Vaporwave’s Mini-Boom of Floppy Disk Releases • Hacker News Board

Re: Vaporwave’s Mini-Boom of Floppy Disk Releases

#11

Post by patorjk » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 3:06 PM UTC

32qwef wrote: post #7

michaelbuckbee wrote: post #3

My mind just can't accept that this isn't a parody / publicity stunt.

I thought the same thing when all these punk and indie groups were releasing cassettes. Then I found out that most people didn't play the cassettes. They bought them because they look good on a shelf. The cassettes have a download code printed inside (Bandcamp will spit out a CSV), so when you actually want to listen to the music, most will redeem the code (or just stream it). So it's still pretty silly, but not as s…

Not only similar, but exactly what the guy selling the floppies thinks:

> "And a lot of these people, I don’t even think a lot of ’em play the shit. They just kind of put it on their shelf."

Re: Vaporwave’s Mini-Boom of Floppy Disk Releases

#12

Post by achileas » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 3:14 PM UTC

32qwef wrote: post #7

michaelbuckbee wrote: post #3

My mind just can't accept that this isn't a parody / publicity stunt.

I thought the same thing when all these punk and indie groups were releasing cassettes. Then I found out that most people didn't play the cassettes. They bought them because they look good on a shelf. The cassettes have a download code printed inside (Bandcamp will spit out a CSV), so when you actually want to listen to the music, most will redeem the code (or just stream it). So it's still pretty silly, but not as s…

It's art and nice to display. People do the same with vinyl records, comics, etc., definitely looks cool to have for collectors and lovers of old tech.

Re: Vaporwave’s Mini-Boom of Floppy Disk Releases

#13

Post by sitkack » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 3:19 PM UTC

Paul_S wrote: post #10

JansjoFromIkea wrote: post #8

Making something that can fit on a floppy disc is pretty cool restriction to give yourself imo. Do you just cripple the bitrate to squeeze a 3+ minute song on, do you stick to super short songs or do you find alternate means of maximising the space (I'm thinking potentially a mixture of midi files with some guidelines, and super low encoded vocals) Floppy discs are much more aesthetically pleasing than cassettes (alt…

I was disappointed that the floppies didn't contain mods (tracker music).

Maybe you should release that album you have always been thinking of, "Meta Flame", a Torch program that uses DNN to turn mp3 files into tracker files. All advanced compression schemes use the Grad Student Algorithm [1]

[1] http://www.faqs.org/faqs/compression-faq/part1/section-15.ht... (search for "graduate student algorithm")

Re: Vaporwave’s Mini-Boom of Floppy Disk Releases

#14

Post by 32qwef » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 3:19 PM UTC

achileas wrote: post #12

32qwef wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought the same thing when all these punk and indie groups were releasing cassettes. Then I found out that most people didn't play the cassettes. They bought them because they look good on a shelf. The cassettes have a download code printed inside (Bandcamp will spit out a CSV), so when you actually want to listen to the music, most will redeem the code (or just stream it). So it's still pretty silly, but not as s…

It's art and nice to display. People do the same with vinyl records, comics, etc., definitely looks cool to have for collectors and lovers of old tech.

Yes. I actually kept some of the cassettes I was given, and they do look nice on a shelf. Plus it's a way to support the band.

I once considered releasing a tape with no music on it. Just nice cover art. I wonder if anyone would know?

Re: Vaporwave’s Mini-Boom of Floppy Disk Releases

#15

Post by binarymax » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 3:23 PM UTC

I'm still waiting for the wax cylinder to come back as the coolest media format.

Re: Vaporwave’s Mini-Boom of Floppy Disk Releases

#16

Post by fzzzy » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 3:25 PM UTC

Paul_S wrote: post #10

JansjoFromIkea wrote: post #8

Making something that can fit on a floppy disc is pretty cool restriction to give yourself imo. Do you just cripple the bitrate to squeeze a 3+ minute song on, do you stick to super short songs or do you find alternate means of maximising the space (I'm thinking potentially a mixture of midi files with some guidelines, and super low encoded vocals) Floppy discs are much more aesthetically pleasing than cassettes (alt…

I was disappointed that the floppies didn't contain mods (tracker music).

I think mod releases and midi releases will probably happen eventually.

Re: Vaporwave’s Mini-Boom of Floppy Disk Releases

#17

Post by jancsika » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 3:27 PM UTC

Would be an interesting constraint to limit oneself to a single html file and use/abuse the burgeoning webaudio API to make an album that fits on one of these.

Re: Vaporwave’s Mini-Boom of Floppy Disk Releases

#18

Post by 27182818284 » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 3:27 PM UTC

acconrad wrote: post #9

michaelbuckbee wrote: post #3

My mind just can't accept that this isn't a parody / publicity stunt.

And yet it's a sub with 100,000 followers: https://old.reddit.com/r/Vaporwave/ There's a sub-genre that dubs Vaporwave songs with Simpsons clips that has tens of millions of views on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=simpsonwave It is indeed very real. Surreal, even.

Simpsonwave is one of those things that reminded me just how great having the Internet is. I'm not in the community by any means, but as soon as I learned about it, I was so happy that it existed and that it had a community putting out work.

Re: Vaporwave’s Mini-Boom of Floppy Disk Releases

#19

Post by nerdponx » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 3:28 PM UTC

32qwef wrote: post #7

michaelbuckbee wrote: post #3

My mind just can't accept that this isn't a parody / publicity stunt.

I thought the same thing when all these punk and indie groups were releasing cassettes. Then I found out that most people didn't play the cassettes. They bought them because they look good on a shelf. The cassettes have a download code printed inside (Bandcamp will spit out a CSV), so when you actually want to listen to the music, most will redeem the code (or just stream it). So it's still pretty silly, but not as s…

Punks, at least, most certainly do listen to cassettes. Cassettes are cheaper to run in small quantities than vinyl. Cassette players are cheap and easy to find. Punk music sounds good on cassette.

I'm not so sure about floppy releases. But there is probably some overlap between retrocomputing enthusiasts and vaporwave fans. Maybe they're the target market. At least floppies are thin; a shelf full of cassettes will fill up quickly.

Re: Vaporwave’s Mini-Boom of Floppy Disk Releases

#20

Post by toomanybeersies » Tue, Jul 10, 2018, 3:30 PM UTC

acconrad wrote: post #9

michaelbuckbee wrote: post #3

My mind just can't accept that this isn't a parody / publicity stunt.

And yet it's a sub with 100,000 followers: https://old.reddit.com/r/Vaporwave/ There's a sub-genre that dubs Vaporwave songs with Simpsons clips that has tens of millions of views on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=simpsonwave It is indeed very real. Surreal, even.

If you think that Simpsonwave is weird, just wait until you discover fashwave: https://thump.vice.com/en_uk/article/mgwk7b/fashwave-trumpwa...

It's literally the same as vaporwave, but with fascist titles and graphics. Reminds me a lot of neo-Nazis appropriating metal and punk.

Vaporwave is a weird genre. It's really popular on the internet, but it never quite hit mainstream, I don't see clubs playing it and most of the artists seem to be self-releasing. A vaporwave artist had a gig here in Melbourne a couple of months ago (I can't remember who it was now), and I thought about going along just to see what kind of people actually listen to it in real life.