New XKCD Forums

Well, we've been keeping it alive via Discord and e-mail ever since the forums went down, and having just finished the last round that way (congratulations to somitomi - who offered me the honor of reinstating it here - for the winning submission!) it's about time that we move this back to the traditional format :) So here it is, the return of the xkcd Song Contest!

Rules: each round is hosted by the winner of the previous round (unless they pass,) who may declare a theme for submissions or leave it free-for-all. Forum members have a week from the start of the round to send their submissions (including title/artist and a link for listening) to the host by PM; once the submission window ends, the host posts the anonymized submissions in the thread, and members then have a week to vote on the results, also by PM.

Voting is ranked, and members must exclude their own submission. First place in a slate of N entries (minus the voter's submission) receives N points, second receives N - 1, and so on. The entry with the highest combined tally is the winner, and the member who submitted it takes over as the next host. Forum members who did not submit an entry may vote, but will only count for half the points.

So! To get back into the swing of things, I'll start us off with a free-for-all round. Send me any song you like, up through Thursday, September 16th; I'll post the submissions on Friday. Let's get some noise back in this house!

Thanks for bringing this back!

I believe the original also had a rule that, if you didn't submit an entry, you can still vote but your votes only count half - will we be using that rule here?

Ah, I couldn't quite remember how that worked. Yes, we'll go with that.

bit of an issue- just registered, and cant pm people- is there another way to contact you for this?

Ah, huh. Yeah, if you need to you can e-mail me at (username)@gmail.com instead.

update: got the perms, am pming song

Snazzy :D

Thanks for continuing this, I'll probably send in my entry within the next few days

I'll probably send in an entry minutes before deadline

Probably shoulda posted this reminder earlier today, but you have until tomorrow morning (PST) to get your submissions in!

Sent.

Suggestion - timeanddate.com countdown timer to manage deadlines?

Alright, the first round submissions are in, and what a slate! Here's the entries, sorted ASCIIbetically by URL:

https://soundcloud.com/dangle/shia-labe ... antor-full - Rob Cantor, "Shia LaBeouf"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lNFTYDNuFo - Elena Skopetos, "A Princess with a Secret"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7xn5zeJ4D4 - Tim Carleton & Darrick Deel - "Opus No. 1"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PfxgbsXeTdE - The New Christy Minstrels, "Green Green"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XOTU9yuRsr4 - Geoplex, "Exegenesis"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yeAsNg7K6E - Merry Hell featuring The Social Isolation Choir, "We Will Meet Again"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUoz6HaFg88 - All Time Low ft. Pale Waves, "PMA"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPFNIdMzd2w - Lemon Demon, "Pirate in a Box"
https://youtu.be/7D-Qxu3Ssoo - Robert Berg, "Finishing the Dex"
https://youtu.be/K3HzzcI1cxE - Lena Raine, "Beyond the Heart"
https://youtu.be/T_xFpjlrF38 - ABBA, "The Visitors"

Listen, enjoy, rank, and vote! I'll tally up the results on Friday the 24th.

Wow, is that the most entries we've ever had?

Pretty darn close, if not.

Oh I didn't realize we could do silly songs

Wow, I think this might actually be a record number of submissions.

The Snide Sniper wrote: ↑Sat Sep 18, 2021 2:56 am Oh I didn't realize we could do silly songs

The OP did say "free for all"

Oh, the other rule from the old version that hasn't gotten mentioned here is that, if you don't vote, your entry doesn't count (for obvious reasons - your entry will have an advantage if you don't, after all).

The version from the old forum (like the version from the forum I copied that one from) also had slightly different scoring rules for rounds with 10 or more entries that weren't preserved in the discord version

I don't think we even reached ten entries in the Discord version

Yeah I don't think we did either, but it still doesn't look like that part was brought back here

Curious how that worked - it's been long enough since the forums went down that I've entirely forgotten.

Basically it was:
-If there are more than 11 entries, you still only vote for the top 10
-If there are 10 entries, a 1st place vote gets 10 points instead of 9
-If there are 11 or more entries, a 1st place vote gets 12 points instead of 10 and 2nd gets 10 instead of 9

Well I'll just vote and let Commodore John do the points however.

SuperJedi224 wrote: ↑Sun Sep 19, 2021 12:26 am Yeah I don't think we did either, but it still doesn't look like that part was brought back here

Apparently 9 was the record on Discord and I didn't even remember we had these special rules for 10+ submissions on the forum

SuperJedi224 wrote: ↑Sun Sep 19, 2021 1:32 am Basically it was:
-If there are more than 11 entries, you still only vote for the top 10
-If there are 10 entries, a 1st place vote gets 10 points instead of 9
-If there are 11 or more entries, a 1st place vote gets 12 points instead of 10 and 2nd gets 10 instead of 9

So 12-10-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 in this case. That's what I'd recalled too.