September 21, 2004 - Frequently Asked Questions

1. Archive access

Q. Some of the old mixes are prompting me for a password/ I can't get older mixes. What kind of shit is this?

A. We only post material publicly for a period of a week after which it is moved to our archives. The archive is pretty big (20 GB+, growing at 1-2 GB a month) and our bandwidth on the public folders is huge, so only mixers or folks who donate towards our bandwith have access to mixes older than a week. Information on donating can be found here.

We recommend that you use a download manager to download.

2. Submitting a mix

Q. I have a mix. I want to submit my mix on b00mb0x. What do I do?

A. We currently accept mixes uploaded to our server by FTP. FTP will work with Internet Explorer, but a dedicated application like CuteFTP will allow you to resume and do other fun stuff. New mixers can get the ftp upload details by emailing us @ admin@b00mb0x.org. Please take note of the following restrictions.

Just mixtapes please, please use the oodles of remix/bootie sites out there for your bootlegs remixes and send the record companies your beautiful original creations. If you don't know what a mixtape is (!?), just look at what other mixers have posted, it pretty much explains itself.

In the interest of trying new things, b00mb0x now accepts video mixes. If you want to enter into this time consuming and frustrating process we accept up to 250 MB per video mix in the avi and mpg formats. If you are familiar with Sony Acid, you can use Sony Vegas for your video content, it works along the same lines.

You can do a full length mix made up of remixes but not a full length mix of stuff you made yourself. If there's confusion about whether a mix is a mix or a remix, we'll make that determination.

Please do not upload more than 1 mix a month. This is a new one. Its tough for us to deal with when people are constantly sending multiple mixes. We want to remain an open site so please hang back on sending your next mix until the following month. It's because we have limited storage and resources and we need to be fair to everyone.

125 MB size limit per mix

MP3s only

Please don't ask use to listen to your mix and decide if it's good enough. Show some balls, man (or if you're a woman, whatever the female equivalent of balls are).

Most mixes are between 20-80 minutes and encoded at 256kbs or lower (I recommend lowest quality variable bitrate with min/max bitrate set at 32kbs/320kbs if using CDex or RazorLame).

Most mixes have covers. Covers are considered an important part of the mix (like any good mix tape or mix cd) but are not required. Check around the site for peoples covers to see examples. We appreciate a tracklist for any mix.

You can now include a print quality cover if you wish along with your mix along with a cuesheet. Neither is required.

You basically need to 1) contact us for the upload server details 2) Run a google search on FTP tutorials so you know what you need to do 3) email us, letting us know your mix is there so that we can post it. If you haven't contacted us regarding a mix that's been uploaded and there for a while, we delete it.

3 .Delay between uploading and your mix being posted on the site.

Q. I uploaded my mix X minutes, days, weeks, months ago. If you didn't like my Ukrainian ghetto-style, why didn't you just say?!

A. If you have emailed us and received a response, it WILL be posted, it just a matter of time. We generally post mixes in the order in which we've received them.

4. Spam

Q. Why is somebody offering to extend my penis size in the comments under my mix? Is there some charge for this extra service?

A. Movable Type, the system we use for the site, is particularly attractive to spamming scripts. We maintain a blacklist of spam sites, but a few, sometimes a dozen or more, get through on most days. If you respond, you're responding to a script. It feels no love, no hate, no human emotion at all. We usually delete whatever spam we get daily and any reactions to the spam. Sometimes we delete kosher comments by mistake when deleting spam.

5. Moderation

Someone is being mean to me! Make him stop!

A. We delete spam. You are entitled to say any mix sucks, just not over and over again.

6. b00mb0x

Q. What is b00mb0x?

A. b00mb0x is a mixtape competition site. It started off in an IRC channel in 2000, when assorted and I decided to see who could make the better mixtape (assorted's was better). Since then we started hosting bootlegs and added things like the blog, but basically we are an online mixtape site, so we've gone back to our roots in that respect. All mixes are welcome, not just DJ sets (although they are very welcome) and the more imaginative they are, the better. Sometimes. We put mixes to the public vote once a year, around November and December.

7. b00mb0x email

Q. What's the webmail link for?

A. Because we love you, anyone who contributes to the site can have a b00mb0x.org, bootbox.org, bmbx.org or b00mb0x.com email address, accessible via the web or an email client. Just let us know what address and password you want (you can change your password via the mailboxes link.)

8. Helping out on b00mb0x
Q. I'd like to help out on b00mb0x any way I can, what can I do?

A. We need people to write for the blog. Blogging is fun. You can write about anything you want, you don't even need to be a mixer. You can link to cool stuff you found online or post your own images.

We're on the lookout for tutorials on various mix related software. Abelton, Traktor, Cubase, ACID 5 all spring to mind. You can perform screen captures by pressing alt+print screen and then pasting the clipboard into your image editing application. We will be eternally grateful.

We also appreciate people submitting covers for the front page. Please don't just take another image from the Internet and slap b00mb0x on it. That's sucky. That's not saying you can't use "found" images in some context, just try to show a modicum of creativity.

Posted by naz at September 21, 2004 10:37 AM

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