• Music Playground
• Music Playground
• Music Playground

By entering competitions, entrants agree to be bound by these rules as amended from time to time, and by any competition instructions.

It is the responsibility of entrants to keep themselves informed as to any updates of these rules, and they acknowledge that any failure to comply with these rules could lead to their disqualification without reasons being given or opportunity for challenge.

The competitions are a work in progress, and are subject to change. The competition administrators can backdate rules and rulings during and after competitions, given that a satisfactory reason is provided.

It is required to have a registered account on the forum, to become an entrant in Music-Playground's competitions.

It is expected from each entrant to behave in a respectful manner towards each other. Content deemed inappropriate by the administrators, moderators or general board members in entries, reviews, on the forum and in rare cases off-site, will have consequences regarding current and future participation.

Any attempts to cheat by either submitting another artists track, trying to tamper with the votes or in other forms will result in an instant ban from current and future competitions.

Every competition will have a promotional text, which all members and visitors are welcome to use to promote the competitions. Alteration of the promotion text is acceptable, as long as the context is preserved.

The creation of posters, flyers, videos and other public announcements used to promote the site and competitions is deeply encouraged.

Music-Playground will in some competitions offer a prize to the winner. The prize is typically donated by private persons or sponsored by small companies in exchange for promotion space.

Some prizes will only be available if a certain amount of entrants is reached. That amount is generally determined by the donator of the prize.

The winner has the right to renounce the prize, in which case the second place entrant will be offered the prize, who also have the right to renounce the prize, and so forth. If no entrants accepts the prize, it will be used for the following competition.

If the competition admin, forum admin, prize donator or other persons with similar connected functions join the competition, they can not win the prize, and will automatically renounce the prize.

A competition is divided into three rounds. Each round consists of mandatory or voluntary actions, which have an impact on entrants' path through the competition.

During the join round all artists can enter the competition, using the proper form on the join page after registering as a member on the forum. An audio-file, an artist name and a track title is required for participation.

Every entry may as well contain information such as equipment used, collaborators, samples used and other notes. This information can only be revised and edited during the join round.

On the entrylist page all entries are instantly viewable once added, along with the provided information.

There is a minimum requirement of entries, before a competition can advance from the join round. If this requirement is not met, the join round is extended by 1 week

The qualification round starts immediately after the join round ends. Entries are put into qualifying groups, seeded using the competition rank. Each group consists of 4-5 entrants. The qualification round is 1 week, if no extension is added.

All entries are available for download from the entrylist page. All registered forum members have access to download the tracks. Within a short amount of time, a competition administrator will put up a link for downloading all tracks.

The first round of voting begins. The voting form is available on the vote page. Every entrant that has not voted, is displayed on top of the forum

The review page is available for review submissions.

There is a minimum requirement of votes, before a competition can advance from the qualification round. If this requirement is not met, the qualification round is extended by 1 week.

The final round starts immediately after the qualification round ends. The first place entrants of each group is put into the Gold group, the second place entrants of each group is put into the Silver group, the third place entrants of each group is put into the Bronze group and the remaining entrants are put into the Medal group. The final round is 1 week, if no extension is added

The vote page has now changed to final voting. Special Mentions are available for voting as well.

Results from the qualification round are now available on the result page.

There is a minimum requirement of votes, before a competition can advance from the final round. If this requirement is not met, the qualification round is extended by 1 week.

An advanced point system is used for creating a fair competition experience. Various tools are used to weigh points more towards entrants using the voluntary actions, especially reviews, to encourage active participation.

Each voting round is seperate from each other, meaning that the points from the qualification round is not used in the final round (other than determining groups)

In each group 4 entrants can receive 1,2,3 or 4 points.

The score is the amount of voting points the entrant has received. Additionally the entrant receives 0.5 points if he has voted, and 0.1 point per voting slot used. Each special mention is counted as a voting slot as well.

Example:

Extra points are used in case the score is tied. Extra points are calculated using the amount and the quality of the entrants reviews.The calculation used is termed 'Bayesian Rating'. This ensures that one good review does not give more extra points than many decent reviews. Any reviews the entrants has submitted for the active competition are not included in the calculation.

Example

Rating points are used in case the score and extra points are tied. Rating points are calculated using the entrants amount of ratings for the featured tracks.

Example

In the event that two entrants are tied in score, extra points and rating points, the rank is used to determine the better entry. The lowest ranked entrant will always win a tie.

Categories are special mentions for entrants mastering specific musical elements.

The following categories are available.

Awards are special recognitions meant for upcoming and new artists. They cannot be awarded to Music-Playgrounds featured artists.

These are the current awards available.

The competition rank is a seperate score, that are both used for seeding in the qualification round as well as keeping track of entrants competition performance.

The rank score is based on the total amount of points per artist, but also takes into account various other feats. These extra feats are applied as multipliers. The extra points and rating points from the final round are used, so it is of no consequence if the entrant rates or reviews during the competition.

The base rank score is calculated using the formula in the following example.

Example

Based on the entrants performance and participation in the competition, a multiplier is calculated and multiplied to the base rank score. Elements affecting the multiplier are amount of reviews in the competition, final group number, placement in group and amount of special mention nominations.

There are certain constants used in the calculation of the multiplier, which currently are these:

Example calculating a multiplier and final rank score

Trophies are an achievement system, based on the PS3 trophy system. During the course of a competition, entrants will unlock various trophies, depending on their actions and their entries' progress.

Currently these are the types of trophies, that are achievable:

Medal	Medal trophies are typically achieved by general participation in the competition, however a few are hard to achieve. There are currently 18 medal trophies to achieve.
	Examples: Baby Steps: achieved by joining a competition In The Spotlight: achieved by receiving 1 nomination in any category
Bronze	Bronze trophies are typically achieved by a more active participation in the competition, and getting decent results. There are currently 25 bronze trophies to achieve.
	Examples: Fill In The Blanks: achieved by using all information boxes when joining Rookie Reviewer: achieved by reviewing all or 20 tracks in a competition
Silver	Silver trophies are typically achieved by getting good results, and participating actively in multiple competitions. There are currently 20 silver trophies to achieve.
	Examples: A Touch of Gold: achieved by qualifying for the gold group Dedicated Voter: achieved by using all voting slots in 3 competitions
Gold	Gold trophies are only achieved in a single competition by the very best entrants. Multiple competition participation and very good results are typically required to achieve gold trophies. There are currently 16 gold trophies to achieve.
	Examples: There Can Be Only One: achieved by winning a competition Track Expert: achieved by receiving 30 nominations in each category in total
Platinum	Platinum trophies are very rare, and are only achieved by masterful artists and extremely dedicated entrants. There are currently 12 platinum trophies to achieve.
	Examples: Competition Champion: achieved by winning 3 competitions
Star	Star trophies are extremely rare, and only obtainable through insanely dedicated participation or perfect results. There are currently 5 star trophies to achieve.

This chapter covers general actions available and required during and after a competition.

During a competition various types of actions are available to both registered forum members as well as entrants.

Registered forum members have access to the following actions:

When an artist enters a competition, more actions become available: