Ideas for improving ILLMUZIK

[Armani]

okay, If you really do care about illmuzik.com , please take your time to read this and reply, as its only to help illmuzik

I think the greatest thing that illmuzik lacks right now is loyal population, like @K-waz , @Danswift , @2GooD Productions , @DEEZ BEATZ , @C4NTK33P5T1LL , and many more that i forgot to mention, the members that most of us know, and at least talked to them once somewhere on the ill.

Actually the reason i wrote this was that last month, one of us had a heart attack and we were really close to losing one of our best people we have here, and that made me see if any of these people leave the ill for some reason, they wont be replaced easily...

This is why i say "Loyal" population. when you take a look at illmuzik, the first problem that you see is that illmuzik doesnt have enough people in it. that seems right but in fact, it's Absolutely wrong, If you look at the introductions forum you can see there's and immeasurable amount of members that signed up every year, but the only member we can always find in shoutbox is @OGBama , or on most of the topics the only guys that reply are @Drago Zetić , @ConspiracyMuzik and maybe sometimes other people than the ones i already mentioned.

The easiest way to understand what I say is taking a look at the forum topics Like this one, if u look at the right side, the most active member you can see is Fade! that's Horrific, and the problem i see in the first look is that most new members post 1 or 2 stuff in the forum, sometimes send beats to the battles and showcase and that's it, they throw the ill away like dirty toilet paper.

I'm not asking you to be active on the ill 24/7, if you're reading this you're probably one of those who care about the ill and reply to threads/shoutbox at least once in a while. what I'm saying is we need more guys like you, if only 5% of the members on the forum were as active as fade is, the ill would be Way, Way more powerful. (im not talkin about the necessary admin posts like posting showcase starter & battle results)

Now the reason i wrote this is to gather the actual members of the ill and the ones who care about it, to brainstorm on How this problem is gonna be solved. by the way if i didn't mention you, I'm sorry, i can't remember all names at once.

I personally gave some ideas for the ill before, like the battles timer and illmuzik on youtube, but still Imma research a lil bit myself and then give my own ideas in the reply section. if you found another way to look at the problem or even Any other problems that you see on illmuzik, feel free to mention it.

Thank you for reading this.

 

[2GooD Productions]

This has been an issue for many years now, I personally think its a sign of the times and hip hops place in the entertainment sphere.
The reality is, hip hop just isnt as popular as it used to be. Social media has changed the way people communicate and entertain themselves. The world just isnt the same world it was 20 years ago. I dont think there is a damn thing any of us can do about it. We can try to be innovative in how we sell ourselves, but economics 101, supply and demand. Too much supply, not enough demand.

We used to have a good selection of night clubs playing hip hop & rnb, we used to have Yo! MTV Raps, we used to have Tim Westwood, Dj 279, Dj's used to play us the best new music. All that has changed. Hip hop no longer has that support network, things have moved on.

From what Ive seen on ill recently, the thing keeping it going is the battles. There is still healthy participation in the battles, a shame that participation doesnt extend across the rest of ill.

 

[OGBama]

Hip Hop's @2GooD Productions place in entertainment is that its popularity has been upended by artists doing everything except making art e.g. social media antics i.e. meltdowns, rants, beefs, etc. and it's all fodder for tabloid culture and a while back there was an article about how Hip Hop was popular in the streaming realm via Spotify but not much more.

I don't long for any good old days regarding the music as music serves different purposes for different listeners plus the good old days weren't pristine, but I wonder how execs managed for decades to sell a genre of music they, thanks to a Billboard poll, hated for so long, second to Country?

Consider most people's casual relationship to all music genres and you get Hip Hop's support system being questionable.

Part of me loves this music so much I want to create it, but I intend to leave producing to someone else.

 

[2GooD Productions]

I dont think the artists are at fault, the industry changed. The labels and execs are the gatekeepers to who makes records and gets played or who doesnt. The industry was stuck in the past and wasnt prepared for the internet, they clung to their old business model and when they adapted to the new landscape they fucked it all up. Sample costs went stupid, it became less about albums and more about singles, the 360 deal was born, a quick return on investment instead of long term, flash in the pan artists that nobody will remember in a few years let alone decades. And the way people consume entertainment and how they get their entertainment changed everything. Society became fast food, fast entertainment, we are so pampered by convenience that people can have a weeks shopping delivered to their front door, they can stream a movie without having to go to the cinema. I think convenience and having everything on the internet changed everything, combined with the greed of a corporate beast that literally priced itself out of relevance, has resulted in the state of all music now, not just hip hop.

 

[ConspiracyMuzik]

I really dont think think the problem is with Hip hop. I think the problem lies in basic production as a whole. The producers on this site that are active most of the time are dedicated. We have honed our craft. We will more than likely do this for the rest of our days if we can. I know I will. There are always around 190-200 guests on illmuzik. I honestly think they dont think they are good enough. Or they dont take it seriously. @ArvinArmani maybe we should promote Illmuzik at music production schools. Like the Art Institute, Full Sail etc. If we do it that way, we are somewhat guaranteed to get fresh young producers. As I have said before I had no idea this site existed. Google search brought me here. A flyer from my music school, or even like a local open mic here in memphis could bring good members. I guess what im saying is active promotion for the site. Is that something that could be possible @ArvinArmani @Fade @OGBama

 

[Danswift]

As I have said before I had no idea this site existed. Google search brought me here.

This is true for myself, also.

I've only been around for a short while but In the meantime I've mentioned that this place is a dope site to a few of my scratching and beatmaking buddies from another forum that I'm a member of so hopefully they'll also find their way here at some point.

 

[crog85]

As far as participation on illmuzik, im sure I can speak for myself and a few of the other members here... I dont contribute nearly as much as i should, but the older we get, life starts to get in the way... job, wife, kids, owning a home, etc.

Between work, chores around the house, eating, sleeping, and showering there isnt much time left in the day to do much else... maybe if im lucky Ill get to work on a beat for a few min before bed, but usually i only have time to work on music on the weekend...

 

[Fade]

This is a good thread, @ArvinArmani! I agree with all of your posts so far.

Side note: someone on here had a heart attack!?!? Did I miss something? What's going on?

Here's my take:

ILL started as strictly a hobby but gained a lot of popularity quickly because at that time a production forum was really needed. Since it grew, I guess in a way I wasn't ready for it. Yes, I'm guilty of not promoting like I should but a big part of that is income. And especially now, we don't generate a lot. Like the saying goes, "you have to spend money to make money".

As far as participation, it's exactly like @2GooD Productions said. It's always been an issue, even way back. Actually, we used to be really busy back in the day on here but most of the discussions were non-production related. Basically, a lot of producers would come here to talk about whatever - news, sports, etc. but it just happened to be with other producers and beatmakers.

When social media came in, that's what changed everything, and not just for ILL. Most forums closed because everyone was just posting on Facebook. Think about it - instead of searching the internet for something you're interested in, most people can just go on Facebook and find a group that is interested in that. They're already signed up to FB so there's no need to come to a site like ILL and create a separate account. Yes, there's an option to allow people from FB to login here but I don't use it. The main reason is because of the way we do our battles and I use your userid and username for the battles. If you login through FB that creates a mess for me.

But I don't think that's a big thing anyway. The main thing is people are lazy and most people will stick to the big websites. It's kind of like Walmart opening a store and as a results a lot of local businesses are forced to close as a result because Walmart is taking all their business.

The other thing is yes, the beat battles are the main thing, whereas before the forums and discussions were the main feature here. Most people today just come here as a place to post their beats in the Showcase or a battle because they want feedback, that's it. This reflects on society - communities are dwindling and I think this is what's happening online.

For promotion, I've always asked that the least everyone on here can do is spread the word as much as possible. If you can donate that would be awesome as well! But the first thing is to get people to know about ILL and to visit. There's still the issue of getting them to participate in discussions though.

When you see who's online, it shows members and guests. There's another one for bots but I removed that because there's no need to show that. So when you see "guests", that's really how many non-members are on here! That's a great thing but I guess some people don't see the need to sign up. I thought about restricting some content for guests, but I don't want to force them to sign up either.

Hip Hop is not the same. When you talk about music it's really changed a lot and again, the community aspect is gone pretty much. I remember when DJ battles were huge in the 90s and I got to meet lots of DJs online, it really felt like a community. But now that's pretty much extinct. For production, where do most of them go? Beat selling websites. Why? So they can make money, of course. In other words, it's all about them, that's it.

It's great that they're selling beats and all that, and that's a separate thing from ILL, but it seems that's all most of them are interested in: selling beats, posting beats, and battling (to get recognition). In other words, it's a very selfish world.

So right now I'm still left scratching my head. I've tried so many things over the years and it would be great to get many more viewpoints and ideas from all of you because ILL needs help to move forward. ILL relies on all of you to visit here and get in on discussions. I know forums aren't as popular as they used to be, but if Facebook or any of those other social sites disappeared (or became paying websites! - Imagine that?), everyone would be looking for a place like ILL.

 

[2GooD Productions]

I had a heart attack just over a month ago, was keeping it on the dl.
Watch this space, Facebooks days are numbered. They are going full thought police and are destroying themselves.

 

[Leon Morina]

okay, If you really do care about illmuzik.com , please take your time to read this and reply, as its only to help illmuzik

I think the greatest thing that illmuzik lacks right now is loyal population, like @K-waz , @Danswift , @2GooD Productions , @DEEZ BEATZ , @C4NTK33P5T1LL , and many more that i forgot to mention, the members that most of us know, and at least talked to them once somewhere on the ill.

Actually the reason i wrote this was that last month, one of us had a heart attack and we were really close to losing one of our best people we have here, and that made me see if any of these people leave the ill for some reason, they wont be replaced easily...

This is why i say "Loyal" population. when you take a look at illmuzik, the first problem that you see is that illmuzik doesnt have enough people in it. that seems right but in fact, it's Absolutely wrong, If you look at the introductions forum you can see there's and immeasurable amount of members that signed up every year, but the only member we can always find in shoutbox is @OGBama , or on most of the topics the only guys that reply are @Drago Zetić , @ConspiracyMuzik and maybe sometimes other people than the ones i already mentioned.

The easiest way to understand what I say is taking a look at the forum topics Like this one, if u look at the right side, the most active member you can see is Fade! that's Horrific, and the problem i see in the first look is that most new members post 1 or 2 stuff in the forum, sometimes send beats to the battles and showcase and that's it, they throw the ill away like dirty toilet paper.

I'm not asking you to be active on the ill 24/7, if you're reading this you're probably one of those who care about the ill and reply to threads/shoutbox at least once in a while. what I'm saying is we need more guys like you, if only 5% of the members on the forum were as active as fade is, the ill would be Way, Way more powerful. (im not talkin about the necessary admin posts like posting showcase starter & battle results)

Now the reason i wrote this is to gather the actual members of the ill and the ones who care about it, to brainstorm on How this problem is gonna be solved. by the way if i didn't mention you, I'm sorry, i can't remember all names at once.

I personally gave some ideas for the ill before, like the battles timer and illmuzik on youtube, but still Imma research a lil bit myself and then give my own ideas in the reply section. if you found another way to look at the problem or even Any other problems that you see on illmuzik, feel free to mention it.

Thank you for reading this.

Well this is coming from an absolute new member and noobie producer in general but I'll just give my perspective on it. When I see people asking questions and guys such as 2Good Productions giving such lengthy and detailed answers I'm intimidated and feel like I couldn't give any piece of advice worth anything. So if the loyal users made some more posts teaching new users things and getting groups of noobie producers together it might make new users more willing to participate

 

[Fade]

@Leon Morina that's a good point and I think that's one of the issues we've had for a long time. Maybe a section for newbies to post in?

 

[2GooD Productions]

Well this is coming from an absolute new member and noobie producer in general but I'll just give my perspective on it. When I see people asking questions and guys such as 2Good Productions giving such lengthy and detailed answers I'm intimidated and feel like I couldn't give any piece of advice worth anything. So if the loyal users made some more posts teaching new users things and getting groups of noobie producers together it might make new users more willing to participate

The last thing I ever intend to do is intimidate people with knowledge. I try to give as much information regarding the topic as I can so people can better understand the mechanics or concept being discussed. Music production is a subject that has many rabbit holes and can be overwhelming, hell just figuring out how a synth works is a complicated subject. What you may lack in "expertise" you may excel in imagination and creativity. Im just a cynical old fuck who has been making music for many years who just wants to pass that knowledge on to those on the come up. We were all noobies once. I understand the value of communication and networking in the world of creativity and art, and in this modern self centered world creativity and imagination is dying, hard. Participation opens up opportunities for collaboration and introducing each other to each others audiences. Teamwork always beats playing alone.

 

[ConspiracyMuzik]

@2GooD Productions it is a fucking conspiracy lmao..... and in reference to what @Leon Morina Said I agree that there can and should be a section entirely for newbies. And a dedicated producer or producers for “listening analysis”. Making that section purely educational may be good. Then @Fade maybe a newbie beat contest can be made. Only for those not confident enough for the major battles. I’ll volunteer to help judge if need be for the newbies.

 

[Armani]

@Leon Morina that's a good point and I think that's one of the issues we've had for a long time. Maybe a section for newbies to post in?

or maybe member ranks ... i mean the way levels work on video games like wow, the older members/members with more battle points/reaction score/messages get rank points (Same as XP in vid games) , so an advice deez beats gives wouldn't be trusted as much as the advice a muppet like me gives ... also you can give the rank points a attractive name like "OG Points" or something like that, i haven't grew up in the american ghetto (or any ghetto) so i dont know what exactly is valued as respect there, but u probably know what is, so name the points something gangsta, not "Rank Points", that'd be too simple in a rap forum.

then maybe u can make a battle that only people with higher ( or lower ) ranks can enter, or make a league for every rank, and only the top 5 in gaining rank points would go to the next rank, and if someone doesn't gain any rank points in a week he would relegate. this one is a little complicated to make though, so ... yea. nevermind

you can also add Medals, like make a little panel at the right side of name ( the part that u wrote the battles won by the guy, for example for me it has AOTB, Beat it up! and battle points ) for medals , for every 3 battles won give the guy a medal or upgrades his medal from bronze to silver to gold to platinium to diamond, or something like that.

the main point of this medal system is giving a medal to Everyone, that shows their ranks. like the guys has 8 medals for battles already, on the left side of these 8 little medals, theres a big one that shows how long this guys has been in the ill. and on the left side of that put a medal that only appears if the guy is an ILL OG , this way people kinda know who to trust.

 

[Armani]

@2GooD Productions it is a fucking conspiracy lmao..... and in reference to what @Leon Morina Said I agree that there can and should be a section entirely for newbies. And a dedicated producer or producers for “listening analysis”. Making that section purely educational may be good. Then @Fade maybe a newbie beat contest can be made. Only for those not confident enough for the major battles. I’ll volunteer to help judge if need be for the newbies.

That's not a good idea in my opinion, because if u do that, its like opening a kindergarten in the ill, also winning battles won't be that valuable & respectable, i mean when someone wins a newbie battle, its like being the best kindergarten student when other people are in university, and that kinda divides newbies from bigger producers. i don't like that, because when i came to the ill i wanted to prove myself to the best, not newbies.

IF we could've gave 5 votes in beat this battles and we were free in dividing our votes between beats, like giving 3 votes to some beats and 1 vote to 2 other beats, or all 5 votes for 1 beat or ... then showing how many votes everyone got and giving the results like a league table, so the guy who didn't get runner up or winner would know if he's on 6th place or 24th place, so that would make a competition between newbies while they were in the same battle as the winner was. then maybe u could make the monthly leagues idea and the member with most total votes in the month would get a little extra medal and some extra rank points.

 

[Armani]

ok @Fade , i got an idea. i officially spent 5 hours on this ... lol

we know that people are selfish, and we cant change them, what we can change is the ill. what if we make a seasonly tournament, and only let people that had the highest battle points gained in the last 3 months in.

Beat it up gives 5 to the winners and 2 to the runner ups
AOTB gives 6 to the winners and 3 to the runner ups,
Warzone gives 10 to the winners and 4 to the runner ups
Beat This! gives 20 to the winner and 7 to the runner ups.

so each months we've got a table like this that resets at the end of the month.

PTS : Total points, the main thing we get sorted by
BTLS : Amount of battles the guy was in, if the scores tie, this decides who stands higher.
WRZ/BT!/AOTB/BIU the battles i already mentioned, the number on left shows how many time the guy won that battle, the number on the right shows runner ups.

so with this system, u pick the top 4 of each month, which gives u 12 players. and for last 4 battlers, pick 2 of the 5th placers that have more points, pick the 2 others from the illiens with most total points in the season (excluding the ones that qualified already). if any of the qualified illiens were absent, u can use a beat from the other 2 5th placers.

That way you'll have 16 battlers for battle of the season. this battle will have 2 parts, and it will be streamed on twitch by you.

First part would start in 22:00 of 2 days before the season ends and end at 00:30 at last day of the season, & second part would start at 23:30 of the same day and end at 01:00.

The first part would contain the first & second stage which takes about 2.5h. (30m intro+outro, about 22 beats, 3m each +2m for Voting and 1m for you/viewers opinions after the voting is closed. (not everybody is gonna send 4 beats))

The Second part is the exciting part, where there are only 4 Illiens left. this one should take an hour. this way its not long enough to be boring but not short enough to seem stupid. (35m intro+break between semifinal & final+outro, 30m for beats, (6 beats, 3m Each +3m for votes & you/viewers opinions.)

Voting in the season battles will be this way : when you stream you listens to 2 rivals, then open the voting for those 2 beats on the site and close it after 2 mins, illmuzik members can vote only.

Then the winner should get a little prize, like twitch bits (a donation currency on twitch, 1 bit = 1 cent), Real money, a Software, a VST, something on the website or...

Battle of the season wont be on winter, instead u pick the 3 winners and 3 runner ups of the first 3 season battles, 3 people with most total points in the year, top 3 of the last season leagues. these are 12 people by now, i'm not sure how to fill the rest.

The prize on this battle should be bigger, and the time u spend streaming this battle must be more, and later when u got richer, you should have a famous retired rapper sitting next to u & givin opinions & voting. for me the dream guy to have sitting there would be Sway in the morning. but the more realistic one would be Alchemist or Havoc or Scott Storch or ... idk.

Having a famous guy there is actually really important, because that gives u a massive heap towards popularity and once u get popular, u can get chiching money everyday.

To vote on this battle, member must have at least 20 total messages sent and 10 messages sent during the past year. unless he buys a premium membership, a premium acc frees him from any kind of shit like this.

For providing the budget, i think the ill makes money offa ads, if u add ads to twitch and yt, double the ads on the site and get donations/bits/subscribes from twitch u can get the budget to buy the rewards (and more). and trust me, twitch can easily make money for u , i saw a homeless guy do nothing and earn 500 dollars in 1 week, or a girl was sitting and talkin with the viewers, then someone donated 100$, she got so excited and cried, so he did it 3 more times and she cried harder everytime. it was fun to watch her cry for money but Anyways, she made 475 dollars for doing nothing. (some other guys started to donate money to see her cry again xD)

Twitch is gettin more popular everyday, so its the best opportunity to bring illmuzik to it.

on the other days ypu should stream at least once a week and make at least 1 yt video. if u do that after 1 year u got about 50 yt videos that get views everyday and you can earn money offa each one of them for eternity.

Please Tell me Every single problem u see with this idea, so i know if i logically solve all of them, you have no reason to not do all of these.

 

[Fade]

@ArvinArmani This is mad confusing, I need time to understand it all, but it's interesting! I'll let you know. Thanks.

 

[Memento Beats]

@ArvinArmani I agree with @Fade. It's very confusing when it comes to the rules you presented.

However, I agree that we should invite some well known beatmaker to judge or to advertise such battle. It would generate a lot of traffic and I'm sure that more people would come here. But the question is how to invite such person like let's say The Alchemist? It would require a big amount of money to make him even remotely interested. I doubt whether he would agree to do that for free but I might be mistaken. I don't know him so maybe he could do it for free. We can always try to contact him. We don't lose anything and eventually we can find a way to promote this site.

Overall, I think that Illmuzik is rather famous among beatmakers/producers if @Fade manages to get sponsors like Image Line, Izotope etc. for the Battle That so we would definitely not be on the losing position when it comes to any form of negotiations.

As far as YouTube and Twitch ads are concerned it's a very good idea to promote Illmuzik in this way. I'm not much familiar with the cost of advertising on Twitch and YouTube but I think the good idea would also be to use Facebook Ads since you can target a very specific group of people with them and they are not that expensive. But it would require a creation of some marketing campaign that would make people interested in beat battles and to stop them from scrolling down. With Facebook Ads you can do it in a very detailed way. You can for example create 9 videos in which you present some elements of your work. You can upload video no.1, 2 and 3. Videos no.4, 5 and 6 will be displayed if a person who watches the ad spent let's say 20 seconds watching any of the videos no. 1, 2, or 3. So in that way you can play with it as you like and as I mentioned above you can target very specific group of people.

It is worth giving it a thought. But as I said rules that you presented are a bit complicated.

 

[Armani]

if you're having trouble understanding Any part of it, please specify, it's really simple in my eye, maybe i haven't explained it well.

 

[Memento Beats]

@Fade Have you ever thought about giving people a chance to earn money in battles? I know that in Battle That prizes are quite valuable but have you considered implementing similar solution in regards to other battles? I've seen such solution when I visited Rocbatltle sometime ago. For example when you sign up you would have to pay small amount of money let's say $5 or 10$ in order to compete with others and the total amount of money would be divided between the best contestants. I mean battle points are nice but they serve only as an indicator who won the biggest number of battles and who's doing best. Could you please give me your insight on this idea?