The Issue with Attachments
 

Some of you may have seen the thread from SB. In case you ignored it or weren't there, here it is again. My idea is to have all of the various attachments on Concerthall (sheetmusic, etc) hosted offline, so as there isn't as much stress on the admins and the server. Miles even made a journal entry about the problem and there are plenty of people here that don't take too kindly to the problem, so to speak.

Also, there needs to be more intelligent discussion in here. The majority of people come here, request something, get it, and never participate in discussion. Or, they come here, request something, request it again, whine about not getting it yet, request another upload site, etc. Sure, downloading sheetmusic or recordings is good, but what about discussing what you're getting? Our community is deteriorating because of this. The other sections have lots and lots of discussion. But why not this one? Thoughts?

Also, remember that the #concerthall IRC channel is a great place for music discussion.

Additional Spam:
55 views and no thoughts? The lack of discussion in this thread highlights one of my points exactly.

The fact that this thread has been ignored until now speaks volumes. Those that frequent the Musician's Library are clearly not interested in change. Speak your mind if you object, otherwise change will be implemented without your consent and surely you'll bitch to no end then.

I, for one, feel that attachments should be disabled and all file-hosting done somewhere else. A running index of what has been posted can be made and maintained and requests to re-upload can be posted. Similarly, for those of you that are as adamant and hardcore about this as you seem to be, why not take your own damned money and pay for your own server so that you can leech and allow leeching as much as you want? Please, this shit isn't cheap and I'm frankly surprised that it's gone on as long as it has without complaining.

Really, though, when TWO threads greatly contribute to a delay in uploading information, that says something.

Be a little more considerate, at least.

Also, where are our mods and why isn't this thread marked important and stickied?

Also, look at the amount of dead threads in the Listening Room, and even Musician's Library. The whole Listening Room is dead, actually. When the "Identify the Composer" thread was active, and maybe some of the others, it was better. But now it seems that mindless leeching has taken over. There needs to be some serious attention to this situation before Concerthall gets overrun even more with leechers and a lack of discussion.

hey maybe they thought they could get some sheet music, this is a serious issue, but it won't be easy to solve either... I mean concerthall has had its ups and downs but it still was mainly about exchange so it's about time something happens to make the situation better, but to be honest Concerthall is already overrun by leechers I rarely post any requests or anything different since I don't share interests with the majority of the userbase of this forum, or better yet none.

As much as I hate to say this, concerthall is the reason I ended up here, at some point I was one mindless leech that lurked for quite a long time and I still practically do that(lurking, leeching not as much) but solving the attachment issue is the best way I can think of making things better.

I see no reason why these kids can't learn to use an FTP like the rest of us did.

Personally I think we'd do well to shift attachments to another location or FTP since it's unfair to expect the rest of GFF to accept our space requirements when most of us (myself included) don't contribute anywhere else on the site.

I also think the rather holier-than-thou stance adopted by many of those pressing the issue might be putting some people off. Plenty of people here only want to be active in the sheet music and recordings threads, and the fact is the moderating team, especially Face, have given their reasons (numerous times) for not wanting to force a change.

If people without any power here want to try to inspire change, that's all well and good, but I rather feel "Come on this is IMPORTANT why aren't you talking about this you morons?" style threads aren't going to get much done.

Okay, I'm moving this to Board Support where more people will see it and leaving a redirect just in case for more Concert Hall goers to join in this discussion.

The condition of my hands won't allow me to make any long posts right now, but I have to say this is a bothersome and somewhat complex issue. It's not like I haven't looked into it and tried to solve it before, but the results never met my expectations.

Just don't forget there's two sides to this argument. Yes, such an amount of mindless leeching on a forum striving for quality discussion is bothersome. Yes, few leechers actually show any gratitude or even courtesy towards the favour that GFF is doing them, and some are just outright disrespectful (cf. the Tsobanian incident during the downtime).

Yet, on the other hand, the little VGM-centered sheet music sharing community that CH used to be would probably never have expanded this much were it not for our "acceptance" of leeching and the availability of attachment space. During the time it grew with little regulation, CH attracted countless leechers, but also dozens and dozens of valid contributors, whose gathering made the appearance of some pretty rare and interesting stuff possible.

I've always thought of leeching as a necessary evil. If for 100 leechers we get one boonsen or one Lousy, then by all means it is worth it.

I've also come to accept that not everybody is actually interested in discussing anything, and that trying to force people into it would yield poor results. So long as people contribute to the community, both words and files are fine. Recently my reasoning has been that if we want the discussion side of CH to develop, it ought to be carried forward by a few core members (Dull, you two, Wafer et al.), hopefully with the random passer-by joining up now and then. I believe many people have the potential to be interested but just stop at the "whatever, this place looks dead" first impression. Better prove them otherwise, especially now that GFF is back in business for good.

As for the attachments themselves, I don't think they'd actually be that much of a problem were it not for the indifference or lack of courtesy towards GFF shown by many concerthallers. I'd rather work on the latter part than remove the attachments altogether.

Damn, this came out longer than I intended.

And how would any of those things change if files were simply hosted off-site, Face?

Did you happen to see Miles' journal entry? If he has a problem with it, clearly it is an important problem. I think both the indifference and lack of courtesy and the problem with the large attachments both need to be worked on. We're using up like 25GB! How much do you think the other parts of GFF are using up? Nowhere near as much. I don't think it's fair, even if there is no issue with space. And besides, the recordings are hosted off line. Why not the sheetmusic? People download both things about equally, and no one has complained about the recordings being hosted off line.

The thing is, after the last two or three crashes, I asked the administration each time about the sheet music attachments, suggesting they be hosted off-site if space was an issue. And, each time, I was told it wasn't, that they could be kept on-site. And suddenly this becomes a huge problem and we're under fire. Make up your minds, guys.

As for me, eh, I don't care either way, since I was about to resign from moderation as soon as GFF was restored anyway. So I guess I'll let you guys have fun with this mess.

I've left a 10 day announcement throughout Concert Hall and Other Requests in light of the redirect getting bumped off the planet.

Well, we know that Miles, the site owner, who pays for the server out of pocket, is unhappy with the amount of bandwidth being taken up by sheet music. In all other parts of the forums, attachments are managed by FTPs and sites devoted to providing free bandwidth for file transfers.

When Miles addresses his concerns about the amount of bandwidth he has to pay for, people in here start accusing him of being 'disrespectful' and get all butthurt. This place isn't free. He has a right to be annoyed.

I think the biggest problem GFF at large has with the concerthall is how it is its own separate little community within a community, i.e. there is no link between the Concerthall and greater GFF aside from the shared webspace. They really feel that the concerthall forum should really have its own website and server, and be run by a separate owner and staff. In fact, when the forums were still paid for by bobo, Minion had tried to sever the concerthall from GFF at large and turn it into a unique community free of the larger boards.

When people here are using a large percentage of the communities resources and they don't invest any money, it can really create a bad vibe. You know, people who aren't contributing to the community in any way, are the biggest bitches when their resources are no longer available. Can you understand the frustration here? I mean I try to defend the concerthall community as necessary, but it becomes increasingly difficult in light of this sort of behavior.

The obvious solutions are 1) All of you cheap bastards donate money to help pay for the server costs (it costs $40 just for one urtext, so that shouldn't be such a big deal 2) Find ways to host the sheet music offsite and be smart enough to figure out how to access FTPs. Geez louise, it isn't THAT hard to do. 3) Split off and start a separate community. You'll have to pony up cash but this might be a great arrangement.

thoughts.

Thanks for that. People there need to see it and God knows how many threads would have bumped it off and this thread would be even more ignored than it already is.

Well, the library of attachments has grown exponentially since the last few crashes occurred. There have been many contributors, many of them who have posted tons and tons and tons just by themselves. I remember when I first came to GFF, the sheet music section was nowhere as large as it is today. I could see how it wasn't a problem then. But now I think it is getting out of hand and some change needs to occur.

I personally don't care if the concert hall people want to leech all day long. That's fine with me. That's the culture of this part of the boards. But I can't see why it would be so hard to FTP this stuff.

Maybe I'm not remembering this correctly, but wasn't there once an announcement about not posting anything that hadn't been specifically requested? Of course sometimes the only way to find new music to play/listen to is to get something you didn't even know existed, but I found that worked well enough when the sheet music community was smaller and there weren't so many attachments all over the place.

There's been a spate recently of people who contribute a LOT - but I mean megabyte after megabyte of unrequested sheet music, musicology texts, and even some things that are pretty worthless (in most circumstances) as posted - violin sonata parts without the piano accompaniment, for example.

While the flood of stuff has been good for those of us in the Concert Hall looking for anything new, the trade-off has been that it all takes up space, and we've hit the sharp edge of that now.

Additionally, Face, if you're still planning on resigning your moderator status, I'm sorry to hear it and I'd like to say thank you for the patience and fairness you've shown in dealing with all the Concert Hall problems.

So their opinion changing between the last crash and this one constitutes not being able to make up your mind? Perhaps if you asked Miles more than once a year it might not seem all that sudden.

To be honest, unless Miles comes out and basically says "There is too much of this shit, PLEASE move it off site", I could really care less since I don't go to Concert Hall. On the other hand, if you guys like these forums so much, wouldn't it make sense to try to make the experience better by moving at least SOME of it offsite?

I agree with Deni and Rat - most of the FTP community knows beforehand that if you want something you post it to sendspace or browse an FTP. Can you imagine what kind of bandwidth this place would accumulate if the MyStuff posters posted their stuff as attachments?

It's not hard to use an FTP server at all whether you're hosting or browsing. If everyone else can do this with no problem, concert hall should be able to do the same if only for the sake of keeping the boards alive and being a bit more lax for the owners of the site so everyone has the opportunity to post and share.

Listen, JRE started this thread because we're trying to come up with a SOLUTION here. When something is decided, there will be an announcement. Btw, parts are not useless. A violin part for a Sonata is great for a violin part. String players don't care about the piano part while trying to read through heaps of sheet music. That is for the pianist to worry about.

I said 'pretty worthless in most circumstances', not 'totally worthless altogether', and like you say, we're looking for a solution so I'm unsure why you're trying to school me on performance practice. Since I happen to have an MA in music performance the attempt isn't needed or appreciated.

You're part of the problem I had with the attempts to stimulate discussion that were going on before the recent crash, since you'd post in a discussion thread but also add something like 'Keep uninformed and idiotic opinions out of this thread'. I'd imagine there were more than a few cases where people didn't bother posting anything at all since they didn't want you immediately jumping down their throats in an overserious and overcritical manner (like you did just now, as it happens).

Enjoy your resignation, Face. And try to be mindful of your health, and don't make long posts over things you have no opinion on when your hands are recovering.

Bandwidth (or transfer) is not the issue. In fact we have even more of it now that we've switched hosts.

Disk space is actually getting tight since we're at 73% usage (it's another 30 dollars per month if we want to tack on another 50GB) but VGMdb is also using its fair share, so I'm not complaining there.

This issue is actually quite simple, there's no need to overcomplicate it. Miles is annoyed at having to upload 26GB, so he makes a journal entry about it. I'm annoyed at the attitude displayed by some Concert Hall members (and so are some of the regulars), so we reply to it. Now that all the stuff is uploaded and GFF is back and running, the issue just boils down to the fact that we could actually run out of disk space with all these attachments, and it's time you guys found an alternative solution.

I've been thinking about what I wanted to do about the attachments to save space (especially since we're currently limited to 50GB of space on this server). I could either just fork out the extra 30 dollars a month to gain an additional 50GB of space for our server or I can start deleting older threads or attachments from the concert hall. I like the 2nd idea a bit better because if we can manage off of 50GB for awhile it would save me an additional 30 dollars a month. I would like to up our server space eventually as vgmdb grows but for now I think we could live off the 50GB for at least a year or two.

Right now GFF's attachments alone currently take up about 21GB of our total server space, and I bet a majority of those are attachments that are from 6+ month old posts in concert hall that aren't even being read anymore. If we cleared out attachments in concert hall that are 6+ months old it would probably free up a huge amount of space. Bandwidth being consumed to download these attachments doesn't do much damage at all. We have a 3000GB monthly bandwidth limit here and in the past with LayeredTech that was 1,600. And we never had any overage fees.

LOL U HAVE TO DGREEZ INTERNET IS SERIUS BUZINESS ETC. Lighten up a bit, champ.

People said some pretty stupid and ignorant things, and additionally, people started posting a lot more when they were provoked into using their brains.

Truthfully, I speak tongue in cheek a lot but I do get tired of the negative attitude of a lot of musicians, both composers and performers, MAs or not. You don't believe me, go read that computer assisted composition thread. I spent most of my time reading responses being permanently in **facepalm** mode. If you have a real personal issue, you can just PM me about it but this really isn't the place to discuss this sort of thing.

So ya, I still think that moving the concerthall to a separate server that is in no way affiliated with GFF, is a potentially valid solution. I haven't heard many responses on this front, but if anything, Dbin's response is a really accurate reflection of how the general attitude demeanour of concerthall posters drastically differs from that of the rest of the community. I'm not saying this is the answer, but I'm just putting the idea forward to see how people both from the Concerthall and GFF as a larger community feel about this.

Edit: Hey Miles, what about moving sheet music attachments into Private FTPs or maybe integrating the Sheet Music into your VGM db project in some way? I mean if you are going to start removing sheet music attachments, perhaps you should give people a week to acquire everything they want before it is removed?

Split from GFF:

+ 95% CH's don't venture outside CH or give a care for the rest of GFF.
+ Relieves huge burden on GFF admin and servers.
+ Easier to manage a smaller community. Streamlined admin and decision making process. Less consultation required for any changes.
+ In the long run more reliable downloads than FTP or file sharing sites/programs.
+ Allows room for growth and more freedom of options.
+ General enthusiasm and support?

- Requires a person or persons to pay for and manage a server.
- GFF staff and Blah (especially Blah) provides amazing (very amazing) technical support. Will be incredibly hard to find someone of equal calibre.
- A separate Concert Hall will take a good month to establish and possibly much longer to recreate the same setup and features as current GFF.


I'm all for a split, but the question arises... who PAYS?


Also, since money is an issue (it always is), why haven't we brought up a discussion on possible donation schemes?

God, stop being reactionary. No one here is asking for CH to fuck off and never come back. We just want them to learn to use the FTP servers.

Great post. Since almost nobody from Concerthall has donated any money, it is safe to assume that they don't have money to pay for a separate server. Still, you bring up some interesting issues and I really wish more concerthall people would actually get involved in this discussion since it affects them. You know, they'll all show up to bitch if all of the sudden, their precious attachments start to disappear.

Is there any way we can have a few people manage the sheet music and make torrents for it or something? $30 a month is a lot less than running a server? Is it really a lot to ask Concerthall people to donate money if they want their sheet music. Like I mentioned earlier, it costs $40 for a Barenreiter Urtext of the Prokofiev Piano Sonatas. Like I bet people download way more music than just a collection of sonata.

Deni: People have actually suggested the concerthall move onto its own separate server, and that is a potentially legitimate solution. I really don't think Mersenne is whining. Rather he is considering the pros and cons of that possible course of action. You should be happy concerthall people are actually saying something.

Whether or not my posting style's different from that of the wider community, I'm just telling you I reckon your posting style prevented discussion rather than inspiring it, that's all. No need to get all personal about it (this really isn't the place for this discussion though, of course) ^_^

Regardless of that, I think your suggested possible-solution of moving the whole shebang offsite is a good one and it seems like the benefits for GFF altogether will be excellent. Ever since the site passed out of Bobo's hands it seems as though it's been run much more for the community as a whole to keep up with all their friends on GFF - and I don't really see what it is we Concert-Hall-only types actually DO for the community rather than hog file space.

As Mersenne pointed out, there ARE negatives, but just for the Concert-Hall-only people and I think we should be prepared to accept those. One thing I would ask about is the legality issue. As it stands, this is GAMINGforce, and obviously plenty of things apart from games get discussed here. It means the Concert Hall is kinda 'hidden' when it comes to people just out looking for sheet music, and given the ever-increasing copyright clampdowns, that's good for us. Setting up a separate site just for sheet music and recordings downloads might be a bit more obvious, but this isn't something I know much about - does anyone have any ideas about this, or is it a non-issue anyway?

I wasn't suggesting that that someone is asking CH to leave entirely. Neither was I trying to be reactionary.

Every idea needs to be weighed up - my putting it out on the table for discussion. If you think that the only solution is to get people to learn FTP servers, that doesn't contribute much to discussing why FTP is better or worse than other options.


EDIT: I'm not a technical wizard, but if one of the issues is disk space, could the CH attachments be stored on a separate harddrive owned by a CH member(s) but connected to the main GFF harddrive via WAN or some direct connection?

To agree with Rat and Mersenne, I don't think those of us defending the idea of a split are being reactionary. If nothing else, I think most of us are aware that floucing off of the site with a cry of 'FINE I'M LEAVING AND TAKING MY FILEZ WITH ME STFU' wouldn't make a blind bit of difference to the community and the upshot would just be US losing out and no-one else :)

I just want to make this clear again, as you must be referring to me here: Even if bandwidth really was an issue (and Bigblah now said it isn't), there's nothing "disrespectful" at all with addressing such concerns. What I found disrespectful about it is exactly what Face has mentioned-- we've been told numerous times that attachments aren't an issue, but we're still getting kicked in the butt for them without warning.

Maybe I read too much into it. In any case, I'd rather just let this rest now.

Regarding the possible solutions, I've said on SB that FTP servers would be the easiest and best solution, definitely preferable to Mediafire etc in my opinion. There's nothing difficult at all about learning to use them.

Alternatively, we could continue using attachments, which would get deleted after a while, and use FTPs for long term storage. This way, people who only care about new stuff or requests don't have to log onto an FTP each time, but those who are interested in the "archive" aspect of the thread can still find all the stuff ever posted.

Except you haven't gotten kicked in the butt for it. And this is the warning. Making your entire point, you know, without merit.

Doesn't Zergrinch have space on his Dreamhost account dedicated for Concert Hall uploads? Dreamhost, for a low price, provides a ridiculous amount of space and transfer which is great for sharing purposes (although you can't run an active forum on there because CPU and memory are limited). In fact I'm using my own account as a VGMdb backup.

I really don't mind going the delete attachments in there after 3-6 months method I mentioned in my post. It wouldn't be that hard to do and the unused old attachments wouldn't be taking up space anymore. I don't want to be the bad guy and say you can't share music sheets anymore. I don't mind it at all. The only thing I don't like is all the space it's taking up and it's really my fault for not saying anything before it grew to the size it did.

It would make more sense to have some people in the concerthall in charge of managing the attachments. They could host all the old music on an FTP and have only the current material available on the boards say dating maybe a month or two back. This makes the most sense in my mind.

Miles, what do you think as far as the negative sentiment towards the concerthall from certain prominent members? Do you think there is a larger problem or is it just idle complaining.

It's the same sentiment towards My Stuff leechers, really. Business as usual.

Yeah, pretty much. The mass majority of us were ftp leechers of My Stuff at one point. So in the same vein there are bound to be music sheet leechers or Concert Hall-only folks that will eventually venture out and become a part of the community. Music has always been a big part of GFF and having a section for actual performers is something we really ought to keep.

Having some sort of organized archive ftps and attachments that are flushed every 3 to 6 months would be a very good idea. I wonder if we should give them their own My Stuff subforum for ftps/etc. to keep them from sinking under all the My Stuff threads and confusing all the sheetmusic leech newbs. war r mah sheet muxix ftpeees?!n i no seeee

SheetStuff?

I think the general concensus is that FTPs become the norm in Concerthall. We should probably stop quibbling about possible solutions and start thinking about how to put this plan into action. A lot of us have already agreed that this is the best option for relieving the stress on GFF's server. The 3-6 month flush idea is great too. I've been to forums that have that same policy and it has worked without a hitch. And a reupload thread where you request things that had been deleted would be necessary as well. So hows about we start enacting some of our current decisions? Or are there any objections still?

So be it.

My opinions are as follows:

• I want CH to remain, as it's a powerful draw for members and seems to generate some decent Adsense money. I don't like how it's so segregated from the rest of GFF, however. I'm aware that most of the visitors probably don't give two fucks about videogames or recycled 4chan jokes but the place shouldn't be an island, just the same. Unfortunately, I've no idea how to improve this problem.
  
• I agree that the disk space issue is foremost; filesharers in other forums are strongly encouraged to host their files offsite. Many people run excellent FTPs while others use Sendspace/Megaupload sites. These are both fine and I don't see any reason why the standard for filesharing in one forum should be shunned in another.
  
• There has been some unrest about the post quality in CH. Though I don't think we're ever going to reach Political Palace-level debates, I do agree it needs improvement. To that end, I support stronger enforcement of anti-spam standards, to the point of making examples out of repeat offenders if necessary. It will probably be an uphill battle but I don't believe "I like Tchaikovsky." constitutes worthwhile discussion.
  
• The only way to enact profound change and have it noticed is to make a dramatic gesture of it. By this, I'd like to purge all the attachments at once and restrict their use from now on. As much as people will protest, letting old attachments remain under a grandfather clause will not encourage reform.
  
• I want a moderator who is very active in Concert Hall, one who knows the ins, outs and who's-who of the place. I've heard mixed accounts of Waferballs' activity and though I'm not pointing any blame in his direction (CH is a big chore!) this forum won't improve under a laissez-faire watch. I'm not asking for any nominations from members, nor am I promising that there will be a new mod, so hold your keyboards. But I might poke around for input. If we're going to overhaul CH, the changes need to be enforced from the start.

That's where I stand on it all.

I vote that we go the FTP route and remove the attachments from GFF once everything has been set up.

It's easier to upload and download from an FTP than it is from Rapidshare.

I'm gonna go the purge all attachments over 4 months old route and see if that makes things better (which it should) and then do it regularly every month or two. This will pretty much eliminate the issue of them taking up so much space. You guys can still post requests as attachments. I don't care. Just remember that they won't exist anymore after 4 months.

I give it a week before I fall through with it but if you guys need more time to go back and download the rarer sheet musics let me know. If you'd like a FTP subforum to share a huge bulk of them all at once I can create one for you.

Have the attachment auto-deleting themselves after a month or two -whatever you think more sensible-.
You will hafta say goodbye to the sheets index, but life is so: "Win some, lose some".....;)

If we go the route of FTPs or upload sites, it might not be gone forever. And besides, the index might act as a good database once it is "useless". It guarantees that someone in the community will have what you are looking for, which means that if it isn't reuploaded after you request it, someone is a greedy bastard (instead of it plain not being on the internet or available from someone). So all is not lost with the index.

I appreciate the way things are going now. 99% of the sheet music has probably been downloaded by active members anyway, so I figure it shouldn't be a problem to get most of it up on an FTP even after the attachments get deleted. So is there anyone among the CH regulars who could easily set up a private FTP?

I admit to not knowing too much about FTPs (just how to access and leech off them, somewhat). What would it require to set one up, exactly?

I'd be happy to set up an FTP with what little I have, but it would only be up when I'm home and not using my computer.

Well, you ought to have a computer that's online continuously for several hours a day (obviously the longer the better) and an Internet connection with a decent upload speed. Apart from that, all you need is an FTP server program (there are free ones available), configure it properly, and you're good to go.

Unfortunately I'm having trouble with my router disconnecting me at irregular intervals for no apparent reason, so my connection is not the greatest for an FTP atm.

Well, I have all the necessary things for an FTP. I have a great university line and I have a semi-good line at home (when I'm there). And my computer is continuously on. If no one else would like to volunteer, I'd be willing to do it.

That works as long as your university doesn't freak out over you hosting an FTP. But based off how much these attachments get downloaded you probably wouldn't use up enough bandwidth for them to throw a fit.

Here is a guide on how to set one up if you wanna give it a shot:

http://www.gamingforce.org/forums/be...-tutorial.html

I think I'm going to go for it if no one else would like to volunteer. I use tons of p2p software, torrents, etc and have never been caught and gotten no notices, so i think it should be fine. Well, here comes the long haul of getting everything on the FTP...

I think having an FTP repository as well as month-old attachments is probably the best solution. That way you don't have to teach newbs how to upload sheet music through an FTP, so the barrier to contributing is low. And if a newb wants to download files, he'll have the motivation to learn how to use an FTP.

Did you guys need more time? If not I'm deleting the older attachments later tonight.

I think it should be fine now. If people missed some things, they can request a reupload in the thread.