[quote=Moseph;18213103]So something kind of weird has been cropping up as of late...[/quote]


Okay, this guy is back, and is decidedly less crazy this time:


[quote][SIZE=3][B]So you think God isn't in Hip Hop?[/B][/SIZE]
So you think God isn't in Hip Hop? Well what do you think about [B][name redacted][/B]? [B][website redacted][/B][/quote]


The comparison here is stark.

we found on CDbaby this one - it's funny, but still true:
http://diymusician.cdbaby.com/2010/10/10-great-tips-to-help-you-fail-as-an-independent-artist/?utm_source=DIYNews&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=102710

10 Great Tips to Help You Fail as an Independent Artist

Article by Scott James of The Independent Rockstar Blog originally posted in Echoes on 10/14/10.

We’ve all seen and read posts and eBooks about how to ‘succeed’ as independent artists and to be honest, I’ve even written a few. But what about those of us who are bent on failure? Those of us who would like to know how to shoot ourselves in the foot as efficiently and painfully as possible? Those of us who would like to be more unsuccessful and confused? Well this post is for you!

Some of these things I’ve done myself, and I can assure you – they work amazingly well! Others I’ve merely watched in admiration as true masters of blunder and confusion have performed their magic before my very eyes.

So here it is, my guide to failure for the independent artist:

1. Steal Your Own Thunder
Got a new CD in the works? Awesome! Make sure you release every version of every demo and every mix you record during the process on Facebook, Reverbnation, Myspace and anywhere else you can find. Try to confuse your fans so that they’re not really sure if you have a CD out yet or not. Don’t set a release date well in advance or plan your promotion to build anticipation. Try to make your release as flat and confusing as possible!

2. Don’t Sell Anything!
You’re definitely going to get signed by a huge label in less than three months anyway, so why bother?! It’s much better to just wait for other people to come in and straighten things out. Taking responsibility for your own career is hard work and it might lead to success, so try your best to avoid it. Try to keep it real and stay as broke as possible. If you have any money then you’ll be less needy and you’ll have more leverage, which could lead you towards success, so stay away!

3. Hide Your Best Stuff
Try to make sure that people have a hard time getting to your best songs. Hide them on your online music players by either shuffling your songs randomly or putting them way down on the list. This will make sure that they’re less likely to get the best possible first impression.

Also, make sure you stop playing your best songs live as soon as possible in favor of new material. Remember, new is better than good. After all, you’re sick of your best songs by now anyway, so why should you go out of your way for people who haven’t heard your music yet? Besides, that would just draw in new fans, so don’t do it.

4. Don’t Deliver For Your Fans
It’s generally best to reach for the stars and swing for the fences as soon as possible. Try to see if you can drag all of your fans out to the ‘big venue’ in town well before you’re ready to play there. That way you can make sure that your fans overpay to see you at a venue that doesn’t care about you and will cut your set short. Bonus points if your fans have to pay for parking. The whole experience should go a long way towards loosing your audience.

It’s always best to make sure your relationship with your fans is based on them doing you favors as opposed to a mutual exchange of value. People will willingly come back to see you if you focus on their experience and deliver the goods, so it’s best to make sure you focus more on having them do you favors.

5. Impress People With the Volume of Your Content
If it’s good to have a YouTube video on your home page then it’s great to have 37! Try to mix in unprofessional and amateur content as much as possible. If you’ve done it – then why not show it! Obviously the big record companies are going to be way impressed when they see just how many ‘things’ you’ve done. If people have no idea how to digest the massive amounts of unorganized content on your page and tend to leave in frustration then you know you’re on the right track!

6. Don’t Tell Anyone Your Name
When people come to see you it’s best if you keep a sense of mystery about yourself. Whatever you do, don’t give yourself away by showing or telling people the name of your act. Try to make them work for it. Remove any visual evidence that you even have a name and try to make sure that if you mention your name you do it in a way that’s garbled and difficult to hear and understand. Bonus points if your name is hard to remember like Anne Kalshzyagrakaviczich. In that case you can tell them your name once just to dare them to try and remember it. They won’t be able to! If they like you then this should piss them off. Awesome!

Also, try and secure a confusing URL for your website that’s spelled strangely and has numbers and dashes and is not memorable. Extra credit if you can make sure that the URLs for your YouTube channel, Facebook page, Twitter account and other social networking sites have nothing in common with each other. If someone wants to follow you then you certainly don’t want to make it easy for them!

7. Don’t Let Anyone Have Anything for Free
Whatever you do, make sure that no one gets their hands on your music without paying you. If more people got a hold of your music then you might generate more demand, so cling to your music with an iron fist. And whatever you do, if you ever do give away any of your music, make sure you don’t get an email address in return. That might start you in the direction of adopting habits that lead to more money and more people coming to your shows.

8. Don’t Facilitate Long Term Relationships
Your relationship with your fans should be all about one-night stands. Anything beyond that will just ruin the experience. If you actually look for ways to stay in contact with them like collecting their email addresses and finding creative ways to engage with them on Facebook and other social networking sites then one day you might wake up and find yourself gaining positive momentum and building a sustainable path of continued growth and success. So make sure people don’t have an easy way to stay in the loop or to find out when and where you’re playing next. If they do find you online, say on your website, make sure that it’s confusing and doesn’t have any dynamic content or a reason or means for them to stay connected.

9. Try Your Best to Be Vague and Confusing When Describing Your Music
When someone asks you what you sound like, try to make sure they won’t understand, remember and/or be excited about what you say. You don’t want to be painted into a corner by a concise and interesting description of your music. It’s best to try and give them a long-winded summary of every way to conceivably describe everything you will ever play. And whatever you do, don’t compare yourself to anyone else to give people a frame of reference. It’s best to tell people that you don’t sound like anyone and that you’ve invented a new kind of music. This should sufficiently confuse and frustrate them to the point that they don’t care to find out any more about you.

10. Talk About Yourself. A lot.
Finally, it’s a good idea to make sure that you don’t talk about anyone or anything else besides you and your career. If you stop promoting yourself for even a minute and start talking up others and remarking about interesting subjects then people might actually start to think you’re a real person and listen to what you have to say and want to hear more from you. It’s best to avoid this scenario by incessantly blasting your ‘friends’ and fans with promotion. This should lead to nausea amongst anyone who decided to give you a chance – a great weapon in your quest for failure.

For bonus points, throw in a few complaints and guilt trips into the mix. This should make sure that even the few people who tolerate your interpretation of how to use social media won’t like you or want to see you succeed.

So there you have it. 10 powerful tips that are sure to help you fail! Use them well and use them often. Try and combine different tips and see just how quickly or painfully slowly you can run your career into the ground.

someone do this up nasty:

[url]http://losangeles.craigslist.org/lac/muc/2036703177.html[/url]

Invest....in what?

Pouring money into "talent" (I didn't check her out so I don't know if she's honestly good or not) doesn't do anything in of itself.

[quote=Xomblies;18262484]someone do this up nasty:

[url]http://losangeles.craigslist.org/lac/muc/2036703177.html[/url][/quote]


First, for posterity's sake:

[quote][B][SIZE=3]FEMALE HIP HOP ARTIST SEEKING INVESTORS[/SIZE][/B]

Music Link [B][ReverbNation link redacted][/B]
Facebook Link [B][Facebook link redacted][/B]

Hot new face to the hip hop scene [B][name redacted][/B], very talented, very real...... looking to take career to the next level only serious inquires only..... No she is not looking to sell her soul...............

[B][Cheesy and obviously airbrushed promo photo redacted][/B][/quote]


I definitely see where you're coming from with your distaste on this one: the photo is lame, and the ad doesn't give you anything more than the same tired cliches you hear every 2 days from whoever wants to make it big that day. The whole "next level" thing doesn't mean anything, but it's such an overused idiom that I basically chalk it up to the expected hype. I've mentioned the problems with stating "serious inquiries" only before, but it certainly doesn't hurt anything.

Beyond that, from the viewpoint of "strictly technical" aspects we're talking about in this thread, it's not a terrible ad. I think a phone number would be smart to leave, and maybe a better idea of location.

But beyond that, the rest is just aesthetics. The picture sucks (the touch-ups are obvious), but it could be worse (we can at least see her face). She gives her name, and she gives links to help you figure out what she's all about.

Would I be inclined to invest in her career? No. In fact, I doubt craigslist is a good place to try to find that sort of financial backing. But I don't see any [I]huge[/I] missteps with the ad itself, just the missing phone number.

Are you seeing something big that I'm not?

[quote=Seafroggys;18262498]Invest....in what?

Pouring money into "talent" (I didn't check her out so I don't know if she's honestly good or not) doesn't do anything in of itself.[/quote]


I'm pretty sure the idea is that you foot the initial bill for recording/gigging and then she pays you back based on future profits. Or maybe it'd be a profit-sharing thing, whatever.

I don't know how common it is in [I]any[/I] small business, but it doesn't seem like there's anything too weird that couldn't be worked out in writing to me.

This next one is interesting. For somebody looking to join an existing group, it hits on all the right notes, but the execution is bad. It's pretty long, so I'll break it up:

[quote] [B][SIZE=3]Another freakin' bass player??[/SIZE][/B]

Let me pay you the compliment of being direct as not to waste your time:

ME: late 40's classically trained bassist. I can read AND play. Have pro equipment and have played everything from classical (double bass) to jazz, funk, blues and my latest gig, trop rock - Buffett covers. [[B][management company name redacted][/B] was our management company so I know the ropes.]

I play all forms of bass, fretless and stand up, guitar, keys, harmonica and percussion...but I'm truly the bassman and don't aspire to be anything else. Can't sing worth a damn...so you should probably hire some hot MILF to front the band...if you know what I mean.

YOU: An established band of like aged contemporaries. Serious about playing, putting on a good show and being "professional" - like showing up for gigs and putting on a good show.[/quote]

So far so good here. There's a bit of personality, which isn't a bad thing. Most importantly, you have a good idea of who this guy is and what he's all about.


[quote]Not looking to start a new band and not looking to share band management/booking responsibilities. The band currently has gigs that pay something to cover the gas and we "all" have enough chops to hang.

Money's not important, playing good music without the prima donna syndrome...is.

I"ll be happy to be a contributing member for the greater good but I don't want to be in charge. I want to set up, play, have a great time, get paid, maybe hang a little with the band and go home. I don't mind ONE BIT, playing Mustang Sally, Give me Three Steps and Brown Eyed Girl until my freakin' fingers fall off because that's what people want to hear.[/quote]

Okay, the "no responsibilities" aspect of this thing might set off an alarm or two, but the recovery is pretty good here, I think. I don't think it's unreasonable to want to be a hired-gun, especially if you're as good as this guy says he is.


[quote]If you want me to play your original music, I’ll be happy to do that…right after you go platinum.[/quote]

Okay, here's the first real interesting one. It's totally cool to want to play covers only. But saying it this way is [I]incredibly[/I] condescending. It comes off as anything from "I know your stuff is shit" to "I refuse to learn any new songs." Not a good first impression to make.


[quote]I'm not a choir boy and don't expect the rest of the band to be. Just some semblance of normalcy (and above average musical skills) will suffice. Won't tolerate drug addicts, alcoholics or other propped up personality types. {Last gig, harmonica player fell over drunk in the middle of a song in front of 300 people. The road crew is still trying to fish my Fender headstock out of his bottom.}[/quote]

This is kind of filler to me. Particularly since "normal" to him might be very different than "normal" to anybody reading this. He also continues to harp on "above average" musicianship, which I guess is fine, but after a certain number of repetitions it comes off as nagging.


[quote]NOT me:
I am not looking for another touring band. Been there, done that…several times. Have the scars to prove it. If the band has more than 4 people...unless the 5th is the aforementioned MILF...I'm not interested. You won't make enough money to cover the gas.[/quote]

Wait, I thought money wasn't important? "Gas money" ain't expensive if you're not touring. Unless you're driving a suburban assault vehicle, you'll probably never need to drive farther than 1 tank of gas in a night. That's what, $20-40/person? So a band of 5 would need to claim $100-200/night. If they're at the level this guy is aiming for, my understanding is that $100-200 isn't in the stratosphere.

Also, keep count at home how many times he mentions having a lead singer he wants to bang. My thoughts: the first time is a joke, the second time is crude, and beyond that I start to wonder about your priorities.


[quote]I’m not looking to fund another band's demo/CD/Studio sessions. Got a stack of those. Over priced coasters at this point in my life.

Let me emphasize this one: I am NOT - AM NOT - funding another band's PA and lighting systems. I am currently “part owner” of four bands sound and lighting reinforcement. Musical equipment depreciates faster than a Kia driving off the lot at [B][local car dealership redacted][/B]. Either the band has it...or "we" rent it but I'm not buying into it. Every band is a temporary gig. Like it or not.[/quote]Look, that recording aspect thing isn't unreasonable. You know how you say that, though? "I am not interested in recording, I only want to play live covers." Phrasing it like this guy has will make you sound dismissive at best, and even more condescending at worst.

But on a bigger note, being a part of band suggests that you should [I]share[/I] in the bands expenses. It's a real a-hole move to show up and expect to never have to chip in for anything. What was that bit about prima donna's again?


[quote]Big pet peeve: I have about one or two charity gigs a year in me. That’s it. Won’t play anything having to do with some inane “Save the Whales, Club the Seals, Hug a Tree or Eat a PETA” rally or fundraiser. I recycle, love animals, hate big oil, hate big anything (well, not big EVERYTHING. Remember the aforementioned MILF? Now we’re talkin’!)

However, just so you don’t think I’m a total heartless bastard…I’ll gladly play charity gigs for real people causes where the money raised goes directly to the people its intended to help. Not the Red Cross or some other organization that will spend most of the money on staff salaries or a new phone system. Nothing would make me happier if I could play a charity gig and see the money collected for some poor family and the organizer turned right around and hand the money collected directly to the persons who needed it. That’s what charity is about, not this 503c, tax refund driven bull shit. I don’t ever need a tax write off that badly.[/quote]

I've read this section a couple of times, and it just looks like you're a jackass. You're looking for paying gigs, nobody is gonna [I]assume[/I] you'll work for charity nonstop. More to the point, don't belittle every cause you can think of. That's a horrible first impression. And it will alienate anybody who believes in those causes right off the bat. Even causes that aren't what you hit on but have similar cost issues. For example, I donate annually to a locate charity that funnels money to keep music education in public schools. The whole [I]point[/I] of that charity is to cover costs of staff salaries and equipment. This ad offends [I]my[/I] sense of charity, and it didn't even mean to.


[quote]A bass player has to know his limitations: Mine are - Can't practice more than once a week and only on the weekends.[/quote]And apparently not looking down your nose at other musicians, original music, your own band mates, and charity causes.


[quote]If your practice sessions outnumber your gigs, I'm not interested. Weekend/holiday gigs are my only options unless they are planned WELL in advance.[/quote]

Really? Isn't the [I]point[/I] of practicing that it happens [I]more [/I]than your gigs? When exactly were you planning on learning the songs? What about working out problems from the last gig? A 2:1 ratio of practices to gigs doesn't seem that far-fetched to me, especially when adding a new member (gotta make sure everybody is on the same page, song-wise). Somebody who's "above average" should probably be aware of that: you don't get above average by not practicing. If you've been playing the same repertoire for 3 years with the same gigging group, I can see practice being rare. But at this point you're looking kind of lazy to me.

The weekend/holiday thing is fair enough, since it probably means "day job", and that might also be the case for other members of a cover group.


[quote]If "you" and "me" match up...drop me a line and I'll send you some session work and live cuts from other bands. If not...I'll keep looking.[/quote]

Links would be better, but this is alright, too. I think the real problems lie in the middle sections of this post.

[quote][SIZE=3][B]Studio Time Holiday Special[/B][/SIZE]

Holiday Special: 2 Hours Studio Time Only Thirty Dollars.[/quote]


There are actually many contexts in which this is a good inclusion. However, this isn't one of them: that's the entire ad up there. We get no name, location, website, phone number, or email address.

Beyond the 2-hour special, which does present some other questions about the special, we have no idea what we might be dealing with here.

[quote]I'm a 24 year old drummer looking to play post rock, math rock, indie, shoegaze or anything else of interest. Please note: I AM NOT LOOKING FOR COVER BANDS OR ROCK.[/quote]


This is an excerpt from an ad that's actually pretty solid. But I found this intro funny. How do you argue that a genre isn't "rock" when it's name has "rock" right in there?

I don't think this is a satire ad either (like I said, the rest of the content is pretty good). Plus, he caps it off with this:

[quote]Music I like: American Football, These Arms Are Snakes, Mono, Sigur Ros, Tortoise, Piglet, Don Cab, Fugazi, Shipping News, Since By Man, My Bloody Valentine, The Appleseed Cast, Bjork, Sunny Day Real Estate, Arcade Fire, Engine Down, Denali, The Blood Brothers, Blind Pilot, Death From Above, Iron and Wine, Liars, Imogen Heap, Maserati, Medications, Koop, Pretty Girls Makes Graves, Glassjaw, Refused.[/quote]


I'm not familiar with all those acts, but I count at least 6 acts in there that I would call "rock" and be comfortable with that label.

hahaha yeah that is pretty funny. Although I think there's been an association that "rock", in of itself, with a certain genre or even era. When you think modern rock you think Daughtry and Nickelback, bands that don't get good rep among musicians. Then a lot of people also think 80's glam.

[quote=Seafroggys;18306322]When you think modern rock you think Daughtry and Nickelback, bands that don't get good rep among musicians.[/quote]

You're spot on with this assessment. In fact, Nickelback was mentioned by name (among others) as the "ROCK" that the poster wasn't interested in.

[quote][SIZE=3][B]STUDIO???[/B][/SIZE]

AND WHOEVER IS HATING ON MY ADS REPORT THEM TO SPAM HOW BOUT YOU HAVE A VOICE AND EMAIL YOUR HATE....

As I always surf Craigslist I find people constantly looking for either a good recording studio or an producer to produce there project. Will here I am to offer my services I have been producing for over 8 years now and worked with tons of known and independent artists. I have all the top of the line equipment and software to produce /record your next hit or if your just starting out I'm the perfect person to show you the ropes of this business. Down below you will find my links to work I have done and so further. I do alot as well as Photography, Cd Duplications, Graphic Designing and etc...

My rates are not to be outrages but not down right cheap neither. So this is only for serious inquires only!!!!

[B][website and youtube site redacted][/B][/quote]


When you look at it objectively, while this isn't the worst ad I've every seen, it's far from the best. Lot of fluff, very little strong evidence (website notwithstanding) to look into things.

The big issue is the first two lines. My local area happens to have a flag-happy population of craigslist users. It's actually why I set up an RSS feed to handle things because sometimes an ad will be posted and then almost immediately flagged (seriously, like within 8 minutes).

I've been keeping meticulous records of the RSS stuff for almost 2 solid years now. Those first two lines? Those are bald-faced lies. The number of ads for people [I]seeking[/I] somebody to help them put together a project has plummeted since 2008, and the number of ads [I]advertising[/I] audio services has gone up about 200% (granted, that's discounting the fact that most ads are flagged away within 24 hours).

But the big kicker? Based on the website info, I've never heard of this guy before. At all. Two years of keeping detailed records and that website doesn't turn up a single time before this ad. This is literally his first presentation of himself, and he starts out angry and follows that up with a lie about how people are "constantly" looking for engineers/producers (maybe they are, but not via craigslist ads).

Hopefully the problem with lying is self-explanatory, but if not, let me clear something up for you: don't lie. People don't like that.

[quote][SIZE=3][B][business name redacted].....Record your next project here~~~ [/B][/SIZE]

Hey [B][name redacted] [/B]here just wanted to say Hi and tell you about our new 2011 deals.....We got Package deals to work with you budget if doing more than 2 songs.....We also are offering services in recording/production/songwriting/arrangement/studio musicain services.......all of these services for only $40 an hour.....

No why go with us as opposed to the other studios offering similar services? The answer is clear....Not only do we have over $30k worth of gear... I as a producer am simply better than them, I also am better than most engineer/producers in the major studios around the area....

Why can I say that?

Because music is a talent that you are born with....your EAR for music is something you are born with not something you can go buy at Guitar Center for $200 and call yourself a producer...... notice why these other adds dont have samples?.....think about it...

Anyway some of my samples can be found at [B][website redacted][/B]

Email me or call me at [B][phone number redacted] [/B]to set up an appointment... [/quote]I've talked about this guy before. The key difference for this ad is that this time he put in a picture:

[quote][IMG]https://docs.google.com/uc?id=0B32AbTOw3ecZODJmZWI1ZWItNjdhZi00NTQyLWIzYTMtZGRiYTA2M2ZkMTIw&export=download&authkey=CIXssusG&hl=en[/IMG]
[/quote]


He got a board that size for only $30k? Nice work! This piqued my interest as to what exactly he was using, so I actually went to his website. No explicit gear listing, but there were exactly two pictures. One was of his wall-mounted guitars, and another was what I'm assuming is his actual recording room...

[quote][IMG]https://docs.google.com/uc?id=0B32AbTOw3ecZYTYxY2NiYTktYTk0Zi00NzYzLThiZGUtNzA2ZDkwZGViYjQ0&export=download&authkey=CLbBr6UJ&hl=en[/IMG]
[/quote]


I'm not sure if I'm getting tired of dragging this guy through the mud or not.

But the actual point I think is valid. Don't go shooting your mouth off when you're obvious lying about something. Why wouldn't we assume you're lying about everything else as well.

There's also the little issue of the fact that he stole somebody's studio images, presumably without permission. This can be a big deal, depending on who you're ripping off.

The big problem though, is that people might assume you're trying to scam them, even if you're not. That's definitely not an association I want potential clients to have before they even make first contact with me.

John Scrip of Massive Mastering also wrote a pretty good blog post about why this is an issue:

[url]http://www.massivemastering.com/blog/index_files/mastering_scams_buyer_beware.php[/url]

Now, the CL drama has gotten interesting...
 

So this popped up in my RSS feed today:

[quote=Published at 9.34am][SIZE=3][B][Studio A] is a rip off! The worst:([/B][/SIZE]

My experience with them is that they took my money up front and gave me a horrible product...The space was not what they said it would be...it was dirty and the engineers are some of the worst I have ever seen in my 10 years career. Their sound was soo awful..Just a warning so no one has to experience how horrible and a waste of money [B][Studio A][/B] is....[/quote]

I'm sure this sometimes happens all on craigslist sites every once in awhile, so normally this doesn't ring any bells. It is a little strange, since Studio A has been (over)posting for at least 14 months and hasn't had this happen before (that I can recall), but whatever, it happens.

But the next thing in my feed was this ad:

[quote=Published at 9.58am][SIZE=3][B][Studio B].... finished products blow...[/B][/SIZE]
Just wanted to let you guys know not to waste your time with [B][Studio B][/B], while it was an ok space, the gear and sound was aweful...Just make sure you check your samples and what not before you commit to a pretty picture and promises of grander .[/quote]

So in the span of 30 minutes we have two very similar ads blasting two different studios (Studio B has been around, but unlike Studio A hasn't been constantly posting for almost 2 years), and they're about the same length, hit the same basic points and feature the same middle-school punctuation errors (check the ellipses)?

To top it off, the next two ads listed in my RSS feed are from "Studio C", and they were posted at 10:01am and 10:03am respectively. Which also talk up the points where apparently Studios A and B aren't up to snuff. Oh, and they have the same punctuation issues. All 4 ads got flagged within the hour, as did this follow up:

[quote=Published at 10:18am][SIZE=3][B][Studio B]...Worst Experience ever[/B][/SIZE]

My experience with [B][Studio B][/B] is the worst I have ever had...Not only are their engineers a joke and take 7 times as long as any other engineers I have worked with, the final product sounded so chincy an unprofessional. do yourself a favor and look somewhere else[/quote]




Even if Studio C isn't the one publishing these, people will certainly think that's the case. I did. I'm not alone either:

[quote=Published at 10:24am][SIZE=3][B]RE: [Studio A] is the worst[/B][/SIZE]

This is a smear attack. This moron has never been a customer. Why don't you respond to this so you and I can meet face-to-face. You won't do that because you are a coward who hides behind his computer screen![/quote]


I can't prove it, because technically CL is anonymous, but I'm confident that this is the guy behind Studio A (like the guy who posts as much as 12x a day isn't going to respond?).

So what we now have here is a pissing match between at least two people in the very venue they're hoping to drum up business. That makes them both look bad.

Best case scenario? The flaggers will knock out all ads/smears/arguments from [I]both[/I] sides before any potential clients can see them. Worst case? People will see this nonsense and start flagging the ads from both sides just because of it. At minimum, a lot of readers of the ads will get the impression that Studio C doesn't think very highly of their intelligence.

I take away 3 lessons here:

(01) Don't do this kind of crap in the first place.
(02) If somebody tries it against you, don't respond.
(03) Be judicious about what other posts are made in an open forum before you plop down your ad.

Studio C could very well be innocent in this (in this case, he's not). But posting ads so soon after the smear attacks suggests otherwise (there have been more Studio C ads within minutes of more smears/argument posts since this: the guy isn't on-the-ball about this stuff).

[quote][SIZE=3][B]Pro Tools Mixing and Mastering $25-50 and FAST[/B][/SIZE]

I am offering mixing and mastering services in Pro Tools. I will mix your track for $50 or master it for $25.

I am currently using Pro Tools 9 which is backwards compatible with any other format of Pro Tools session. Email me for samples of other tracks that I have mixed/mastered.

My turnaround time is very quick, usually 1 to 2 days for a master and 2 to 3 days for a mix.

1 set of revisions is free, 2 sets of revisions is $10 and 3 sets of revisions is $20.

We do not have to meet up, we can share files completely online through my iDisk account and you can send me the money through PayPal.

I have an extensive list of outboard gear (API, Brent Averill, Distressor, many Reverbs) as well as a great list of plugins (Waves, McDSP, Focusrite, PSP, etc.)

I've worked with various grammy-award winning producers and engineers. My experience is second to none in the [B][location redacted][/B] area.

Let me know if you think we can work something out.[/quote]


On the whole, this ad is just mediocre, rather than completely terrible: it lets you know what services are available, and for how much, and also hints at a good product and lots of experience. It also doesn't give a name, a direct contact/website, or any particular samples.

I'm dubious about the pricing considering the list of gear that is claimed to be had (though if the intent is $25-50/hour, then it's right in the normal range).

I'm mostly curious about what everyone thinks about this part:

[quote]1 set of revisions is free, 2 sets of revisions is $10 and 3 sets of revisions is $20.[/quote]

That seems weird to me. I've never heard of charging for revisions before (largely because if the client wants a revision, that means you did it "wrong" on the last attempt). Combine that to the fact that you never actually have to meet this person face-to-face and things look, well, kind of shady. It strikes me as a money-suck operation, where you have to keep paying to get a slightly better mix each time.

Has anybody heard of charging for revisions like this? I don't mean "alternate cuts" (for radio release or whatever), I mean actual "hey this is f-ed up, fix it" revisions.

sounds like homeboy just snagged the waves bundle off pro audio torrents and made himself a template: 20 bucks and i'll run your shit through my plugins, an other 20 bucks and i'll move some faders for you

[quote]I am mixing engineer of about 10 years of experience, hundreds of clients, utilizing a hybrid setup of both digital analog gear. I have other ads across craigslist and found a lot of great musicians looking for a professional mixer at the helm. I specialize in getting that sought after, industry sound[/quote]


A mixing engineer who specializes in [I]mixing well?[/I] I've never heard of such a thing!

[QUOTE=Moseph;18341661]I've talked about this guy before. The key difference for this ad is that this time he put in a picture:




He got a board that size for only $30k? Nice work! This piqued my interest as to what exactly he was using, so I actually went to his website. No explicit gear listing, but there were exactly two pictures. One was of his wall-mounted guitars, and another was what I'm assuming is his actual recording room...




I'm not sure if I'm getting tired of dragging this guy through the mud or not.

But the actual point I think is valid. Don't go shooting your mouth off when you're obvious lying about something. Why wouldn't we assume you're lying about everything else as well.

There's also the little issue of the fact that he stole somebody's studio images, presumably without permission. This can be a big deal, depending on who you're ripping off.

The big problem though, is that people might assume you're trying to scam them, even if you're not. That's definitely not an association I want potential clients to have before they even make first contact with me.

John Scrip of Massive Mastering also wrote a pretty good blog post about why this is an issue:

[url]http://www.massivemastering.com/blog/index_files/mastering_scams_buyer_beware.php[/url][/QUOTE]

that looks like a really nice desk to write with

This isn't exactly in the same vein as the other posts, but I think it warrants a discussion:

[quote]I have a home studio set up for sale. I will accept only REASONABLE offers consider the values of the items

- Dell Computer w/ 1GB Ram, [B]2[/B] 19 Inch Flat Screen Monitors, [B]2[/B] Hard Drives. I will give the exact size, but plenty of space. Keyboard & Mouse of course
- Delta M-Audio 1010LT soundcard included in the computer. This has ample inputs and outputs, also includes mic inputs/outputs. *$199.99 at musicians friend alone*
- Audio Technica Mic. I forget the model, but it's black and goes for about $100 bucks.
-$30 mic preamp, brand new!
-Crappy receiver that you may or may not need. I use it to amplify certain components

- Pop Filter, boom stand, and $8.00 headphones
- Alesis M1 Desktop Active (one speaker has a rip, so bassy sounds don't convey well)

The computer has Pro Tools M Powered, Cubase 4, Recycle, Wavelabs, Fruity Loops 8, Tons of sounds, Ejay Hip Hop 5, Adobe After Effects, Sony Vegas Video, Adobe Photoshop CS, VSTIs like Purity, Halion, Oxytocin, BassStation, Vanguard, etc. So to make beats, WOW! You have way too many VSTIs, you won't need a keyboard/synthesizer. I have tons of RTAs (compressors, isotope, and more!).

This is everything I record with, I actually charge for studio time. So, this is a profitable business if you know what you are doing. I'm getting out of recording for a moment.

[B]Reasonable OFFERS! I will not respond to insulting offers[/B]

[/quote]

So here's the first big thing. If you're going to insist on "reasonable" offers, you can't skimp on the details. That computer? We don't know what it is, other than that it has an M-Audio Delta 1010LT installed. 1GB of RAM? "2 Hard Drives"? They were doing both of that regularly in like 2001. Hell, my dad set up multiple hard drives on our home computer at least as early as 1997 (probably earlier, but my memory doesn't go back that far). So there's a very good chance here that the only part of the computer that's worth anything are the Delta 1010LT (maybe), and the 19" monitors (and if they're pretty old, they might not have any brightness left in them).

A "black" Audio-Technica mic doesn't help us out, even if you did buy it new for $100. Audio-Technica swaps out a lot of their product line every few years, and they sell both dynamics and condensers in that price range. Some of them hold their value a lot better than others.

"$30 mic preamp, brand new"? Show me a receipt, and you'll get at most $20 (and that's only because ATM's don't give out $5 bills).

Here's the other big thing, notice how he's not including something simple like a dongle or transfer for the necessary software (Cubase 4 at minimum, not 100% sure about requirements on the rest)? Either he's selling you something he ripped off from the Internet, or he's selling you a brick and keeping the licenses. Which do you think is more likely (remember, he described his list of VSTi's with an "etc.")?

If you're selling on craigslist, cut the crap: list the details and give us an asking price. By my counts, he [I]probably[/I] could get $225 if the buyer is feeling generous. Seeing as how he is reminding us that the Delta 1010 used to be $199 new (still is at AmericanMusical, but B&H is selling it new for under $170), he is probably thinking he can get close to top dollar for this stuff. Here's my breakdown:

Computer: the value of the Delta (I'm guessing $80)
Computer Monitors: $40/each (i.e., $80 total)
Audio-Technica Mic: $45 (a reasonable guess on what it might be worth)
"$30 Preamp": $20 (because I'm being generous and too lazy to break a $20).
Software: $0 (used software has no street value unless you're transferring a license).


I'm kind of curious what others think of this kind of thing.

I'm pretty much with you on that. A $30 mic preamp...hell, any audio equipment worth $30 can hold virtually no value at all. That's like something you may sell at a garage sale for $5, a price you suggested. Maybe even less.

When I first built my studio computer in early spring 2007, I only put 1 gig of RAM in there. So 1 gig doesn't necessarily mean top of the line in 2001 (I didn't really see 1 gig computers until more 03-04 though). Now it was low even for 2007 standards, but I still did it (I later upped that to 2).

But yeah, two hard drives, our Packard Bell had two hard drives in 1997 as well.

The 19" monitors would be decent, but yeah, age and they're probably 3:4 ratio as well, which I have no problem with but people want 16:9 these days. My studio LCD monitor is a 22" widescreen even.

[quote=Seafroggys;18395110]I'm pretty much with you on that. A $30 mic preamp...hell, any audio equipment worth $30 can hold virtually no value at all. That's like something you may sell at a garage sale for $5, a price you suggested. Maybe even less.[/quote]


Whoops, guess I was too subtle with that one. I was trying to suggest $15 (i.e., 50% street price) if the thing was [I]brand new[/I] (as in 31-90 days old). Once you can't prove that the thing is in pristine condition and fresh from the factory (or you hit day 91), then we really are talking like $5-10 tops.

Man I've been involved with an interesting potential client, whom I will probably no longer want to work with due to the overall......strangeness of not just her mysterious behavior, but of her music as well and the overall presentation of her music.

My studio is meant for me mostly, I'm not really set up for commercial work (parent's garage is not an ideal setting to make money and an image) but I do browse on craigs for small time things that would probably fit my studio environment.

So on Feb 13 I see a post of a female singer looking for a place to record her vocals for less than $20 an hour. She already has the music but just needs to sing over it. She's asking for a pretty low rate, but considering its just for recording vocals (which is relatively straight forward as far as setup and such is concerned) that I offered her a rate of $15 an hour. Yes, that is lower than I believe that work, and less than double my day job, but hey something is better than nothing. I figured it may be some karoke work she wants to do or something.

There were no other details in her post, no links to music mind you.

Next day she sends me a response asking me what software I use and a link to her music (a myspace link). Even though I've shown other people on the internet her myspace, I'll follow Moseph's example and not link it. What I got was very.......interesting, to say the least. First off, her Myspace looked like a typical myspace page (i.e. bad layouts). Secondly, the picture of her on the myspace.....I am not one to judge people on their appearence, but she looked like a $10 prostitute. Very trashy looking. I'm sure she is quite pretty, but the way she presented herself was pretty shoddy.

Thirdly, her music was....uber electronica. Pretty generic electronica tracks, with some of the worst uber-autotuned vocal tracks laid over it. Makes T-Pain's stuff seem as smooth as a classically trained tenor. The autotune was flying all over the place, the tonality of her voice seemed like a generic pop-stars (kinda that Britney Spears tone)....who knows what it actually sounds like. Fourthly, the lyrical subject matter of her work was edgy for the point of being edgy. One of her songs had her sing "I like pornography" over and over again. Other of her songs....blah. Makes some gangsta rap seem tame. Just terrible.

Now I understand electronica is not my thing. I record relatively natural sounding stuff. I figured I could probably get her vocals close to how it is on her other songs, I do have the right effects and stuff. But what made me curious was the high quality of the backing tracks. Were they ripped from commercial music, were they from royalty-free compilations, or were they actually made to her work? The contrast of qualtiy to the electronica backing tracks (which were pretty pro) to her terrible vocals was extreme, leading me to believe that if she could afford tailored backing tracks, she could afford a real studio. So they were probably not 'her' stuff specifically. Still, I was willing to give her a shot.

The weird part hasn't even been mentioned yet. From the myspace she linked me, there were obscure links to other myspaces, each with the same name but numbered differently (the one she linked me was, say, baby0, and others were baby1, baby2, etc.). Each one of those weren't explicitly listed as being her's, but under website on all of them they linked back to the baby0. They all had different tracks, and from the random samples I clicked, all seemed to be the same person performing them. If that doesn't sound shady enough, her location on every myspace page was listed in a different city...New York, Seattle, Hollywood, Chicago, etc. But never Portland (where I'm located, for those who don't know).

That gave me warning bells wondering if this is some sort of weird scam that I was unable to figure out. A glimmer of hope came in her e-mail asking what software I used. That probably means she is looking for compatibility, which *could* mean she wants to be able to take the raw tracks and do the mixing herself. That could explain the terrible effects, and would save me a lot of trouble (and embarrassment). I'd just be responsible for the actual recording, not the mixing. Or I was hoping for too much and she was just clueless to how DAWs work and that functionally they're all the same, but she thinks otherwise.

So I shoot her an e-mail:

[quote]Hey BLANK, good to hear back from you.

There are several things I want to make clear before we proceed with anything, as there is some confusion on my end. Since you want to know what software I am using, I'm assuming you want to take the tracks you record here and then do the effects and mix somewhere else, or are you wanting me to do that myself? I use REAPER, but I can save your vocals in a way that any software can read them if you were wanting to mix them yourself or somewhere else.

As I said earlier, I haven't recorded that many vocals, and I have yet to record electronica sort of thing. Not to say I don't know how to get that effect on your voice, but it may require a bit more work on my end if you are wanting me to do the mixing for you.

Also, your myspace says you're located in New York? And the different BLANK numbers (which I'm assuming is all you?) are all different places; Hollywood, Seattle, etc. Are you actually in Portland? I'm a bit confused as to this.

How many songs are you wanting to record?[/quote]

Pretty straightforward but not accusatory. Fairly innocent e-mail if you ask me. Just clarifying a few things confusing me, and trying to get what she actually wants to accomplish aside from "singing over tracks."

Several days later (the 20th, just a couple days ago) I just get this back from her:

[QUOTE]hey i was wondering if you have any studio time open for tonight.. call me at BLANK - HER NAME[/QUOTE]

She didn't answer ONE of my questions. Completely ignored them. Even if she ignored my confusion as to what her Myspaces were about, I'd still like to know if she planned to mix them herself or have me mix them, and how many songs she'd like to do. That's all basic pre-production stuff you do before any session. That and I checked the area code of her phone, and its LA County. Now there can be a gazillion explanations for that....she moved from LA to Portland being the most innocent one. But given her 10 myspace profiles all with different cities....I'm just confused. Who is this person? Who are these people if not one person?

Add that to the fact she wanted to book THAT VERY NIGHT! Who does that? It was only two days ago but I'm pretty sure I had something going on that night anyway. Also, I use my landline more than my cell because I live in a cell phone pocket and I have to walk about 100 feet down the road to get enough reception to talk, so its just easier for me to use the landline. There would be long distance fees on that for sure.

I'm just thinking of saying fuck it, this is too weird. Although I'm almost curious enough to go down the road and give this number a call, see what I get. But everything leading up to now is just sketchy as hell, but I have no clue how this/these people/person are trying to con me.

Your guys' thoughts?

Definitely not the behavior you'd expect, but at the same time, not too weird for a CL situation. My inclination would be to pass on the project since you didn't particularly like the existing samples, but if you're keen to try your hand at something new you could potentially salvage the situation. More detailed thoughts follow below...

[quote=Seafroggys;18415875]So on Feb 13 I see a post of a female singer looking for a place to record her vocals for less than $20 an hour. She already has the music but just needs to sing over it. She's asking for a pretty low rate, but considering its just for recording vocals (which is relatively straight forward as far as setup and such is concerned) that I offered her a rate of $15 an hour. Yes, that is lower than I believe that work, and less than double my day job, but hey something is better than nothing. I figured it may be some karoke work she wants to do or something.[/quote]

I've done that session, the only difference being the location (I recorded it at the singer's place, because that's what I do). She was a little flaky (not this bad), but I ended up recording her twice over 2 years.

[quote=Seafroggys;18415875]Next day she sends me a response asking me what software I use and a link to her music (a myspace link). Even though I've shown other people on the internet her myspace, I'll follow Moseph's example and not link it. What I got was very.......interesting, to say the least. First off, her Myspace looked like a typical myspace page (i.e. bad layouts). Secondly, the picture of her on the myspace.....I am not one to judge people on their appearence, but she looked like a $10 prostitute. Very trashy looking. I'm sure she is quite pretty, but the way she presented herself was pretty shoddy.

Thirdly, her music was....uber electronica. Pretty generic electronica tracks, with some of the worst uber-autotuned vocal tracks laid over it. Makes T-Pain's stuff seem as smooth as a classically trained tenor. The autotune was flying all over the place, the tonality of her voice seemed like a generic pop-stars (kinda that Britney Spears tone)....who knows what it actually sounds like. Fourthly, the lyrical subject matter of her work was edgy for the point of being edgy. One of her songs had her sing "I like pornography" over and over again. Other of her songs....blah. Makes some gangsta rap seem tame. Just terrible.[/quote]


Nothing weird here. That's just the MySpace culture sometimes.


[quote=Seafroggys;18415875]But what made me curious was the high quality of the backing tracks. Were they ripped from commercial music, were they from royalty-free compilations, or were they actually made to her work? The contrast of qualtiy to the electronica backing tracks (which were pretty pro) to her terrible vocals was extreme, leading me to believe that if she could afford tailored backing tracks, she could afford a real studio. So they were probably not 'her' stuff specifically. Still, I was willing to give her a shot.[/quote]

Also not weird. Backing tracks are kind of a big business, and a lot of studios/producers/beat-makers/etc make that sort of thing sound good and then make it available, often for very cheap or free. What you're probably dealing with are vocal lines she wrote to accompany a pre-created backing track. It's not uncommon, particularly when dealing with people who fancy themselves as singers and rappers, but not necessarily musicians/producers/beat-makers. One of the dead giveaways will be if the track is compressed all to hell and would also be that way without the vocals: usually those pre-created tracks are given a pseudo-master before they're sold.


[quote=Seafroggys;18415875]From the myspace she linked me, there were obscure links to other myspaces, each with the same name but numbered differently (the one she linked me was, say, baby0, and others were baby1, baby2, etc.). Each one of those weren't explicitly listed as being her's, but under website on all of them they linked back to the baby0. They all had different tracks, and from the random samples I clicked, all seemed to be the same person performing them. If that doesn't sound shady enough, her location on every myspace page was listed in a different city...New York, Seattle, Hollywood, Chicago, etc. But never Portland (where I'm located, for those who don't know).[/quote]

I agree this is the first genuinely weird thing so far, but I can also see reasons for wanting multiple MySpace pages. Maybe she changed her "name" (i.e., artist name) a few times, or maybe she wants to circumvent song limits imposed by MySpace without spending money. The "location" thing is the weirdest bit, and that's where I agree that maybe you've got some kind of scam happening.

[quote=Seafroggys;18415875]She didn't answer ONE of my questions. Completely ignored them. Even if she ignored my confusion as to what her Myspaces were about, I'd still like to know if she planned to mix them herself or have me mix them, and how many songs she'd like to do. That's all basic pre-production stuff you do before any session. That and I checked the area code of her phone, and its LA County. Now there can be a gazillion explanations for that....she moved from LA to Portland being the most innocent one. But given her 10 myspace profiles all with different cities....I'm just confused. Who is this person? Who are these people if not one person?

Add that to the fact she wanted to book THAT VERY NIGHT! Who does that? It was only two days ago but I'm pretty sure I had something going on that night anyway. Also, I use my landline more than my cell because I live in a cell phone pocket and I have to walk about 100 feet down the road to get enough reception to talk, so its just easier for me to use the landline. There would be long distance fees on that for sure.[/quote]

I wouldn't engage further without a lengthy phone conversation, or preferably a meet and greet in person in a public place. And by "public place" I mean someplace where weird crap doesn't generally happen: a public library, church, community center, or government facility.

I also wouldn't do anything with a phone that's explicitly tied to your identity. Shortly after I left the studio gig, they got some folks wandering around offering the staff $2000 in cold hard cash for the key to the room for 20 minutes. The same guys were later seen trying to convince users (that they didn't know) to let them in mid-session. The police were called both times. So short term demands like that could be here trying to get access to a studio to swipe some gear for a quick buck.

If you're still interested in this, I would check out Google Voice. I use it as a proxy for recording to help prevent situations like this from being an issue. You can set it up so that it's tied to your phone number (or not, if you prefer), and it gives you free calling nationwide. What's nice about it is that you now have a distinct phone number that isn't tied to your identity explicitly (just a potentially anonymous email address or Google account) and any attempts to back-trace you have to go through Google before they have a shot at something actually tied to you (and if you don't have direct phone routing, it doesn't matter anyway).

My first inclination would be to send a follow-up email and then leave the ball in her court (most of the time, this does mean the session falls through in my experience). However, since she's demonstrated no particular ability to make use of email, getting her on the phone might be your only option.

Figured I should share this as it's pertinent to the purpose of this thread. It pertains to a re-post of a particular ad I talked about before:

[quote=Moseph;18341661]...[/quote]

The guy who lied about his gear and said he was hands-down the best? Somebody else posted a response to a re-posting of that particular ad language (no pics though):

[quote]Arrogant egomaniacs who insist they are "the best" at something should be a red flag to everyone. Their boasting is usually a cover-up for some deficiency.

I went to [B][Bad Poster's] [/B]site and I listened to every sample that was available and here's the thing: It all sounds good... BUT every single recording on that page is done with keyboards/sequencers and drum machines! ANYONE who has a good ear and knows the first thing about recording knows that it's easy to get a good recording when all your instrument sources are direct- no microphones involved other than the vocals. I can do shit that sounds like a friggin' Lady GaGa album in my basement with a 16 track DAW if I'm recording all instruments direct like that.

If [B][bad poster][/B] is such a bad-ass engineer and producer, lets hear what it sounds like when he has to mic up an entire drum kit and bass and guitar amplifiers.. or horns, etc.
Any slapdick can make a great recording when it's all digital to digital with no live miking...[/quote]


It wasn't me who posted that. But I think clearly it's a sign that the posting style of that ad is able to rub people the wrong way.

[quote][SIZE=3][B]Record in HD for free![/B][/SIZE]

Thats right, Free! every 5th caller will receive a free track just for calling! [/quote]

I'm going to ignore that "HD" doesn't have any definite meaning for audio like it does for video. They probably just mean high sampling rates.

What I'm really curious about it is what everyone's reaction is to this "radio caller" style promotion? Do you think it's a good enticing promotion?

That's a legitimate question. Because my reaction is, "well, what about the other 4 callers?" In other words, I'd want to figure out some way to be the 5th caller. Am I over-thinking this?

[QUOTE=Moseph;18420303]I'm going to ignore that "HD" doesn't have any definite meaning for audio like it does for video. They probably just mean high sampling rates.

What I'm really curious about it is what everyone's reaction is to this "radio caller" style promotion? Do you think it's a good enticing promotion?

That's a legitimate question. Because my reaction is, "well, what about the other 4 callers?" In other words, I'd want to figure out some way to be the 5th caller. Am I over-thinking this?[/QUOTE]

I wouldn't consider you over thinking it, what do they mean by "free track" does that mean they will do a free track for you or you will receive a free track to listen when you call? What about the rest of the recording's are those going to be lo-fi? Do you have to pay extra for "quality" work. In some cases though the radio promotion thing would work to get people to call and if they are doing a doesn't matter who's the 5th as long as we book em type deal... See now you got me over-thinking on this subject

[quote=Cramboli;18423715]I wouldn't consider you over thinking it, what do they mean by "free track" does that mean they will do a free track for you[/quote]


That's what I'm assuming they're getting at.


[quote=Cramboli;18423715]What about the rest of the recording's are those going to be lo-fi? Do you have to pay extra for "quality" work.[/quote]


I didn't post the entire ad. It's very clear that the normal rates are $40/hour and they will only record "in HD" (again, I'm assuming that means at sample rates higher than 48kHz).

So this nonsense:

[quote=Moseph;18346273]....[/quote]

...got a little more interesting. And I think I may have screwed up a bit (more on that later).

Basically, the guy who's smearing people is back at it, this time going after a 4th recording guy. To make this post make more sense, we'll call the smear poster "Mr. Smear" and you should know that this new target goes by "Mike" (I figure it's common enough that his identity is secure) and is repeat poster who advertises that he has Pro Tools 9 HD.

For a couple of weeks, Mr. Smear has been going after Mike with basically this ad:

[quote=Mr. Smear][B][SIZE=3]Pro Tools 9 HD is a lying crook![/SIZE]

[/B]I was taken for a ride with this guy.....Not only when I arrived did he not have the a fully functional HD setup as claimed....He was extremely slow and was very dissatisfied with the result....Dont waste your time! [/quote]


Now, for whatever reason, Mr. Smear has continued to post this after like a solid month (he relented on the other studios). Mike shot back with a couple of ads challenging Mr. Smear to answer basic questions about the studio:


[quote=Mike]Well since you claim to of come to my STUDIO tell me some FACTS because you and I know your lying because you NEVER CAME TO MY STUDIO...Tell me then what do I look like and where exactly is my studio? What color is the carpet? Is the studio in a house or a commercial building? How many couches are in the studio? Since you CAN'T answer these questions it poves YOU NEVER HAVE BEEN AT MY STUDIO. You did the same trash talking with 2 other studios last month so EVERYONE KNOWS YOUR LYING. ANSWER THE QUESTIONS AND PROVE THAT YOU HAVE BEEN TO MY STUDIO...I POST PICS AND ALL YOU DO IS FLAG ALL THE STUDIOS ON HERE.[/quote]


For the reasons I've already discussed, this is a bad move, but I think it's understandable where it's coming from. After a month of being bad-mouthed relentlessly from an anonymous source, I think anyone might feel compelled to try to do [I]something[/I] about it. The responses were either taken straight from the photos Mike himself posted in his ads, or were incredibly vague:

[quote=Mr. Smear]your studio sucks ass. the carpet is blue...you got 2 couches and your in a house....and guess what else your work sucks and you dont have protools 9 HD is just 9...why dont you get a real job instead of pretending your a producer and stealing peoples money you lazy piece of shit... oh ya your white and tall and dumpy looking .... you know i was there you faggot..[/quote]

On repeated challenges, he also said that Mike would "deal in cash" (really? who doesn't?)


Herein lies the basic problem with the Internet: people looking to stir up shit have no sense of shame. You'd think I'd be aware of this, but apparently a month of this crap clogging up my RSS feed weirdly affected me too.

It started when I saw this:

[quote=Mr. Smear]This guy does not have Protools HD its just regular HD, He is slow and will rack up your bill. also his work sucks, hence why he doesnt post any he is horrible...If your good you post samples he is a crook billed me for about 5 extra hours because he is soo slow/computer stalling, and told me it was just part of the deal...He is a scam artist and my recording sounded like a 2 year old did. Just trying to save you guys from this scammer [/quote]


After about 3 weeks of this new ad, I decided to try to shame this guy (see my mistake?) with a private email from a dummy account:

[quote=Moseph]I don't get what you mean by "regular HD." what does "HD" mean outisde the context of Pro Tools? I only know it as a video spec, and even then it's more casual than technical......[/quote]

Mike also made a more public observation by posting an ad that said basically the same thing, but also issued more challenge questions to be answered.

The response?

[quote=Mr. Smear]Sorry [B][the fake name I used][/B], My bad its a Typo.... You claim to have HD PROTOOLS it is just standard PROTOOLS 9...As far as the 5 hours your overcharged me, it wasnt for work that wasnt done it was work that anyone else could have done 5 hrs quicker... you piece of shit...Guys please dont fall for this guys fakeness. he is like your typical salesman scammer...."Oh I can do this do that" when your his ginny pig and learning while you pay...dont do it![/quote]


You can all face-palm at me now (I'll pretend it's in unison for full effect): maybe I was too subtle, but more realistically this guy doesn't have any particular sense of shame about what he's doing (which is obviously lying his ass off). So what did I really accomplish? Well, I basically taught Mr. Smear a new trick to be considerate of. Oh, I also facilitated his inadvertent use of a mid-20th Century racial slur for Italians (pretty sure he was going for "guinea pig").

The sad part? All of Mr. Smear's attack ads are posted within 30 minutes (and normally closer to 15-20) of his own studio's ads. Since they all get flagged within about 20 minutes, the only real way to see all this is with an RSS feed (or something similar I guess). Most of the time, these smears are immediately adjacent to his own ads. They also feature a lot of the same grammatical issues (particularly the ellipses and lack of distinct sentences)...he's not even particularly bright about [I]trying[/I] to make it look like a legitimate complaint.

I think the big lesson here, for me, is "[B]there is no shame on the Internet, Moseph: exactly how stupid are you that you didn't know that?[/B]"

I'm unsure as to why he hasn't been flagged for that, I mean like right in between his posts just trolling other businesses?

[quote=Cramboli;18456781]I'm unsure as to why he hasn't been flagged for that, I mean like right in between his posts just trolling other businesses?[/quote]


Oh, he's getting flagged. That's kind of the craigslist culture in my area: they flag basically everything that isn't 100% within the guidelines (and sometimes stuff that is, too). Usually within 30 minutes.

Another big part of the craigslist culture is therefore is persistence in re-posting ads. Kind of by necessity.

If you can come across something other than craigslist for adverts especially something tailored towards Studios and whatnot that would be a worthy post. I've been thinking about doing something like that but I don't have the time,skill, and patience to do so :(
Besides these minor inconveniences I've been hearing more complaints of craigslist ads and stuff of all nature with users and just overall trust with it. I think it'd be worth a shot to have/find something tailored to that so it would eliminate some of the b/s. I know there would still be some issues but if it was one thing towards a specific demographic it might make it easier to sift through on the users end and easier cleanup on the moderators.

eBay classifieds/Kijiji
Facebook classifieds

I don't use those because they're less populated, so it's a lot of effort to keep track of them with very little actual content. eBay has added RSS feeds to their classifieds now, so I might start using that.

You can also do things the "hard way" by searching Social Networking sites manually (or by perusing the friends of band profiles). However, that's a very "noisy" way to go about doing it, as you will often find stuff you're looking for, but located far, far away.

I have another sketchy craigslist situation I want to run by the people here.

So I teach drum lessons, and I advertise on craigslist (where I get the majority of my students). A year ago I had a hispanic man call me who didn't speak good English, but we managed to communicate okay on the phone and we set up a time to start lessons. But.....I forgot to give him the address. So he never showed up, but he never called again.

About two months ago, this same man calls (I remembered his name for some reason) and wants to set up lessons again. He didn't seem to remember me or anything, which isn't surprising as most people don't have the same memory that I have. So this time I wouldn't be stupid and forget to give him my address. When I get to my city name (Damascus, which is a rural community just southeast of Portland) he doesn't know what it was, or where it was. I ask him where he was coming from, and he said Beaverton (which is a major suburb west of Portland). For those that don't know the Portland area, NOT during rush hour that's maybe a 45 minute drive. On my craigslist post I give the locations of many of the surrounding communities as well, to attract people from those areas. I gave him the benefit of the doubt and assumed he didn't realize the location, but then he said he had no car and wondered if he could come by mass transit. The nearest busline is 4 miles from my house, and even if you managed to make it that far, that's a decent 2+ hour busride just one way.

Anyway, he decided to see if he could ask around for a ride, and it ended there. There's dozens of drum teachers between me and him, some that offer the same rate I do (I'm below average for the Portland Metro area, but not 'budget' or 'bargain' rate), so I'm really curious why he chose me, seeing as many of these people advertise on craigslist much more often than I do. Its also worthy to note that during that recent phone call, he mentioned having never taken lessons with anybody, meaning that he never found anybody else, closer or farther than I was, during those ten months.

Regardless, I just shrugged it off as either an oversight on his part or maybe just stupidity. I dunno, but I didn't feel sketchy about it then.

On Monday, I get a phone call from a hispanic woman wanting to take lessons. She doesn't know English very well either. But she says that she and a friend wants to take lessons with me. I'm pretty quick at formulating guesses, so I was almost certain her friend was this man who had called me twice. They wanted to take lessons together, for my regular rate. Now in retrospect this seems like a red flag for me. I don't teach multiple students (especially adults I don't know....school aged children would be a different story), so I should have just said no right there, or done it for a slightly higher rate. But at the time I was just happy to get some more students, so I give her the usual introductory speal, rate confirmation, and then the address. She too was confused about how to spell Damascus. Are people this clueless about Portland suburbs? Anyway, halfway through the conversation she said that she was in Tigard (which is a little closer than Beaverton, its SW of Portland...but still a good 30-35 minute drive) and her friend was in Beaverton (aha!). She works in the evenings but we picked a time in the early afternoon, then she gave her name and the name of her friend (which was...you guessed it....the same guy).

This just seems weird to me. The first two phone calls seemed totally innocent to me, but that last one introduced me to sketchiness. I don't know if I'm reading too much into it, or maybe I'm being slightly xenophobic (which is wrong, I know).

So here's my current theories:

1: He needed a ride to my place to take lessons, and convinced a friend to take lessons with me.
2: He needed a ride to my place to take lessons, and had his friend call me to make it look like she was wanting to take lessons too, but they show up and only he takes the lesson.
3: They're trying to scam me somehow (or rip me off).

I don't have a phone number, otherwise I'd be inclined to call and cancel because I'm not feeling comfortable about this (it is my home, and I have two drumsets worth several thousands and audio gear worth many more thousands...not to mention anything else my family has). Maybe I'm overreacting and they're really genuine, and for some reason haven't found a drum teacher who is a lot closer to them (which.....is a stretch). I just don't know. Thoughts?

EDIT: I failed to mentioned that when the woman called, the first thing she asked me after saying she wanted to take drum lessons was where was my address. Now that could be a result of lower than average english skills and she might not have known when would be the proper time to ask such a question. But I figured it would be worth mentioning.

On paper, this sounds awkward but not unreasonable: you explicitly give directions from other parts of town in your ad. Also, didn't you just post a thread in D&P talking about an interview you did that was published locally, or something? Keep in mind that I didn't have the same phone calls, so this is all based only on your descriptions.

If that's the case, it's not weird to think that you had a higher standing in the mind of these two (just by the fact that your name was exposed to them more frequently, or they made a mental connection because it seemed to apply to them).

One thing I would suggest is to always get contact info from students before the first session. It could help avoid issues like this, but is also smart in case there's an unexpected emergency, like you lost power or something.

I would also be adamant about not teaching two students for the price of one. It's bad practice and general, and the ensuing dialogue could help reveal some of their motivation.

Lastly, try to keep a group of people conspicuously on-location (not interfering with the lesson, however) during the lesson: if they were planning on trying something, the fact that there's a whole bunch of people around would probably help them reconsider (or at minimum, have others on the scene to call the police).

Yeah after I thought about it some more overnight, I think I overreacted a bit.

That interview was just posted 2-3 days ago, doubt if it was advertised on craigs at all.

It would be cool to think that I had a higher standing to them in their eyes, but I highly doubt I have built a reputation yet....or enough of a reputation where people come to me BECAUSE I'm me.

Having friends over is a good idea, and is what I was always planned on. Yeah, I am hitting myself in the head for that deal I offered them. But to be realistic, they'll probably only do one lesson, if that. The reason being is the distance. Neither one of them, not knowing where my town is located, actually knows how far away I actually am from them. Once they realize the drive from Tigard is 40 minutes (I just checked Google Maps) at best, given good traffic, they'll probably do one or two lessons and then be done. Or at least, she'll be done. The guy probably would honestly want to continue, but he'll have no way to get here. Almost an hour and a half round trip isn't worth a half hour lesson, and also she said she starts work at 4:30 or so, and with her lesson ending at 3....yeah, if they even show up for the first lesson after she finds out how far away I am, then she'll probably be unwilling to continue after the second week or so.

[quote][SIZE=3][B]Looking for demo singing projects[/B][/SIZE]

Looking for demo singing projects. If you are interested please respond and I will give you my website. Thank you. [/quote]

This is a classic case of "not enough info." That's the entire ad. It's completely unclear whether this person is looking to sing on a demo, work with a singer for demos, or record somebody else' singing for a demo.

[quote][B][SIZE=3]Recording a mixtape or album?[/SIZE][/B]

One of his many clients include [B][artist or label I've never heard of][/B]'s artist [B][artist I've never heard of][/B]. Recording engineer and music producer is fresh from America's newest mecca of music Atlanta to provide his talent and expertise to the [B][location][/B] area. You get a great rate at Platinum winning [B][Well-known Studio Name][/B] Studios' Studio D. He will take the time to record your song at a professional level on some of the recording industry's most optimal and expensive gear at great price for you. Sound like a big music label without a big music label budget. Reply now.[/quote]


This is so close to being a pretty good ad. It gives a clear idea of the experience involved (presumably those early references are impressive to somebody: just because I don't know them doesn't mean they don't have local/regional notoriety). It mentions the facility in a concise way that is still easy to learn about (the studio's website gives good info, and it [I]is[/I] one of the better known "big league" studios in my area). There's minimal BS hype.

But the whole thing is just [I]awkward[/I]. We never get "his" name, so the thing comes off as the second half of a cheesy movie trailer narration. It's also weird that the poster is willing to name-drop a previous client and work location, but not himself.

Say you did respond to the ad: what you would put in the email reply (only a CL email was given)?

"Hey, is this him?"
"Hi, who the f*** are you?"
"I wanna get into the D room at the studio!"

None of those come off as demonstrating a great sell in the ad.

[quote]These services are NOT for mixing, but MASTERING only. If you are unsure of the difference, please do a Google search for a better understanding. All genre's accepted, all files will be delivered via downloadable link in Waveform Audio Format and .MP3 format. Processing begins after payment is received. Payment is ONLY accepted through a verified business PayPal account. Merchant ID is available upon request. Inquire within with any questions. [/quote]

This is a snippet of a larger ad. The ad itself is pretty functional overall, but I wanted to get some opinions about something.

Wouldn't you think it would be better if a potential client is confused about the difference between mixing/mastering to get them in CONTACT with you so you can explain it yourself? They only provide enough info to email them: I understand that it can get tiresome to constantly re-explain the same thing however many times a day, but if you're communicating via email, you can save a fine-tuned explanation in a text file and just send them the copypasta every time. I would think that getting an open line of communication would be a much better MO for business in this case, because if you helped out the client before they even knew they needed help, then they might be more inclined to come to you for your actual services.

Am I backwards on that?

Yeah I'd be super annoyed probably, so I agree with him posting that there is a difference. Heck, I was super annoyed when a friend of mine I was recording kept on referring to mixing as mastering (but I never corrected her.....).

Although...why get a song mastered and have it returned to you as an Mp3?

You can also get it in both Waveform Audio format [b]or[/b] mp3.


Wait a second, what is Waveform Audio format? .wav?