the 3 minute minimum is really necessary. Here's a potential idea/compromise: allow those on the song selecting committee to have the claim of up to 4 states that they have the sole power of? I do want ppl on the forum to feel this is a more "open" contest, but i do understand how you feel. Another possibility is just making the song process more "open" for people to see. I'd have to think how to transfer the spreadsheet to a forum thread or something. As for dropping the 3 minute minimum rule, consider it officially dropped. For good.  |
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Post by Gregory (inactive) on Dec 12, 2020 23:14:27 GMT 1
Hi guys - thanks for the feedback. A lot of this was helpful in determining what to do. The hard part is I got opposite takes from people I trust on certain things, and I don't want to lose their interest. So we're going to do some of what was discussed, but not everything. - The 3:00 minimum time limit for songs is gone; there's still a 4:00 maximum. - The Billboard chart rules have been clarified:- The artist cannot participate if they have had a Top 40 hit on the Billboard Hot 100.
- The artist cannot participate if they have had a Top 10 hit on any other Billboard Hot/Top song chart. So the change here is Top 10, instead of Top 40, for everything else.
- The artist *can* participate if they are no longer part of a group that had a Top 40/Top 10 hit, or if they were only a collaborating artist.
Although Wikipedia is still the best source to verify an artist's chart success, you can try some other resources like racpro.com, umdmusic.com, and and pulsemusic.proboards.com to confirm eligibility - these sites record/archive Billboard charts for (generally) free. Okay, now the big one: -- When the Song Submission period opens, we will now also have a Confirmation period. When the confirmation period opens, you can confirm for one (1) state/territory. This is the state/territory that you are solely responsible for sending the entry for. Before jumping in and doing four, let's just see how one each works out. - Any state with a song selection planned cannot be confirmed with. These states are announced when confirmations open.
(I'm not doing the song battles this year, it was more effort than it was worth.) - You cannot confirm with the host state (Minnesota). This will either be reserved by the previous contest's winner, or *will be one of the states doing a song selection*.
- You cannot vote for the state you've confirmed with. If this concerns you, have someone else joinin as a Jury voter and vote for your song later 0:)
- After you confirm a state/territory, you have a couple options:
A) Send a song to Committee for acceptance.
--- Your song must be accepted by the Committee. If we do not accept it, we will explain why.
B) Choose your state's song from those that have been submitted. Committee will share these with you, and you would get to pick which one.
- The Song Selection Committee will determine the rest of the entries.
-- Please do continue to suggest songs for states/territories, including state selections!! - Song submissions remain open after confirmations close, which is traditionally most of January. By January 31st, we start announcing entries.
- We have to include at least one song from you if you send songs to a state selection (as long as they're valid!)
- The confirmation period will only be open for a few weeks. I won't be posting reminders.
So... If this works out, we can expand the number of states you can confirm with in the future. If it doesn't, then we will revise or return to the old system in 2022.That's my word. - The Song Selection Committee - who is usually Derek , myself (and maybe Tufkai if he's interested?) - will work like this: - Review the submitted songs
- Find and suggest songs for all remaining states and song selections
- After the song submission period closes, Committee will finalize their choices. Each committeemember can "lock in" up to 5 songs that they have the sole final decision.
One thing I love about the selection committee is we have varying taste but usually come together on enough things to agree what is best. This is pretty much how it's worked over the years, with the exception of picking 'favorites'. I don't want to be the person making the final choices for everything, thus the 'lock in' concept - but I don't want to force Committee members to listen to 300+ songs each year.
If anyone else is interested in Committee, send me a PM. I'd like there to be at least three of us.My "pipe dream" would be to have open polls where the community votes for the song for each state. But we just aren't big enough for that. Maybe in 10 years... lol.
So that's where we're at, and this message is already super-long, so I'll finish it by saying that Confirmations/Song Submissions will open probably next weekend. Be on the lookout! Thanks y'all |
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