Was just looking at tune on the session and thinking how handy it would be if there was an upvoting/liking feature for tune settings. What do you think? https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/CXLB86F
If two settings have the same number of likes, the older setting would be displayed first.
What about running a survey to actually ask people why they choose certain versions to print out and learn, rather than others?
-the audio feature helps to make that choice, but there are a lot of other motivators.
“Handy” as far as tune settings is in the eye of the beholder.
One vote very much against this proposal.
Or, perhaps I should say “handy” as far as tune settings is in the <ear> of the beholder…
Surveys? Up-voting? New search by non-trad? Trying to turn this into Reddit?
Anonymous_Piper, given that you don’t listen to the music, on what basis would you yourself upvote a tune setting, would it be on how pretty it looked, symmetry, or you just preferred it, even if it was some jazzy murdered version of the original tune.
I think the tune section here is the main reason this site exists, making the tune section better is always a good initiative, rather than calling it a like, I would say something along the lines of nominating the setting which is most accurate to the way you know and have heard the tune, but for that you would need to listen to the music.
In my opinion if you don’t listen to the music then any new features that are put into your hands could produce a negative outcome.
We discussed upvotes for tunes about a year ago. (And I would note that Jeremy hasn’t done anything to forward the idea in the last year either…) https://thesession.org/discussions/44565
Most of the time when a tune I look up has several settings, the posters have included useful information on their sources. That’s very helpful.
A popularity contest for tune settings? Ecch.
You can bookmark a setting.
Consider that an upvote, a thumbs-up, a like, a favourite, or any other term that implies endorsement.
(Reverend: bookmarks were introduced in the past year.)
To “up vote” any particular setting, I feel like, to be fair and informed, I would need to learn all the settings for that tune. And then it’s possible I would up-vote all of them. Or I might find myself wanting to change my vote at a later time.
It’s always a possibility that a given setting works better for some instruments than others, or not equally well for players with differing skill levels. So without further details on why a particular setting was voted up, votes would be of questionable value.
As an alternative, if you really like a setting above others, how about discussing it?
Atsunrise- because it’s not the information I was looking for?
Theirlandais- if it was a tune that was not specifically recorded by one person or group (e.g. Micheal Mcgoldrick) I would pick the setting that was the most sensible for the instrument that it was meant to be played on, as well as a little preference and obviously common sense.
Jeremy, bookmarks do not raise the placement of a tune in the list. This is where I see fault in the system- even if the most liked setting is not your favorite, the worst you’d have to do would be to look through and play all the settings (which you have to do with the current old-to-new system anyway.)
>> bookmarks were introduced in the past year.
True, and they’re helpful, Jeremy, thanks! We did discuss maybe ranking the settings that have the most bookmarks higher in the list, but again, I don’t know if it’s worth the hassle 😉
Anonymous_Piper, you’re coming up with all these suggestions for changes, but it’s Jeremy that would have to do the work to implement them. Maybe if you give him a big donation for the site, he might take the suggestions more seriously, since this is a free site which he has generously developed for the community, and continues to run without any revenue stream other than donations… 😲
(BTW, Jeremy generally doesn’t like meta-discussions, or discussions about the site instead of about music…)
Anonymous_Piper, I hope you’ll reconsider your approach to requesting new features.
Insulting the members of this board because we push back on your suggestions with legitimate reasons that apparently don’t fit into your world view of the purpose of this board doesn’t seem like a very effective way to deal with, well, anything.
I honestly like the way it is right now because the comments below reflect the versions in order, so if I am looking for something specific I know where to find it. Next to that we have bookmarks (this makes you only show the version you picked and not a list). In most cases my nr 1 tunes I use are actually on spot 1 (usually Jeremy’s) with a few exceptions due to the instrument played. I also think theres not always a nr 1 tune in the list used (how many here play multiple instruments or change settings based on tune clips/musiv video’s and thereby play a variety of certain tunes).
If you want to have only 1 setting shown you have 3 options I would say:
1. Bookmark
2. Write down of tunes which version you play (i.e. X:3 <authors name>)
3. Print screen / print the tunes you use and collect them in a document/folder/physical organiser
Dutchie- someone who actually explains their point very well! I see exactly what you’re saying.
Revered- yes, he messaged my and told me I had posted too many. I will refrain from posting any more for the time being.
I skim through the settings when I’m first learning a tune, to find the one that best matches what I’ve heard, either at a session or on a recording I’ve felt inspired by. I use that as a reference when learning the tune, then don’t refer to it again. So likes, upvotes or whatever aren’t of use or interest to me and I’d ignore them. That’s not to say that I object to them, but I’d have a mild preference for keeping the versions in chronological order, which sometimes feels like it’s giving some kind of useful context.
“I would pick the setting that was the most sensible for the instrument that it was meant to be played on, as well as a little preference and obviously common sense.”
If that’s your logic then upvoting doesn’t make any sense, because you wouldn’t know why people have upvoted that setting and what instrument they played, I presume upvoting is a collective thing, where you want to fast track to the most upvoted setting to speed up the process. I guess you would then ask Jeremy to add what instrument the upvoter played.
Anyway, Jeremy has already told you what he thinks of the idea.
Anonymous_Piper: Question/ Jeremy what time is it ?
Jeremy: Answer/ 27 Celsius, you can use that temperature to work out the time.
I still think it’s absurd that you don’t try and find a recording/audio of the tune (to listen to the other 80%), it’s like trying to cook with plastic food.
The fundamental problem with up/down voting is that different players come to this site with vastly differing requirements for what they would consider the “best” setting.
If I’m looking for a specific version on a specific recording, having the most “popular” version does me no good.
If I’m a player from city X and looking for the version of the tune that is played at my local session in city X, but there are more players in city Y who are up-voting the version played at their local session, the most up-voted setting does me no good. It also creates a false hierarchy of “best” to “worst” versions based on voting, which will be misinterpreted by newer players who would, by default, gravitate towards the more up-voted versions, and the least voted would be considered as somehow less worthy of consideration.
If I’m looking for some version of tune I heard in a non-standard key, up/down voting does me no good.
The whole concept of up/down voting is based, in my opinion, on a very narrow worldview where the tune database should be a popularity contest, which I can understand might be the position a player of limited experience in this music may hold without any thought to the larger context of how the tune setting database is used by others.
The tune setting system currently requires that a player looking for a specific setting has to be willing to do a bit of work to locate exactly which setting meets their requirements, and as such the system works for a wide range of scenarios. That’s a good thing. I don’t think it would benefit by imposing an arbitrary and easily misinterpreted concept of “best” or “most popular” through a voting system, in my opinion.
When I’m investigating a tune or trying to learn a new one I usually play through all of the versions in turn to see which works best for my instrument, or - if I have heard the tune already - which version corresponds best with the one I have in my head (even though that might be fragmentary). Often later settings are reactions to earlier ones which the posters think are wrongly or poorly notated, or in an unsuitable key (as noted in the comments), and we would lose that sense of progression if the settings were ranked according to votes.
NO!
https://thesession.org/members/33668/bookmarks
😀
“…which you have to do with the current *old-to-new system anyway.”
a.k.a. chronological order. Which is helpful in situations such as these two consecutive comments, beginning with the first one here; https://thesession.org/tunes/115#comment108796
Talking about why people learn certain tunes.
A couple of version choice triggers for me:
The key, any reasonably common key where I can play the tune in the lower and higher octave without going above the d on the top string, octave mandolin then it’s a good possibility.
Any version (or even a tune) that has a note followed by it’s fifth above or the fourth below, unless they are open strings is out. But I’m working on it.
Any version that has 64 eighth notes in 8 measures or 128 notes in the 16 measures is out, unless there are lots of sharps and flats.
I love reading the comments to the tunes.
I’ve given the idea more thought. I think up-voting is, at best, a halfway measure. I suggest “rank choice” voting. For those not familiar with the concept: under rank choice rules, each voter may rank up to five settings in order of personal preference. Votes would then be tallied. If one setting received more than 50 percent of all first choice votes cast, all other settings would be eliminated.
If no setting won more than 50 percent of first choice votes, the setting with the fewest first choice votes would be eliminated. The first choice votes for that setting would then be allocated to whichever setting those voters ranked as their second choice.
If that still did not result in a setting with more than 50 percent, the process would be repeated: the setting with the next lowest first choice vote would be eliminated, and those votes distributed as per the next higher ranked setting of each of the voters who voted for the eliminated setting.
Eventually this would reveal a setting that is least objectionable to all voters. And the rest would be eliminated, because no one remembers a loser.
This type of question could go on forever. It’s not the 1st time & it probably won’t be the last. So, I’ll just cast my votes right here; right now. For every tune recorded by Matt Molloy on flute (or whistle) I’m voting ^up^ for his settings every time. Same for Frankie Kennedy. That goes for non-trad tunes as well. 😛
Done!
Rank choice voting to reveal the “least objectionable” tune? Is that how you approach which tunes to learn? Really?
Just to repeat what’s already been said -- we’re all coming from different experience and different parts of the world. I don’t want someone else deciding for me what’s the best setting of a tune, because that’s either my personal preference based on recordings, or what’s being played in local sessions which is the intent of this database according to the site owner. Open your ears and decide for yourself what’s a good setting of a tune. Don’t complicate what’s working fine..
Umm, I think I detected a tongue in cheek in that post- let’s let the topic lie and go back to arguing about backing styles 😉
If the backers are voting should they rank the settings based on the ones with chords included?
“I love reading the comments to the tunes”. …
Yes, me too, and that’s where the ‘voting’ is best reflected. It should be left there.
@conical bore, My attempt at humor was clearly too subtle for a print medium. I apologize for any stress I caused.
@Barry, sorry if I misinterpreted. 🙂 No stress here, the music is all that matters. I’m thankful for our host here that lets us talk about it.
Not completely related (I read upvotes in the post title), but on the forum I often wish there was a way of upvoting a comment/sending a thumb up to a poster.
I often get the situation where I post a comment and someone agrees/mentions me/says something very nice back/gives some great advice.
I don’t want to take then post off topic by filling it with multiple unrelated “thankyous” when I wasn’t the original poster, but also seems a bit rude just to leave that post and not to acknowledge that persons time/thought in writing it.
Feels like it would be nice to have the ability to thumb up comments, but can also see how that could accidentally create cliques and other social media issues which don’t tend to happen here as much currently.
belayatron, you can bookmark comments.
Not quite the same as an upvote, like, fave, or whatever, but it does demonstrate attention and the act of doing it would show up in the “recent activity” list.
What a dreadful idea! How could an indication of what other unknown individuals like, possibly help or inform anyone, whether learner or not? Your own taste and experience is the only valid measure. The variety is the spice - if you’re learning from dots, learn several versions; it’ll stand you well.
(Two or three distinct session groups round here each favour different settings of some tunes, and it’s a joy to give each an airing. On my own, I might play a different setting altogether.)
Thanks Jeremy, I didn’t actually realise the bookmark functionality existed, that’s a very useful feature.
It might be useful to have some indication as to what is “The dominant variant” . Sorry.. 🙂
However, I wouldn’t like a vote on personal preferences or on what may or may not be the most accurate. Perhaps, members could “tick” the version they actually play most commonly as opposed to what they would prefer to play or consider to be the most accurate?
Of course, even that wouldn’t necessarily be that helpful as settings will vary from area to area and session to session. Until you actually visit sessions and hear the repertoires, you never really know but then you will surely find out very quickly.
I like the current chronological arrangement of settings and see no benefit of Reddit-style up-voting. I like the sense of site and participant history; the Session has been around long enough that some members have died, but they have left us a valuable legacy of settings and comments. Usually the more widely-used settings are the oldest and thus they are the first ones seen. As others have remarked, the comments are another draw and I usually enjoy scanning through them.
My suggestion would be to give a small coterie of trustworthy users (I’m thinking of the Kennys and Nigel Gatherers and so on) the ability to “mute” settings, to hide them from the main view, though leave a link to click to see them. There are a lot of settings under many tunes which are a waste of electrons, for various reasons, and being able to get rid of them would be a public service.
Could we please reserve top position for the correct version? 😉
Which setting of this tune would be ‘the correct version’ , Rick?
https://thesession.org/tunes/1214
You can bookmark it if you like.
@AB Setting #3
I start the second bar with the triplet AFA (in place of F2F)
You do know this was a joke, right?
Correction: NOT a triplet!
“Could we please reserve top position for the correct version?”
Hahaha Rick Payman for the win!
“You do know this was a joke, right?”
That’s not too hard to sort, Rick.
“My suggestion would be to give a small coterie of trustworthy users (I’m thinking of the Kennys and Nigel Gatherers and so on) the ability to ”mute“ settings, to hide them from the main view, though leave a link to click to see them. ”
Sounds like we’ll need “rank choice” up and down-voting for who gets included in the super-muters group. Vote soon, vote often! 🙂
Just thinking about how this might work (if at all) were it to be adopted . . .
By way of example, Anonymous_Piper, how would you prioritise your votes for each of the two versions of ‘The Soup Dragon’ , the two settings of ‘Beginner’s Luck’, and the three settings of ‘The Wellerman’ that you’ve posted?
Personally, I’d have no interest in such a voting system even if I thought there could be some value in it (which I don’t). I don’t play through every tune that is posted, but if something catches my eye - e.g., a title that seems intriguing, or a tune I’m actively looking for - I’ll play through the first version I come across and maybe sample bits of some of the others to check out different keys or phrasing, and make my own mind up about how I’d like to play it. In the end, I’ll add my own twiddles and variations as I get used to it. Knowing that one setting here has been ranked 5 out of 17 by an unknown number of some other people would be monumentally irrelevant.
Of course, if the suggestion were to find favour, where would it end? Should we have a system to vote for the various versions of a tune as published in O‘Neill, Breathneach, Kennedy, Kerr, etc.? There are no definitive settings of folk tunes, just ’skeletal’ approximations, different styles, and personal preferences. There is such a thing as excellence and such a thing as rubbish, but you only have to look at politics to see that voting systems don’t necessarily offer a convincing means of distinguishing them.
Don’t get me started . . .
“If two settings have the same number of likes, the older setting would be displayed first.”
From a pragmatic point of view, I would maintain the existing chronological order of both settings and comments, then add a Setting Search/Selector (Menu) - perhaps next to the number of settings - which could then include:
* Most Bookmarked (Upvoted)
* My Bookmarked
* The Correct Version (THIS WAS A JOKE, @AB!!)
Sorted, @Rick!!
//Was just looking at tune on the session and thinking how handy it would be if there was an upvoting/liking feature for tune settings. What do you think?//
I think it would be totally pointless, to be honest.
Now, instead of me trying to explain why it it pointless, I’d welcome any comments as to why it could be useful in any way at all.
Yes, I’ve read all the comments.
@Theirlandais - mark this on your calendar - for once, I agree with you 🙂
Actually, Most Bookmarked won’t work, because of the bias/feedback caused by people bookmarking the most bookmarked/upvoted version for themselves.
Jeremy really ought to have a rule discouraging such Meta discussion - please accept my own apologies for succumbing to temptation.
Why is “upvote” a word? When did that happen?
I’m going to crawl back under my rock. It’s a great rock.
Sedimentary?
Metamorphic.
A handy tip about bookmarks: You have a personal bookmarks page, which has all of the bookmarked settings, e.g. https://thesession.org/members/120226/bookmarks. You can go there and use the browser search to get directly to a bookmarked setting. This can save your finger valuable scrolling energy if your preferred setting isn’t at the top of the list on the main tune page. (P.S The above link is to my bookmarks, you have to find yours on your profile page)
Jim Dorans said: “Now, instead of me trying to explain why it it pointless, I’d welcome any comments as to why it could be useful in any way at all.”
I can see that it might be quite interesting to know which settings are most well-known/ played/ popular, so as to be able to say: “Hmmm” and see what makes that version stand out from the others. But that’s more of a research project than “useful”.
I haven’t been around much the past few months, as my attention has largely diverted away from music (in large part due to the lockdowns, which limited when/where I could practice and the such).
In that time, I have spent significant time on some Reddit-like forums.
From my experience here and elsewhere, I would have concerns with several aspects of how an upvote system would work on TheSession (if Jeremy were to chose to do so).
In no particular order:
1) Relating to a previous comment above: How would the average user weight two settings which are roughly the same? Would they upvote both? Would they just not bother upvoting the second? Would they be more inclined opt to upvote the one which already had the highest number of upvotes? I suspect this could get rather messy.
2) Would there be an option to ‘sort’ as ‘oldest’ vs. ‘most upvoted’? I would think that would be a valuable option, defaulting on ‘oldest’ to introduce the least change to the current system.
3) I used to be curious about which tune settings people chose for their tune sets that they would make here, so, if I knew the tune they added to a set well, I would often see which setting they picked (i.e., what settings did people deem ‘good’?). Part of what I learned from this, over a very long period of time, is that many people often chose setting #1, even in the infrequent cases where setting #1 is a poor transcription (which other people having noted this in the comment section).
The point to this story is, with an upvote system, I have a strong suspicion that some folks would just upvote the current ‘top setting’, even if it wasn’t necessarily a ‘good setting’ (which of course can be subjective, but sometimes it is more clear cut), rather, because they like the tune itself (not necessarily the setting), which would have the net result of cementing that setting’s position at the top of the list.
4) Would there be a downvote system? If so, how would that work out?
5) I have seen on one forum design that instead of upvotes, you can have a ranking system (not sure how easy this would be for Jeremy to implement), say, from 1 to 5 stars. Is that a better option? I suspect no, but, just throwing the idea out there.
6) Someone above pitched the idea of a few ‘trusted’ members to have ‘hide power’ of some settings. While this could work, it runs some risks (from what I have experienced elsewhere, admins/mods can really mess up a forum), and, as we have all seen, Jeremy is an excellent admin/mod. Top notch.
‘Hiding’ really bad settings can be done in rare cases by simply messaging Jeremy something like: ‘I don’t believe this transcription really wasn’t done very well, I think these bars should be X (having listened to the recording Y referred to if there was one), could you please double check and possibly change accordingly Jeremy?’.I have personally done this in a small number of cases where a bar had too many (or too few) notes, for instance … very obvious mistakes.
7) Could you see who upvoted what? I have seen some forums where this is possible. This could be very useful, because if someone like Kenny or Nigel upvoted it, I personally would be more trusting that the setting is good. Whereas if the upvoter was a username I didn’t recognize, or, perhaps a user I know to be a beginner, I might be more reluctant to assume that the setting is good. And it almost goes without saying that I would check the transcription myself anyways. Have a listen to it, and a recording of the tune, etc. etc.
8) On some forums with upvoting systems, the forum eventually degrades a bit, because some members of the community turn it into some sort of popularity contest. Seeking upvotes. Especially if this is tied to some ‘stat’ on their account.
I imagine this is less likely to occur on a music forum like TheSession, though, it is something to be mindful of. I imagine we are all here to learn from each other, to enjoy the much, and so on, not to have some weird competition with each other about ‘who has the best setting’ or something.
9) What about settings which users modify after their original posting of it? Would the upvotes ‘reset’ (b/c you wouldn’t have a way of knowing if the original people who upvoted it like the changes)?
(Fixed) typo in my previous comment:
> I imagine we are all here to learn from each other, to enjoy the music**, …
NfldWhistler: “1) Relating to a previous comment above: How would the average user weight two settings which are roughly the same?”
No idea! 🙂 I was just trying to find a reason for doing it as a reply to Jim Dorans!
Regarding multiple settings, sometimes there are many that are equally good - perhaps X:2 comes from a certain recording of musician NN, X:3 is close to a generic setting, X:4 comes from a respected musician who hasn’t recorded anything, X:5 from yet another album (equally popular as X:2), and so on…. and maybe setting X:1 is poorly transcribed.
Which setting will get the votes?
A bit of advice which might be useful for someone clicking on a tune with multiple (15 or more) settings & wondering how to tackle the beast. You can begin with the 1st three settings. But first, see if the contributors
left a comment. They don’t always so finding anything might help. Comments matter.
You can make it more than three. Point is rather than trying to take in several settings, several comments;
you can approach it in a way similar to how it appeared originally. The *original setting may or may not have been acceptable. Either way if the members reading the tune post in real time were paying attention it’s
likely the 2nd & 3rd settings are worth checking out. It’s a crapshoot. But if you’re needing a method
to go to any tune, and find a good setting, and still having time to go to a few more (without spending
all night reading years of commentary) it’s a starting point.
The other thing I want to say is don’t loose sight of how you would play the tune and what is your
‘base’ setting of the tune(?)
Ben
* if the original setting is not acceptable chuck it & go w/the next 3.
…also check out the most recent setting…
~ & use bookmarks to find the good ones later!