Tagging demos anonymously? Stop this now

Bettye Zoller · **Voice Talent** Joined: 03 Aug 2003 Posts: 163

OK. I've read all your posts and geeze, my initial post here already has generated some 1300 or more posts. I should be running for VOICEOVER PRESIDENT..but of WHAT?? I hardly can figure out what to vote for for US president...anyhoo...I love all your posts. Most perceptiv thinking, ya all. So here we are...on voice 123. And what's the deal? I still think tagging is sophomoric and highschool and stupid. And I don't have time, As someother pros like me have said here, to take time to listen to demos and tag them. I barely have time to audition here and sometimes do not audition at all for days cause no time. So when I do audition for something that is bigger money--certainly not the $100 etc. jobs...oh they offend me as a professional...I still do not have time to do other things on the site. Is this a social site or a dating site> NO. We pay to be on here. Let's stay professional. I've told the voice 123 folks this too in other emails...let's keep on keepin on folks. And also, let's keep pushing for that so -called improvement promised so long ago that sets professionals apart from newbees and audio engineers apart from people sitting on beds with laptops!

Lee Gordon · **Voice Talent** Joined: 22 Oct 2004 Posts: 1549

Diane Havens · **Voice Talent** Joined: 09 Jun 2006 Posts: 1281

Yes! Just so -- and in all practicality, it will make no difference in the search feature (currently).

Seekers, when they DO search, will use the same oft-used words we all have on our pages. They are not going to consult a thesaurus and use Boolean limiters to narrow their searches, now are they? ( Wasn't the argument about refining the rating system to provide more detail that it wouldn't then be used? How is this different? That the ratings be used seems to be far more important to them than it should be, it seems to me.)

A search feature is only as good as the searcher. The words on our self-generated pages will remain, and are still searchable -- (for now). Editing those by other parties would certainly bring law suit. So...?

JC Haze · **Voice Talent** Joined: 10 Aug 2007 Posts: 86

Lee said: "Man, my head is getting ready to explode! I can't believe all the angst and venom this stupid little experiment has evoked.
Why are people actually playing along? I have no idea. Maybe for the same reason people play the Google Image Labeler game ( http://images.google.com/imagelabeler/ ) -- because it can be interesting and potentially useful."

JC says: WHY are they playing? Simple. To win a free membership. Why else bother?

Bettye Zoller · **Voice Talent** Joined: 03 Aug 2003 Posts: 163

Well, I've received some emails saying "try it, you'll like it." I have not had time to linger after auditioning on 123 yet...the box comes up when you audition saying you can go listen to demos and tag...but I am going to do it next week for the first time cause I feel "sheepish" about not having tried it yet. My thing is "time to do this." I sometimes go on my audition board and think, "I really ought to be doing something else...these are lowballs..." and don't even audition just like most of you think too, Yes? But I've been sent a video to view by 123 and I shall view it next week. So I'll be back (as Swarzenegger said) soon with my thoughts after viewing the video. One thing: Alex Torrenga and team have built a monster site here for manyyears now and I owe the team my time to reconsider my opinions about tagging and thank them for their time in contacting me. More next week. I'm slogged this week with two sessions with out of towners and two seminars I'm presenting in Dallas. I'm fried. Hugs everybody.

Claire Dodin · **Voice Talent** Joined: 16 Aug 2005 Posts: 400

ok, after all of this I decided to give it a try.
They sent me the "French" speaking demos and OH MY, "French" was really only just the title in most cases.
There are several well produced demos from people with good voices who pretend to speak French but their first language is obviously different and I could only identify one of two words in the demo.
What saddens me, is that the voice talents are not able to veto themselves, they should know their French is bad. English clients who don't speak French will trust their French is good when it is shockingly bad.
Anyway, so that's what I've learned from this exercise. Not quite sure what I can do with this information.

Kara Edwards · **Voice Talent** Joined: 26 Oct 2006 Posts: 347

OK, I finally had the chance to tag about 5 demos yesterday.

Wow- what to do when it's poor quality and obviously someone who hasn't taken the time to study their craft??

Be honest or skip it? I'm a coward...I skipped it.

I'm shocked that folks would pay money to post poorly produced demos that showcase their inexperience! Please oh please folks- if you are going to give voice over a shot- take some classes!

Fortunately, 2 of the demos were spectacular, and I was sure to give them appropriate and (hopefully) helpful tags.

Edited to add: after tagging those demos, I went back and listened to my own. A silver lining from this experiment- I realized it's time to update and improve a couple of my own demos! See, good can come of this tagging stuff!

Scott Pollak · Posted: Fri Jun 13, 2008, 14:35 (GMT) Post subject:

I will admit that I finally listened to a few and tagged a few, too. And Kara, I have more cojones than you do, obviously (and thankfully!).

Several of the demos I listened to were terrific and I tagged accordingly. Several were awful and I tagged accordingly. While straying away from words I REALLY wanted to use, such as 'fecal' and 'excretory', I did use words like amateur, inexperienced, weak, and so on.

Sorry, but it's time to thin out the chaff here.

Lee Gordon · **Voice Talent** Joined: 22 Oct 2004 Posts: 1549

I still don't think tagging is meant to be a form of critiquing; it's for categorization. What has made this whole process so controversial is the fact that Voice123 did not really make it very clear that they were not asking us to rate other people's demos (i.e. amateurish, boffo, weak, need's polish, etc.), they are asking us for the same kinds of descriptive words we would apply to our own demos (i.e. serious, sultry, effervescent, youthful, grandfatherly, etc.).

Most of the demos I've listened to, whether good, bad, or ordinary, have not caused any particular tag to spring to mind. Maybe I should start tagging demos with the word "generic." Come to think of it, maybe I ought to add "generic" to my own profile.

Keep in mind that if you have a word in your description that nobody ever searches for, it won't hurt anything for it to be there. For instance, we could all add the word "wretched" to our profiles and it wouldn't make any difference because, presumably, nobody ever does a keyword search with that word when they are looking for a voice over. Therefore, the search engines would always ignore it.

Conversely, if your profile is missing an appropriate description of your voice/style, you could be by-passed when a seeker plugs that word into a search, even if you are the perfect candidate for the job.

Bettye Zoller · **Voice Talent** Joined: 03 Aug 2003 Posts: 163

Well as I said in my last post, I've not done tagging yet but will try to find time to do some next week. But your comments here are very perceptive about a talent whose French was horrid and demos that just are amateurish. Very interesting. One good thing about tagging...we're going to use the exercise to REALLY hear who is on this site. I believe the talents should be grouped as "beginner" and "advanced" and "professional recording Studio and Pro Engineer" and "beginning recording." Something of this sort. We need separation into "pros" and "beginners" but...how would this be done? Food for thought.

Dina Monaco-Boland · **Voice Talent** Joined: 28 Nov 2006 Posts: 671

Brad Venable · Posted: Fri Jun 13, 2008, 16:44 (GMT) Post subject:

What a den of confusion this tagging thing is...

So when can we view the tags on our demos? Or is that a Premium subscriber only deal? If people can tag me but I can't view them without paying that I will not be a happy camper.

Inquiring minds want to know!

Greg Houser · **Voice Talent** Joined: 12 Mar 2008 Posts: 174

September Day Leach · **Voice Talent** Joined: 31 Aug 2005 Posts: 1526

I think what it all boils down to is that V123 is a business who, like most businesses, wants to make money. You can't make money by excluding people who want to come to the party. This isn't an agency that only takes on the pros and doesn't mind putting in the work and money to promote them because they believe they'll make it back. They're offering small businesses (and some big ones) the chance to bypass agency bullcrap and get straight to the gooey center. Everyone's talking about standards and such but V123 never claimed to be the VO Messiah. They are just a business offering a venue for seekers to get to talent. Why should we expect them to have to uphold standards in the industry? That's not their business model and, in the end, if they did do that, they would lose money. It is what it is. There ARE businesses who uphold the VO standard and they are called agencies. Agencies represent the creme de la creme. When a business goes there, they KNOW they will get a pro. If Atlas sends me ANY of their talent, I know I'll get something usable. Let's face it, V123 is the Wal-Mart. Great deals but sometimes the shoes fall apart after the first wearing. Oh, sure. You can find name brands here and there, but it's mostly the Equate brand for sale. And let's face it, isn't that a good thing for us good talents? To be up against worse talents? Aren't we more likely to land the gig? No, I don't want to stand out because I'm the least sucky but it's always a hell of a lot easier landing gigs here than when I'm competing against the pros at my agencies.

Could V123 maybe offer "Top Tier Talent"? A level or icon that a member is given only if they are a real pro? Maybe. That's more work for them and it could really honk off current clients who think they are top talent but who aren't. The bottom line is, it's not their job to keep industry standards high. This isn't the place to come to get street cred or steady $1,000 gigs. Those places are agencies.

There are great jobs posted here that pay very well and the seekers who book them are not booking crappy talent. I tagged a few demos myself today and would be willing to bet my cat's ears that at least two of the talents that I tagged have never gotten one job here at V123. And some companies are willing to wade through them to get to actual good talent just to be able to deal with talent directly and not with agencies. V123 is a bar scene. Everyone is allowed in but you get to pick who to hit on and who you'll give a fake phone number to. But everyone is allowed in because the bar wants to make as much money as possible. You want exclusivity? Gotta go to an agency.

Just my opinion Smile

Diane Havens · **Voice Talent** Joined: 09 Jun 2006 Posts: 1281

You are absolutely right, Ember. And I would have stayed if I was one of those who kept getting work here. Who wouldn't? Who wouldn't then be able to overlook so much of what's wrong here?

I once did get regular work here, not the highest paying, but I was new, so I didn't expect it. And I think some seekers actually will hire someone we'd here consider bad -- in fact, we've all heard some "bad" VO on the air somewhere, haven't we?

There are other factors at work here, and the complexity of the site now has made it so difficult to navigate optimally that they have to run training sessions to show how to use it. And write us long involved e-mails.

I realize some very fine talents such as yourself book lots of work here, but then, some very fine talents do not.

And I am sure some not so fine talents get a gig here now and then, and then tell all their friends -- yes, it's a business. A product you can buy or pass up.

I'm passing for now.

I may be back. I may not.