Good post - thanks for the insight...
 

Larry Jones

iRelevant
I really don't understand what some people hope to gain by putting a obvious Rap song in the Blues Section FI. 

Yes, I noticed that, too. It seems that Bandlab users have no idea what style they are working in. I've mentioned this here before. I had a hard time finding any musicians I might be able to collaborate with, or even any music I wanted to hear. It may be this poor organization that makes the site appear to be full of subpar musicians. They're just not not where you expect them to be. Very democratic, though, letting everybody decide what the word "genre" means. 
 

I have encountered this regularly on Soundcloud as well. I know we aren't discussing SC, however I thought a good comparison could be made. Both are highly democratic placing the genre decisions in the hands of the Users. Both are predominately musicians and composers or those that wanna be.
It is so bad on SC that when you attempt to stream certain genre you might get anything. It is basically unusable to me.
I'm not sure how to narrow both genre and the types of collaborators you are looking for. It seems a lot of the top needs to be skimmed in order to find it. If you "fork" anything be prepared to lower your expectations. If it's something you worked hard on and value, don't do it.
The usefulness to me personally is probably as an idea pad. Once you upload there isn't presently much control. This is bad for me because I'm always re working tracks in a mix. You can delete a track and upload a new one though.
I WANT to like it. Not really flowing well for me yet. Maybe with time.

Perhaps Meng could approach LandR and ask if they will license their
Genre-Recognition artificial intelligence engine?
 
Only need to catch a reasonable percentage to raise the quality-of-experience
and give BandLab a unique selling point.

One thing I noticed is that the default genre is Other, so if you're uploading from your phone it's easily overlooked.  I actually made that mistake my first couple uploads.

jpetersen
Perhaps Meng could approach LandR and ask if they will license their
Genre-Recognition artificial intelligence engine?
 
Only need to catch a reasonable percentage to raise the quality-of-experience
and give BandLab a unique selling point.

I don't have much belief in this proposal, and think I would become pissed off if my classification get's over ridden by supposed AI. There are multi-genre songs, and it is ultimately a human judgment call whether as song is Rap with Reggae elements, or a Reggae song with Rap elements. I think it would be better do find a way to discourage obvious erroneous classification by the publisher. To communicate why this is not in anybody's interest. 

iRelevant

jpetersen
Perhaps Meng could approach LandR and ask if they will license their
Genre-Recognition artificial intelligence engine?
 
Only need to catch a reasonable percentage to raise the quality-of-experience
and give BandLab a unique selling point.

I don't have much belief in this proposal, and think I would become pissed off if my classification get's over ridden by supposed AI. There are multi-genre songs, and it is ultimately a human judgment call whether as song is Rap with Reggae elements, or a Reggae song with Rap elements. I think it would be better do find a way to discourage obvious erroneous classification by the publisher. To communicate why this is not in anybody's interest. 

I agree, although BandLab could help by offering sub-genres, and allowing you to pick more than one of them. The genres as they stand are far too generic.
 
M.
 

msmcleodI agree, although BandLab could help by offering sub-genres, and allowing you to pick more than one of them. The genres as they stand are far too generic.

+100

I want to make one think perfectly clear. The reason I stopped using Sound Cloud was because I had some people I have no idea who they were select FOLLOW my account and when you clicked their user names there were links to porn sites. I absolutely DID NOT LIKE THAT AT ALL! As I believe none of you would either. I contacted Sound Cloud and asked them how to remove them and what I might could possibly do and was told "There is nothing we can do at this time because our site simply is just not setup to do so". 
 
That's the first thing I looked at with BandLab, the Blocking option. I like that for this very reason that I mention above in this post. 
 
Thus far, or so far, or however the wheel turns, or the orchard blooms, or the grass grows, or that old steam engine still keeps on moving and the old town drunk keeps on chugging.. 
 
I really like Bandlab, I just wish even they want to call "FORK" something that they would put something to the side of it saying something like [This allows others to download your music and gives up your rights]. Although as per my personal experience so far the "FORK" option seem to be by default turned OFF. But who's to say in the future per their terms an era is not made....... 
 
Either way, or whatever the case. I like Bandlab's site, and the idea of working with others that I don't know to create some tunes who are looking to work with others might be a great learning experience for me. 
 
That being said, the navigation actions of Bandlab's site is really not straight forward, much like the Fork issue I mentioned earlier. 
 
When you click your user name you should see all of your songs post, and especially if you click your username you should be directed straight to your area where your music is posted. I had to save a link to get me where there is only my music that I have posted for others to listen to, just to be able to find them. 
 
That's cool with the Facebook feed to see your followers and people you follow latest songs shares and such things. But it should be made better to find your own songs easier. 
 
Bandlab is cool, don't get me wrong, I'm just pointing out some of my issue's in the hopes while there are people that are in the position the make changes can do so. And I will say their support as I mentioned in another thread was very very good. 
 
Either way, sorry to keep beating a dead horse so to speak, but I just wanted to say a few more things. 
 
Thank you BandLab for listening to me and others first and foremost, because you could have very easily just took off with Cakewalk Sonar Platinum and re-branded it another name and left all of us loyal Cakewalk users in the dirt. 
 
 

Speaking of genres, "Prog" seems to be noticeable by its absence.

iRelevant
...I would become pissed off if my classification get's over ridden by supposed AI. There are multi-genre songs, and it is ultimately a human judgment call whether as song is Rap with Reggae elements, or a Reggae song with Rap elements. I think it would be better do find a way to discourage obvious erroneous classification by the publisher. To communicate why this is not in anybody's interest. 

You raise the problem of conflicting interests.
 
For consumers, sub-genres help finding material.
For artists, sub-genres are hidey-holes that reduce exposure.
 
Artists who put their Rap songs in Country do so knowingly to maximize exposure.
They would be pissed off, irrespective of whether man or machine re-categorized their material.
But Country fans will be pissed off finding Rap tracks in their Country category.
 
Google base their results (mostly) on algorithms, regardless of who they piss off.
 
An algorithmic solution has the advantage of being for the most part a neutral arbitrator.
 
And hey, paid featured songs can be put over multiple categories as an additional income stream!