i hope i do well! :]

fuck me, one of the new contribs has only been here for three months

ah well, i'll apply next year i suppose

oh yeah more staffers that's necessary

why wasn't monica granted an emeritus tag what an outrage

"As amusing as it is that most of these new hires are a cool dizcovery for the site, it goes without saying that that wasn't intentional and more of a coincidence of the muzik variety."

This is hilarious, oh my god.

On a side note, this news makes me so happy. :] thrilled to be a part of the team.

I said the same thing acad

congrats to Xeno, Irving and Noctus. I don't know anyone else so idk

Pleasant surprise indeed.

cool i like these ppl but who the shit is breakingthefragile

rigged just like work but congrats jk

still waitin on my fuckin raise jom

breakingthefragile did that novel length Bieber review not too long ago

w/e

Sweet, so when do I get to be mod?

happy for everyone here. taylormemer's a pretty bad writer but a pretty nice guy otherwise and he seems helpful in the meds thread. no idea who breakingthefragile is but grats.

am i really the only dude here without an avi? sides Irving

word. gratz y'all.

Eli got staff I'm so happy! (being his #1 fan and booty call)


and shoutouts to my bros J-Royal, Noctus, and Matt!


All the promotions were really well deserved! Congrats everybody!!!

Breakingthefragile (or Alex) certainly deserves it. He's pretty new, but he literally reviews every new album since he's been here and all of them well-written.

Glad to see Omaha and Gyro getting their promotion. Excellent choices.

These aren't the droids I'm looking for

yay! i'm just glad i didn't get demoted for writing only four reviews this year (i think?)

Wait what o.O

No handholding in Olympus please?

Congrats to;

- AliW1993
- breakingthefragile
- DarkNoctus
- Gyromania
- OmahaStylee94
- taylormemer
- Irving
- Xenophanes

Jeez xeno, irving. Took you guys long enough to get here ;-)

Must write more to justify Staff tag...

Must write more to justify Staff tag...

Must write more to justify Staff tag...

Haha.

congratz guys

Yayy Noctus and Omaha :]

Dude Jacob let's see Right Away, Great Captain! at the end of this month.

This is the greatest event since the Storming of the Bastille. Congratulations.

Go guys.

Found this thread a little late, lol. Wow, it's still hitting me, this was really unexpected and such a pleasent surprise, thanks so much for this, I'm stunned, seriously. Congrats to everyone else, I'm honored to be granted this title when I'm still so new, I promise I won't take it for granted.

Gratz all.

A dude with 200 comments and no avatar is contributor, bizzaro world oh man

holy shit well done jake m/

the amount of time one spends on this site that doesn't have to do with their writing ability doesn't factor into these decisions at all

I'm saying it as a compliment, like the dude is already a really good writer

breakingthefragile deserved it, he's come a long way.

I have come a pretty long way from when I first accidently bombarded the site with 7 reviews in a row on my first day here like a total dumbass, because I didn't realize user reviews got posted on the front page. lol XD

I kind of remember that, ahaha

Congrats.

"As amusing as it is that most of these new hires are a cool dizcovery for the site, it goes without saying that that wasn't intentional and more of a coincidence of the muzik variety. Sorry."

Haha. Got a good kick out of this. Thanks a lot, everyone!

Well done guys

"As amusing as it is that most of these new hires are a cool dizcovery for the site, it goes without saying that that wasn't intentional and more of a coincidence of the muzik variety. Sorry."

I love Jom.

Hey Irving

Congrations to all and especially to the two new amazing staffers!

Y'all deserved this one big time!

"As amusing as it is that most of these new hires are a cool dizcovery for the site, it goes without saying that that wasn't intentional and more of a coincidence of the muzik variety. Sorry."

i feel like there's an inside joke here that's going over my head. can someone explain?

also, congrats to everyone and all that good stuff

'i feel like there's an inside joke here that's going over my head. can someone explain?'

Some of these jolly fellows (including Gyro) write for a music site called Muzik Dizcovery...

oh okay

thanks you're a good friend

Congratz to everyone.

Congrats to all the new contributors and also to Irving and Xeno who will be leaving us for greener pastures =)

lol

nah because they review good albums which is against staff policy

I also said PaperbackWriter should get it. He's managed to put out quite a bit of content in his short time being here. Maybe he'll get a late promotion.

Also, I know for certain that some of us newbies have reviewed some pretty out-there stuff in the past. I know I have.

lol wow

:/ sorry potsy

lol tater

but seriously congrats to the whole list, everyone who got the promotion are all solid choices

reviews take 5 mins max yea

Haha. Potato man will never review again. If he does his 1337 will cease.

Oh shit. Potato man! It's gone. :/

I didn't even notice you were ranked 1337 but that's pretty funny. Too bad you lost it.

sunshine + lollipops + rainbows = sputnik comment threads

Congrats to everyone who's been voted better at reviewing than me and made contrib. I'll try not to nurse a grudge for too long ;)

don't worry potato, i'll review all the albums you like and i'll become editor one day

yikes.

hardly anybody here actually reviews slightly under the radar stuff on a consistent basis or does it well enough to get promoted so where are they supposed to come from. at the time it looked like the outside promotions would be a cool way of bringing in new people with different tastes but they fucked that up

out of the current guys who applied carouse would've been a good pick tho

pmmets got screwed

YOU'RE MAH BOI PERRY

neck

Congratz to everyone promoted!

porch would be a good pick, but I think he only reviews older albums.

i only review 6 or 7 albums a year anyway so it wouldn't matter if they were all new releases

also i feel pretty much the same way about it as potato and only get the urge to do it occasionally

yeah grats gyro

Well, it makes sense from generating traffic, which generates more potential revenue from advertising and such. I know you don't wanna hear that, but it is what it is...

potato and porch: cheers

"out of the current guys who applied carouse would've been a good pick tho"

backed

I can understand where potato man is coming from here, but at the same time it's up to the userbase to determine the site's overall content in terms of reviews.

Well, not necessarily. If a staff/contrib member comes across an 'obscure' release, there's nothing that says "you can't review this because it isn't mainstream/hipster enough".

And when I say up to the userbase I'm talking very generally, inclusive of all members of the site.

Yo silentpotato I got 1337 now, you jel? (:

+Obligatory congrats etc, well done dudes

This place needs more moderators, whatever Sputnik's title is for those people (Staffer?). It often takes days for news articles to be approved for people to comment on, or for duplicate articles to be removed.

I will try, brb gonna go write a review so i move up the ladder of sputnik

Potsy for mod 2012: for crushing dumbass users one by one with InstaBan!

Yea the thing about reviews on this site is if you review an album it gives people a chance to comment on it and keep bumping it. Every time that happens more and more people see the album and will be more apt to check it out. Otherwise the only time they show up is in lists and pretty much go under the wayside.

I sign on to this site and most of the time the albums people are commenting on are the same, bc those are the ones with reviews. Music before 1990 besides the really popular stuff gets almost no love here either. On RYM an album from the 60s/70s/80s will have thousands of views but on here it will have like 10. So I agree with potsy in that we need more people willing to review older stuff, and also more current underground stuff. We dont need any more Anthony Fantanos just reviewing the most popular albums. So I hope the new guys mix it up.

I mean I might start reviewing here and there. Im not that obscure or anything and Im not promising its going to be amazing but just to have reviews up to let people comment on albums that dont have them is the most important thing.

seriously guys, shame on sputnik for not being as into cool "under-the-radar" shit as thesilentpotato!

i feel ur pain dude UGH nobody on staff writes about music as cool and offbeat as the music i listen to!

btw if anybodys interested here's a list of that music:

congrats to everyone. especially Ali, Irving, Matt, and Eli. You guys rule. oh and Omaha.

and Potato, if there were people who reviewed that sort of stuff well and consistently then they would probably be considered for promotions. but there aren't that many right now. Rasp used to do a lot of that (and he's contrib) but he doesn't review much lately. they pretty much picked the best writers they could have in my opinion.

if memory serves paperbackwriter is not a very good writer tho... :S

i agree he has good taste tho

yea pizzamachine fucking lol

i mean i love the guy but fuck

lol

paperbackwriter is awesome idk what happened there. the promotions are never perfect. and least Eli got staff.

maybe it's cause this is a review writing site and not a paperback writing site

Congrats to everyone who's got promoted.

It's very hard to get noticed when you write revs about stuff that's unpopular on here and it's not even anybody's fault. That's just how the psychology of the crowd works. People tend to comment more on the discs they know. Look at me, for example. I wrote plenty of reviews on records that were really obscure on here back in 2009 and 2010 and it really took me plenty of time to make some users read my work. To be frank, it's way easier to get noticed and promoted when you cover coveted LPs that garner a lot of attention from Sputnikers, but is getting contribed or staffed really the most important thing on this site? I prefer to think that it's not. Just my thoughts...

there's a strangerofsorts out there with real good taste in electronic music i'd like to see snag a late promotion.

Speaking of lists potsy Im happy you're keeping yours short n sweet now because like I said before people are more willing to check out unkown albums if someone only recs them a few at a time. Thats the best way to promote a band. We cant throw 100 unknown albums at somebody and expect them to check em all out. Its just not going to happen. That will take months. So if we really want people to check something out put em on a small list, and if we really really want them to check it out write a review. Other than that people are going to listen to what they want and you cant do much about it. Most of the userbase here seems to be younger so Im not expecting them to all of the sudden start reviewing shit from 1968.

congratulations guys m/

fuck that, kill should be staff

treeman should be staff

Like for instance Im listening to that Cymande album you recd. On RYM that album has 313 ratings but on here it only has 4. Kinda crazy since thats one of the best rated psych funk albums ever.

And yea the 100 album lists are great once in a while for year end/definitive/best of/whatever else you wanna do but Im always more down to give a quick look to something in a small group if it looks up my alley.

I know I've had to add a lot of shit too that I was like "huh" when it wasn't there

beats antique man i used to jam that

convince me to start again then

okay potsy youre still cool though

okay. i might later but im listening to the new mountain goats right now

yes sir yes sir

she looks like she would be your soul mate

why isn't pmmets a contrib I mean really

Gratz all

/hat tip

Paperback's a good writer, but I think he needs to focus on more recent stuff to be considered first. His writing's good but he focuses on specific genres that aren't terribly common, and pretty old albums. Not that there's anything wrong with that, and I love the guy to death. But being a Contributor means generating steam for upcoming releases, and I know that if he focuses on that in the future he should have a promotion next time for sure.

Thanks for the kind words, guys. :]

Damn I should've applied; Congrats new fellas!

Congrats people, well deserved.

Actually silentpotato, a good amount of my reviews were of albums that didn't have any reviews, and
all have been posted the week those albums were released. I've even made a few album and band pages
myself to review a new release. If that's not unknown for you enough I don't know what is. You know,
it's pretty ironic, I think I realized that on this site there are so many reviews for lesser known
artists that there are commonly no reviews at all for releases that are somewhat popular in the
mainstream. Most pop and modern rock albums on here go un-reviewed or have 1 review from a user, so
before you bitch that we need more reviews of "under the radar" albums, think for a fucking second.

And Fragile has a valid point - comparing reviews of Usher's latest to, say, The Ghost Inside's newest release shows an emphasis on the more obscure artists. They're a group that don't have a ton of support in other places, even if we hear their band's name like everyday. Alex is a really talented reviewer and has shown great promise with his writing, so it's silly to call him out for his review choices - I had to adjust which albums I reviewed, too, to ensure that I'd be considered for the promotion.

yeah kj...i totally forgot to apply

It's all good; we'll be in the wave of inductees scoot

@OmahaStylee94 Exactly, before I wrote my review for Believe that album didn't have a single review for awhile. Thanks for the kind words too dude. I didn't even apply actually lol. I had no idea people were getting promoted, so when I just logged in to see I was a contributor I was like HUH!? I'm still pretty surprised I got promoted over a lot of users that did apply and have been here for years.

potato no one on staff wrote a review of the bieber album

OMG I JUST REALIZED THAT I CAN NOW (well, soon-ish, at least) PUT DISNEY REVIEWS ON THE STAFF COLUMN.

SO MANY ENDLESS POSSIBILITIES

Potato man is just mad coz no one reviews the albums he adds.

you guys dont get what a unique and under the radar contributor thesilentpotato is to this community!

"I'm still pretty surprised I got promoted over a lot of users that did apply and have been here for years."

that says something about the quality of your writing ;D

also, that new bieber album is pretty great, even though people are sure to hate it just for the sake of it.

"OMG I JUST REALIZED THAT I CAN NOW (well, soon-ish, at least) PUT DISNEY REVIEWS ON THE STAFF COLUMN. "

Totally m/

TL;DR WE HAVE ENOUGH HIPSTERS AND PEOPLE WHO LIKE BAD MUSIC COMING TO OUR SITE ALREADY

holy fuck...this guy has 2300 ratings in three months

Congrats to everyone promoted. To those who missed the cut, remember that good things come to those who wait. And if you feel like someone got snubbed, there was probably a reason...like they don't cover enough new material, or they have issues staying out of trouble. Yes, the position is mostly about writing skill and consistency, but there's other things that factor in too.

congrats to these ppl, I've seen some good reviews. I also would love it if KILL was contrib. also, Captain Dooright is a good reviewer and so is Scoot, great reviews on great music.

oh shit guys we totally forgot about KILL

Sowing if youre not part of the solution, you're part of the problem. Can we have a fair and balanced staff that approaches every clarkson record with an open mind instead of pushing the typical Taylor Swift propaganda??? i mean for fucks sake

Hahaha

DISNEY REVIEWS ON STAFF!!!

D/!!!!!!

im most interested to see what, if anything, Irving and Xeno will contribute to Sowing's blog

I also would love it if KILL was contrib

he's worth more to the community as is tbqh

^yep

I love this trio

I don't think KILL would even want to be staff; he'd say it's for fags and faux cunts who conspire against true metal, and they suck dick anyway and probably haven't even heard Camel

I realize this as well, that was kind of tongue in cheek. I saw a few people mention that. KILL is hilarious and yeah seems to be a cornerstone of part of sputnik's personality as it is and I don't think anything needs to change there.

I was serious about Captain DooRight and Scoot tho. Scoot mentioned that he forgot to apply and that's a shame. I've read a few of his reviews and they have been great, and his Blindead review is one of the best I've read since I've been on the site.

"I don't think KILL would even want to be staff; he'd say it's for fags and faux cunts who conspire against true metal, and they suck dick anyway and probably haven't even heard Camel"

HAHAHAHAHHAHA.

Good picks but I think BassDemon was also worthy of becoming a Contributor.

yeah, kill is much better off as a user. his joke reviews are pretty great.

'To those who missed the cut, remember that good things come to those who wait.'

That's rarely true though I can see where you're coming from

Xeno I expect more indie reviews from you now that you're staff

;]

BAZINGA. but they can actually be kind of funny at times.

I also vote for Xeno to bring back his Big Boss av

good contributor picks, bad staff picks

"I was serious about Captain DooRight and Scoot tho"

scoot definitely, not so much captain due to the whole plagiarizing thing

oh, guess I haven't heard about that....

"good contributor picks, bad staff picks"

T.T

good contributor picks, bad staff picks

that's a pretty empty goal but ok

Gratz, looking forward to great reviews.

that's a pretty empty goal but ok

Raven is jealous

oh potato, you're a silly billy and i love you!! :]

backed tater

i wanna be contrib so i can have the title thing under my name and people will be like wow omg ur so cool

also birthrite isnt raven, raven is cooler than that

n'aw shucks!! [:

'Good picks but I think BassDemon was also worthy of becoming a Contributor'

This so hard.

Counterfeit should be staff






































LOL

yeah that is a serious question tho, how is angel not staff?

"Haha. I know you guys will staff me next time around. I want to be the person with the least amount of reviews ever promoted to staff."

maybe i can be the first staff with the lowest approval rating!!

oh I see you didn't choose me
oh
some good picks some bad, as always

Get back on contrib and review some good emo

Celine Dion on staff's most listened to list has just become inevitable. ;)

Congrats to everyone who got a promotion. Guess I'll keep writin' and try again next time.

it's probably because they figure what's the point in dedicating a lot
of time if no one pays that much attention to the hard work

-I agree, that for some that is the case. But its not always about the views and comments you get. I review a lot of Jazz/Jazz Fusion stuff, I get maybe 7-10 comments at the most and very little views because it isnt a popular genre here. But I write them so that if someone was to ever get into these groups, there will be reviews there for them to see.

i just wrote a review for jazz and you didn't comment on it Paperbackwriter

Oh good for you, I'll take a look at it now.

wisdom

@Xenophanes
Thank you. I mean, I'm not going to lie, it feels good when people notice your work and pos it and that was one of the
reasons that I wrote in the beginning but I grew out of that and simply fell in love with the enjoyment of writing. It's why I do it
and will continue to do so.

@andcas
That's really good, man. I've experienced the same here, I've learned a lot about music here and found bands that I never knew existed that I now love. It's a great place we have here.

Yeah, I learned a while back that pos votes mean nothing and negs are nothing to get upset over. Still, we all write with the intent of getting attention for our work, so it sucks if your stuff goes largely unnoticed.

'it sucks if your stuff goes largely unnoticed.'

um yea

I can say this about pretty much all of my reviews except for 1 or 2

"I agree, that for some that is the case. But its not always about the views and comments you get. I review a lot of Jazz/Jazz Fusion stuff, I get maybe 7-10 comments at the most and very little views because it isnt a popular genre here. But I write them so that if someone was to ever get into these groups, there will be reviews there for them to see."

I know that feel, bro. 7-10 is a good day ;)

*weird electronic shit away*

By great he means terrible r

Pos's and Negs really mean nothing...like, nothing at all. I've never recalled an instance where approval rating was even mentioned in the discussion of promoting someone. It's all about writing at a high level frequently, and if you do so, you will more likely than not get noticed by at least a few staffers and that's enough to bring you into the discussion.

Like I'm not entirely sure why half of the applicants decided to post their stats in their applications

@SowingSeason and Deviant.
Jom kept implying that the site may still be hiring new contributors, how certain is that?

I agree with all these promotions.

But Jom knew this already, since he asked for my personal opinion on the matter.

@SowingSeason and Deviant.
Jom kept implying that the site may still be hiring new contributors, how certain is that?

Yeah the stats thing looked pretty hilarious. One person did it and then everyone jumped onboard.

Xeno & Irving: your staff privileges seem to be up and running now

Oh, ok then. I've started to write reviews for new releases since getting hired at the altreview. I hope I get noticed in the long run.

I probably could write another review if I wanted to. In fact, I think I'll do one pretty soon.

i should write moar or sumthing

no lie shadowremains just shoutboxed me that he loves me than just deleted it

actually i just posted on the forum that you should get banned so idk what delusional hallucination you are going through

also this: http://oi46.tinypic.com/1jnuqt.jpg

"Yeah the stats thing looked pretty hilarious. One person did it and then everyone jumped onboard."

my bad. i don't really see what the issue is. it's a quick overview of how many news posts/reviews/whatever a person has contributed.

Well you still got picked and in the end that's all that matters, Gyro. You deserved it, mate. Definitely one of the best writers on the site.

It was more just "we don't care about your approval rating"

yeah the approval rating isn't necessary, i just kept it because i didn't feel like deleting it i guess.

PaperbackWriter: you're far too kind :3

honestly i've never actually looked at the amount of hits/reads on my reviews

i just like having an output :]

maybe you can start giving agalloch true ratings now that you've landed the position and can stop asskissing

but seriously...

Sputnik has the main front for popular mainstream bullshit MORE than covered with the current roster of staff and contribs. Like I am very aware that a large amount of traffic to our site is for reviews on awful shit like every new Bieber album or whatever else, that's popular music for you, but I think its okay if we have maybe ONE or TWO well written contrib/staff reviews for each of these musical gang bangs instead of FIFTEEN of them.

We've got the pop and hipster garbage covered guys. What we actually need is staff and contribs who will, like I said, focus on the new releases that go under the radar and have a tendency to also review older and less widely known releases. There's a reason why all of the good users here have to branch off and go start up obscure blogs to promote these releases. Nobody comes here for that because 95% of the time these albums aren't even in the database or have hardly any ratings whatsoever.

TL;DR WE HAVE ENOUGH HIPSTERS AND PEOPLE WHO LIKE BAD MUSIC COMING TO OUR SITE ALREADY

lets get some staff and contribs that can attract new audiences to the site.

I wish I could say "I don't write for the views, ever", etc., but sometimes this isn't the case. When I find a great musician that needs some exposure, I write a review hoping that as many people will check it out as I can afford.

That's honestly the most exciting thing for me with this new position - I can provide great musicians with attention, and that's one thing I've always wished for. :3

im still not aware of what albums the staff/contribs are always writing multiples of? we have a dibbing system to prevent
that. this is obviously more directed to staff bc contribs can write whatever they want

the system has failed

[url]http://www.sputnikmusic.com/review/39422/Sufjan-Stevens-The-Age-of-Adz/

^ l-o-fucking-l

for an album of the year (at least for some people) that's not really that surprising. also pretty sure keelan, robin and conrad weren't staff when they wrote theirs as well.

the point is, there would be staff reviewing lesser known releases if there were any good writers reviewing lesser known releases but *crickets*

Guess I'm gonna keep on going and try to apply again next year. Congrats to everyone who was promoted.

the point is, there would be staff reviewing lesser known releases if there were any good writers reviewing lesser known releases but *crickets*

point me in the direction bc we spent like three weeks trying to find people believe it or not. and i'd love to include you in
that but you've barely reviewed this year

both keelan and robin were actually staff, i dont think conrad was

so i guess it was only 4 5's

the point is, there would be staff reviewing lesser known releases if there were any good writers reviewing lesser known releases but *crickets*

that reminds me, i gotta go down to my basement to feed monica

interesting news development from a while ago: monica follows the moaropeth twitter and allows it to follow her

point me in the direction bc we spent like three weeks trying to find people believe it or not.
and i'd love to include you in
that but you've barely reviewed this year

interesting news development from a while ago: monica follows the moaropeth twitter and allows it to follow her

fuck man, now im breaking down

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3eOuK-pYhy4

sputnik could solve this "problem" you guys seem to have by just running semi-regular reviewing contests.

Basically take that sowing quarterly mixtape idea and ask for longer submissions. Let the best submission every month (by staff vote) win some worthless Keane album on vinyl or equivalent, but the better submissions get "featured" in a nicer writeup, edited and with embedded pictures and clips.

"both keelan and robin were actually staff, i dont think conrad was"

actually, Keelan wasn't staff at the time. Alex wrote a staff blog about what a great review Keelan's Age of Adz review was and they staffed him shortly after that.

Needless to say on my behalf that staff promotions of Irving and Xenophanes are (more than) well deserved.

Congrats to the new contribs.

actually, Keelan wasn't staff at the time. Alex wrote a staff blog about what a great review Keelan's Age of Adz review was and they staffed him shortly after that.

that's not a terrible idea acad minus the vinyl prize

i can see regular reviewing contests doing very well, at least at the start, to engage users to put their best quality content forward for recognition where it would otherwise be missed due to staff/userbase interest in what's being reviewed or simply being overlooked because of submission density

a regular physical prize is a near impossibility but if people are bothered enough about becoming contrib/staff, they'd probably submit anyway

kind of like those review of the month/review a random album things that were going when i joined the site

it at least got people using the forums a little bit

people on sputnik already wouldn't do it for the prizes, i just suggested it because (1) giveaways attract fresh meat and (2) recent giveways on this site, while well-intentioned, have been poorly utilized. What i mean by this is that contestants are asked to email the Sputnik email account (sending traffic off-site) instead of posting their submissions on the site (generating new content and discussion on-site).

I know you guys don't have a budget and you do a great job with what you're given, so i was just making a suggestion for next time someone is saddled with a giveaway...

All you'd really have to do to keep people interested in the contests is give the winners some special recognition--give them links that they'd be proud to share on their facebooks or google plusses or whatever. I think the easiest way to do this is to pick "winners" periodically and put presentation-savy staffers or contributors to work as 'editors' - just make the submission look nicer than a regular review. Then post them on the staff blog. All there is to do after that is have MX link them to user profiles and make a nice pretty banner for each feature. Maybe a somewhere on the front page if it takes off/future layout designs permit.

The point of all this would be to encourage what potato is complaining about (which personally, I do not think is such a big issue atm, but still) not happening to happen. If submissions come from the userbase and are moderated by the staff you have a cross-pollination of recs.

well i certainly enjoy writing reviews for more lesser known than popular ones

HOW DID I NOT GET PROMOTED WHAT AN OUTRAGE!! WHAT, IS ONE REVIEW EVERY THREE MONTHS NOT GOOD ENOUGH FOR YOU?@34

Seriously, though, congrats to all who got the nod!

http://www.sputnikmusic.com/list.php?memberid=428565&listid=104206

BOOM

Congrats guys.

This thread fills me with warm emotions