Sounds of 2012 and how it will work

If you followed me all the way through my "Sounds of 2011" series, which recapped Everfree Radio's Top 100 brony songs from that year, you'll know there were a few teething problems. Happily, things settled down after a while, and I now have a better idea of how I want to handle the 2012 edition. When will that appear? Right now, I'm not sure – but I'm not planning on waiting until Friendship is Magic has ended.

One thing I've been thinking about is how to handle songs that are no longer online, or are only around in unofficial uploads, perhaps because their creator deleted them. I've come up with four rules which will form the basis of my decision as to whether any particular track is featured or skipped:

Rule 1: Any song that is officially available from the artist, whether on their YouTube or another source such as Bandcamp, will definitely be featured. This is the easy one! 1b: This is for songs still available from the artist, but not in exactly the same form, eg acoustic or karaoke versions.

Rule 2: If there is good evidence that the creator is fine with third-party hosting, the song will be a go. Alex S, who has an official archive channel, is an example of this. (Another is WoodLore, but he's not a factor for 2012.)

Rule 3: Songs which are very well known will be featured even if the only way you can get them is through an unofficial source.

Rule 4: Unlisted songs will generally be featured. I reason that artists who've left songs accessible, even if unlisted, aren't likely to mind specialist fandom publications linking to them.

I think that provides a reasonable balance. To expand on Rule 3: I really do mean very well known. As a 2011 example, imagine if WoodenToaster had nuked "Rainbow Factory" from his account. It would have been silly to have pretended that didn't exist. But this won't apply to smaller-scale artists who had a minor hit years ago that everyone's now forgotten about. Those songs will be skipped.

As this post goes up, all being well I'll be at a convention. When I get back, you can expect the review of S9E07 by midweek or so. Remember, no Ponyfic Roundup this week, so PR 250 will appear on the 22nd.