Points Going Into the Ether

[Ling]

I'm stumped by the point awards system. I max bumped "Man In the Moon" when it was at 397 points... it's now sitting pretty at 663 points and so far has earned me zero points. The weird thing is that other songs that have gained less mileage have reaped at least a point or two. I've tried emailing the contact at T61, but I've never gotten a reply. Grr... any ideas what I should do next?

[scrivener]

It is a weird and unpredictable system, and I'm guessing they keep it that way on purpose so that the algorithm is not so easy to figure out. Racking usually gives 1 or 2 points, but every so often you get a rack reward of 30 or 40...it's not often, but it's often enough to keep you hanging on for the next one!

The only reliable way to earn points is to listen to songs on the rack. It might take longer, and on some days it might take more songs to earn the same number of points, but it's a guaranteed way to earn points up to the limit without spending them.

Although if you've got an itchy trigger finger, you probably bump more songs if you listen to more songs. You have 800+ bumps to my 180 or so! If that's the case, more rack-listening might not pay off quite as much...on the other hand, the more songs you bump, the more chances you have at the big payoffs, right? :)

[Greg]

The point return system is mystery wrapped in a riddle sunk in a murky lake. You get a better point return the earlier you bump a song and the more points you have sunk into it. That being said it's not so much the point total the song was on when you bumped it that matters so much as the unique listener # at which you bump a song. While the song may have gained 266 pts only 8 unique listeners bumped the song after you (you were unique listener #176 out of the current # of 184 listeners for 46 bumps after yours). So 212(266 - 46 = 220 - your 8) of the bump gain was by listeners who put their first bumps before yours and so most of the bump gain is returned to them. The more unique listeners a song gains after you is generally a better gauge of what your point return will be.
P.S. - Look in the comments - bumpers tab for your unique listener number.

[Greg]

I would actually disagree somewhat with the rack listening approach. There is only a set amount of points that you can earn from the rack in any given day with each song earning you from 1 to 50 points by random distribution. While it is a certain way to earn points and bumping songs from the rack will also give you a point refund, you're unlikely to get any great payoff. The more points you have sunk into a song and the earlier you bump a song (in terms of unique listners) the greater your point reward will be. The rack is set to a random play of songs that haven't made the homepage so you're getting a mix of new songs, which may or may not take off in popularity, and old songs, sometimes several months old that never managed to garner a large listener base and are unlikely to take off now with decreased visibility. Most of the discovery action still occurs on the browse by today page because there you're guaranteed to find only the new songs uploaded in the most recent 24hr period and so have a better chance to be an earlier unique listener on a hot song resulting in a greater point payoff.

[Mel]

Songs that have more bumps are cheaper it seems, and songs that are new with less bumps are expensive, points wise. Listening to the Rack songs is time consuming and the payoff varies as already mentioned. For most songs I only get like 1 or 2 points. When I first joined the system which was like only this past weekend, I noticed I got bigger point awards for listening to rack songs.... but as I have logged on every day now, and listened to a dozen or so rack songs at the time, the payoffs are a paltry 1 or 2 points.

However remember that by logging in every 24 hours, so far I get 20+ points for just being there. Hopefully this lasts. I am pake so I don't bump too many songs, and just will continue building points the slow way.

I am here mainly @ 61 to find good music and download those free available songs that I like, and listen to them later on my iTunes and iPods.

[Mel]

Here's another thought. What if everyone here formed a cartel and all promise to at least listen to each other's RADIO tab for a few minutes every day. Apparently people get point bumps when someone else listens to their radio. If you hate the songs on the other user's radio, just turn the volume off on your computer, let the radio play for several minutes and song cycles, and do something else at the same time... like sleep in the late night.... of course how much bandwidth does this activity use up?

[Mel]

So like right now listening to The Rack I got one lousy point for "Beautiful Explosion" by Plajia and for "Spring Time" by Jesse Grace I get 15 points. Also got free downloads out of those 2 which I probably value more than the points.

And now I get only 1 point for "Long Time" by Jon Crocker. No free download either... hmmph!

OK... and as they say... the hits just keep on coming!

[Ryan]

Thanks, Greg, for all your great insights and advice. Just from your few posts here, I've learned more about thesixtyone.com than I have in a couple of weeks of stumbling around. I, too, was just playing through the rack in the hopes of earning points -- and I didn't even know you could pre-select a genre, so my mix was pretty ridiculous! Bagpipes to industrial to ducks quacking.

I like that the system really does reward spending points and catching songs early moreso than just passively listening, though I gotta say I'm also more intimidated, because I don't have half the knowing ear some of my friends here do! I'm pretty sure on the bump rewards front, I'm spending only a little less than I've earned back, and that's through a small minority of tracks that pay off well.

I definitely wouldn't recommend not listening to music as a strategy. Besides, from what Greg says, the benefits for non-stop playback is cut off at some point.

[Greg]

If you just listen to the rack to gain a steady income of points you can mute it and leave it in a separate tab while continuing to browse music of your choice. I'm not sure when the rack cuts off the points giveaway, probably after about 200 - 300 pts, it will tell you when you've reached the day's max. The points are given after the first min of listening at which time you can also switch to the next song.

As for radio bumping you can only bump one radio about once every 13 to 15 mins. The point return is as follows:
DJ level 1 - after 25 listens - 100 pts
DJ level 2 - after 100 listens - 250 pts
DJ level 3 - after 1000 listens - 500 pts
DJ level 4 - after 5000 listens - 1000 pts
DJ level 5 - after 25000 listens - 2500 pts

For a maximum of 4350 pts.

I know of no one past DJ level 2. 1662 is actually the highest radio count I've heard of so basically it would be a longterm strategy to get many points out of radio bumping. But it's a pretty good way to hear music you might have missed.

On a side note here are the level up numbers if anyone is interested:
1: 0
2: 120
3: 170
4: 270
5: 480
6: 750
7: 1300
8: 2000
9: 3150
10: 5000
11: 7500
12: 11700
13: 17550
14: 26300
15: 39500
16: 59200
17: 88850
18: 133270
19: 199900
20: 299858
21: 449800

[modsuperstar]

I've found you do get a pretty substantial return if you max bump early. It cost you a buttload of points, but looking at my stats it's shown it typically does pay off.

ex.
Beautiful Explosion - Plajia +219 points (13 -- >76 bumps, x6 )
I think this one cost me 35 points a pop to start(then goes down a point or 2 per bump), which cost me roughly 210 points, but already after a few days I'm already at least +9 and the song still has lots of room for future bump growth.

[Kalei]

Is there a MAXIMUM point amount that one can earn on a song? Say for instance the Meiko song that I first bumped. I gained 605 pts to date from that song. However, the points haven't gone up for days now (605 for 4 days now) while the bumps still continue to go up. I'm confused.

[Greg]

@modsuperstar - a song gets cheaper by one point per unique listener who bumps it. If as you're bumping it someone else, a new listener is also bumping it you'll see the larger cost drop. The algorithm adjusts for artist level on the return for a song. Newer, lower level artists like Plajia return more points than higher level artists, presumably to help level the playing field with artists who've been on the site longer and already have a fan base. This is an aspect of the algorithm I've had to come to grips with recently and I think this might tie in with Kalei's question on the Meiko song. It could be that as Meiko has recently uploaded a lot of songs and leveled up (
Meiko #4 on the leaderboard) her songs have subsequently been penalized by the algorithm returning fewer points per bump. The song should continue to earn a profit but not as much or as fast as it was. That's my theory, anyway.


Mathmanmrt is a good person to ask bump questions to. He's a math teacher, so he's good with numbers, he's also been on the site a while and keeps track of point returns on a lot of songs and so has a pretty good grasp of profit margins and also bump/listener # requirements for a song to hit the homepage. Just shoot him a tunebox with a hello and your question, maybe bumping his radio as a goodwill gesture, though he'd likely help you anyway. Best not to write a question about the algorithm on anyone's walls. The algorithm is a sensitive isssue with the administrators, being a key feature of the site, and they tend to be a little wary of people probing its workings even superficialy.

[scrivener]

I had a banner day, points-wise, on Thursday (1000+ points). We should call that "pulling a Stefanie." Anyway, after that killer day, I kinda tanked Friday and Saturday. Almost nothing. I did my usual amount of bumping, but I was getting lousy returns. You think the Halloween Friday meant that fewer people were in front of computers, and fewer people bumping? Is that generally the trend anyway, for bumping to be decreased during weekends?

If that's the case, should I expect decent returns on songs I bumped early Friday and Saturday, or, once they go to the rack, have those tracks lost their momentum?