::|CONTENTS
- Restrictions on submit
- How to use
- it2moai
- Downloads and Mirrors
- See Also
DON'T YOU LECTURE ME WITH YOUR THIRTY DOLLAR WEBSITE, or 🗿, is an online sequencer with a selection of instruments and meme sounds - 191 of them as of April 2023. It was created by
@TheRealGDColon, announced via
this tweet on Jan 26, 2022, and is available at
thirtydollar.website.
Think of this format as meme Mario Paint Plus, but with a surprising amount of versatility... oh, and all 12 notes.
Restrictions on submit
Your submitted file should be the .🗿 file that can be loaded on the page. Note that there is currently no wav/mp3 export, so you will need to play back and record the audio yourself for renders, for example using Audacity.
How to use
Most of the basic functions of the sequencer (add, delete, pitch change, duplicate, and drag around) are indicated on the tool itself, as well as the available commands you can implement, but for convenience some of the more important functions will be listed here.
*
Combine↔️: You're probably going to want
multiple sounds to occur at the same time. This is how you do that. You will learn to love it, because it's ALL YOU HAVE! You can keep chaining sounds but the more you do it, the laggier your browser will likely get. Huh, is this format PC performance based? :thinking:
*
Set Tempo⏩: Sets a "sounds per minute" value, can go as high as 10,000. This means that a
"beat" is equivalent to one sound/sample icon.
*
Pause⏸️: Set a number of beats for the sequencer to pause before it proceeds to the next command. You can also use • (the very first option in the samples list) to pause for one beat.
*
Loops🔁 &
Targets⏺️: You can specify
loop points as well as indicate how many loops should occur before proceeding. Multiple loop points can exist, it will always seek out the most recent point. Targets work similarly as
"go to" points: set a Target, and later on, set a "Go to Target" command to go to the chosen Target. You can have multiple Targets, identified by number.
*
Set Volume🔊: Sets the
global volume of all sounds to be played after it. Note that even if you use it in the middle of a combined sound, the resulting combined sound will all have the chosen volume. Can be set as high as 200%, but it's already easy to clip with this thing so this is not recommended.
*
Individual Note Volume: A recent (2023) feature addition to the tool. Hold Ctrl, mouse over a sound, and use your mouse's scroll wheel to
raise or lower the volume of that sound only! Can be set anywhere from 0% to 400% in increments of 2, or potentially set more finely if modifying the .🗿 file in a text editor (see below). An absolute godsend of a new feature for this sequencer, so much so that it prompted a new version of the it2moai converter (also shown below).
*
Stop ALL Sounds❎: Does what it says on the tin. Unless this command is used, all sounds will fade (i.e. the whole sample will play every time). There is currently no way to stop a single sound.
The most fun part of this format, though, is that it is secretly an
MML gateway drug: the exported .🗿 file is in
plaintext and therefore easy to modify. Due to the lack of a select-multiple-objects function OR copy/paste function OR undo function,
modifying a .🗿 file in a text editor is the recommended way to copy/paste large chunks of sequencer data quickly. Many of the sounds are also represented with emoji, but you could pretty easily get the hang of straight-up "MML" sequencing this format. Cool meme format huh?
it2moai
It may come as no surprise that users of battleofthebits.com have created a converter script to turn a template
.it module into a valid .🗿 file that plays back on the site. First written by
kleeder in 2022 and later modified for the current* version of the site by
kilowatt64, it2moai is a Python script that allows you to completely bypass using the web tool interface except to record your render (and check your work).
* current as of April 21, 2023
it2moai v0.1, by kleeder, can be found
here - 131 sounds, no effects, tempo approximated via global tempo setting, Note Cuts will "Stop All Sounds" by necessity of the tool
it2moai v0.2, by kilowatt64, can be found
here - 191 sounds, individual note volume and global volume are implemented, samples in the template .it are categorized and tuned(!) where applicable
Downloads and Mirrors
Different versions of this tool can be downloaded
here. There are currently two archived versions: the original one from January 2022, and an updated version from May 2022. Userscript-Rewrites for smoother playback are archived there too.
Note that these are deprecated versions now; they contain fewer sounds and are missing the individual note volume feature that was added in early 2023. There are basically no patch notes for this tool, so keeping up with this is a pain!
In case the original page dies, working mirrors can be found here:
Version 1:
https://kleeder.de/files/moai/%F0%9F%97%BF.html
Version 2:
https://kleeder.de/files/moai2/%F0%9F%97%BF.html
(pls tell kleeder if this one stops working, thx)
These versions have the userscript added, so you don't have to deal with plugins.
See Also
-
Mario Paint
- Example tracks:
original Twitter thread, or
BotB moai entries
-
Know Your Meme article for more info
