Battle of the Bits now has an official Bandcamp page. You can find it here: [it will not be linked because the bots destroy it] or by clicking the fancy Bandcamp button on the right side of the website! ^_^


Why?

Upon the inception of Bandcamp, BotB was a relatively early adopter of the site as a place to make available for sale a few choice releases. However, it was mostly relegated to unloading Winter Chip I 7 inch EPs as BotB couldn't do much else with it than that due to licensing issues. That was until the new licensing agreement was implemented. With that, BotB was in the legal clear to upload all future works from the site!


Releases

Currently, each major battle will receive its own release. Beyond simply mirroring entries on another site, our lovely releases help showcase all of you talented BotBrs as well as (hopefully) introducing n00bs to BotB in general!

*When?*

Typically, you may expect a release during or around the voting period of the major battle the occurs after the battle in question. However, a more apt answer would be "when I get around to doing them." But a general rule of thumb is that shorter releases should be early while bigger ones will be late. (because the larger releases take more time, obviously)

*Tracklists*

Plenty of complicated algorithms and voodoo magic are involved in the selection of tracks for our releases, but I can share some general guidelines as to what helps tunes make the cut. First and foremost, scores are the deciding factor; so make sure you vote if you'd like to have a say in things! As you may have noticed, the first place scoring tune is always Bandcamp's "highlight" track on the release. Next, we aim for BotBr variety and balance. Should one BotBr win a bunch of formats in a major chip compo, for instance, the tracklist will need to expand with more tunes to keep one person from overpowering things. Finally, stylistic variety. If a bunch of songs on the cusp of making the release all sound the same, they aren't going to make the cut. As for the track order, it is something I pride myself in. This is not just throwing darts at the dartboard, I do my best to make a cohesive work from start to finish. I hope that some of you can enjoy these releases as such!

*BotBrs*

The artist name for each tune will always be identical to the BotBr name as it is on the site. This is for cohesiveness and to aid outsiders in finding their new favorite artists. If you would like your artist name to be different on the releases, you will need to make a new account.

*Renders*

Bandcamp requires uncompressed .wav uploads for its releases. For this, simply the .mp3 renders available on the track page will be converted and used. The only adjustment to the audio is level normalization so that the tracklist can maintain a consistent volume. Obviously, as the mixing is different for every tune, it is impossible to get the leveling perfect. The goal is then that the listener never has to adjust their speakers. Re-rendering each tune specifically for the Bandcamp release is not feasible and will not be done. Only in rare occasions when the BotBr provides a higher bitrate render than would fit on the site will anything other than the default render be used, and even then, no promises will be made in that regard.

*Collabs*

As of 10/30/17, a syntax for how to present the id3 tags for the artist in even of a collab has yet to be decided on. For now, only the initial BotBr will be listed. Figuring this situation out is not currently a priority. The current format for collaborations is as such: [Artist A] + [Artist B] + [Artist C] ect... ONLY tracks that are listed as a collaboration through the BotB site will be listed as such, anything mentioned as a collab in its description but submitted by a single BotBr will only list the uploader.


Pricing

While it was initially intended for all releases to be free, bots devouring all our download credits on multiple occasions forced a change of plans. Now, we have implemented a very simple pricing scheme. It is as follows:

Singles and EPs (a few tracks)
$1

LPs (album length)
$3

Megamixes (big seasonal battles)
$5

However, the most recent release will ALWAYS be free. Make sure you don't wait too long to download! All money earned goes to puke7 to help fund BotB. However, it should be mentioned that the primary purpose of the Bandcamp site is for promoting Battle of the Bits and all our BotBrs, not to be a source of revenue. Of course a little extra ca$h helps, but that will never be the end game for our Bandcamp presence. (not as long as I'm running things, anyways)


Goofs

Should you notice any problems with the releases: bad audio files, typos, missing artist names, ect... please be sure to mention it on the battle thread so that it can be fixed!


Linking Ettiquette

Due to a recent barrage of spider bots that ended up using massive amounts of BotB server resources by feeding them scraping information, we'll have to curtail normal habits of linking and do something that's more "community friendly."

Please, if you are going to link to your Bandcamp account, do so by a URL shortener/shrinker. Bots were scraping links to such a high extent that they were affecting the output of BotB's hosting. Even better, you could abbreviate your details to like 'bclink', etc. We would not like to disable profiles due to bots swarming your links. lub j00.