# Westworld entry rejected due to Spitfire typo



## tone.room.tape.

Hi there,

recently I made a score for the Westworld scoring competition by Spitfire Audio. When I tried to submit, the submission form did no longer work. As I found out later, the problem was that they have a typo in their terms and conditions.
The website here says June 3rd at 23:59 *BST*
https://www.spitfireaudio.com/westworld/
but I only looked at the terms and conditions, which state 3 June 2020 at 23:59 *GMT*
https://www.spitfireaudio.com/westworld/terms-and-conditions/
So there's an hour difference, because of BST and GMT and unluckily I tried to submit exactly in that period of time.

When I sent them an email about that, they told me, that they are sorry that I didn't manage to upload my entry correctly in time and " We realise how annoying technology can be sometimes! "
After that, I thought I didn't explain my point well enough and sent another mail. No answer! And after two more mails again no more answer from them. I put quite a bit of time and effort into this and even if I know I have no chance of winning this, I'm really disappointed about their response, or lack thereof!

I'm pretty sure, I'm the only one, who was unlucky enough to get in that situation but maybe there is someone else?
Apart from that, I'm so disappointed by Spitfire, that I wanted to share this!

Cheers


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## gussunkri

"Scammed"? Are you sure that is the right word? To me, it sounds disproportional to what actually happened. 

Share your work here instead. Maybe you will get som constructive feedback. Given how many contributions there were, constructive feedback, a learning experience, and some fun is perhaps the most realistic goals one ought to have with the whole Westworld competition.


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## Rory

tone.room.tape. said:


> unluckily I tried to submit exactly in that period of time.



Rather more accurate than your thread title. It would be a good idea to amend the title, which on its face makes a serious allegation. Or is accusing Spitfire of running a scam deliberate clickbait?


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## nolotrippen

I was scammed by the OP. Kidding. There will be more contests. Just make sure you get it a wee-bit early. Cheers.


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## Technostica

scam


1. an illegal plan for making money, especially one that involves tricking…




dictionary.cambridge.org


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## sostenuto

Yeah ... change Title ..... but assuming the 1-hour printed discrepancy is accurate, that is not trivial in terms of SFA responsibility ?


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## tone.room.tape.

Sorry, this wasn‘t my intention at all! As you may have noticed, I‘m not a native english speaker! I changed the title, or what would you suggest to be more appropriate?
I still think it‘s quite unfair, I did everything correctly according to the terms and conditions of that competition and I think it‘s really outrageous of them, to just ignore me after that!
Sorry that this came across so wrong!

Cheers


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## tone.room.tape.

Sorry for the wrong word, I looked up a word that‘s more similar to like they fibbed me, if that makes more sense! I‘m really sorry about, this was completely unintentional!
As I said in my initial post, it‘s not that I think I would have the slightest chance to win or something but it‘s about the principle and poor behaviour to just ignore me after they obviously made a mistake!
@gussunkri here‘s my entry

Feedback is welcome, though this was not my intention as well, to get clicks. As you can see, this is the only video in my channel.
Cheers


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## Polkasound

tone.room.tape. said:


> Apart from that, I'm so disappointed by Spitfire, that I wanted to share this!



I am equally disappointed. Spitfire's own typo was apparently responsible for an entry being rejected, and their response was to shrug it off? Assuming this is all accurate, it's absolutely inexcusable.

I would change the thread title to *"Westworld entry rejected due to Spitfire typo"*


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## Jeremy Spencer

Well, considering the contest was open for a month, you shouldn’t gamble and leave it to the eleventh hour.


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## Polkasound

Wolfie2112 said:


> Well, considering the contest was open for a month, you shouldn’t gamble and leave it to the eleventh hour.



When I produce a song, I'll mix it, then let a day or two go by to let my ears rest. Then I'll go back to it, edit it, tweak it, and remix it. Sometimes I'll end up with 20+ mixes of the same song. Maybe @tone.room.tape. was taking the same approach, using every day available toward the end of the contest period to edit, tweak, and remix... right up to the last hour.


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## axb312

Pretty crappy of @Spitfire Team if true...


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## dpasdernick

Come on Spitfire. Man up here. If the OP's comment is true you are the ones who erred. Accept his entry. It's the right thing to do. I'm a consumer of you goods and this isn't leaving a warm fuzzy.


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## Emmanuel Rousseau

I understand you must be disappointed but what you should learn from this may serve you well in the future : never submit your work at the last minute. This will avoid situations like this, and will look more professional.

EDIT : I should have mentionned I don't like Spitfire's reaction either... Not very classy.


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## tone.room.tape.

Hey, thanks for your responses!

It's pretty much like Polkasound pointed out. I tried to improve on it till the end. Why is that a bad thing? I always had the time in mind, so I can deliver it punctually and I actually was on time! So I don't think it was like gambling. Apart from that - I definitely wouldn't complain, if I was late, because of my fault.
As I'm pretty unexperienced, it takes me quite a bit longer to make something like this, than the professional guys here. I guess, that's also the reason, why this is extra frustrating for me but more so, that it's just incomprehensible to me, how they reacted.

Thanks @Polkasound for the advise on the thread title!


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## tone.room.tape.

And for the ones, saying "if this is true" :
As I didn't know, how to better explain it to them, I even sent a screenshot, when I described my problem. I know, this could easily be faked but come on, I hope you don't think I would do that!


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## Yogevs

There's a one hour difference between the two.
There's also a lesson here for you.

NEVER WAIT FOR THE FINAL FINAL FINAL MOMENT IN A DEADLINE TO SUBMIT SOMETHING.

What if there was a power shortage? No internet? Website down? Your computer crashing?

I agree - it's super annoying... but come on...


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## tone.room.tape.

I'm afraid, my motivation for this didn't come across. It's not like it's strongly annoying me, that my entry didn't make it into the competition inherently. If it was due to a power shortage or any of your mentioned reasons, or me not making it on time, I would think something like: "It's a pity."
The reason, I'm upset is, how Spitfire reacted to this. They obviously made a mistake and to completely ignore that is just not ok, I think! I would even understand, if they told me, they didn't want to send my entry to the judges after my complaint, because it would maybe be unfair to others, if they get my submission separately but they should at least have apologised for their mistake.
But yeah, I get it - people have a different opinion about what's an appropriate behaviour.


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## Virtuoso

Supreme being said:


> All the Op gets is people pointing fingers going "that should teach you".....not very nice


They clearly don't know how the industry works.  

"Projects are never completed - only abandoned!"


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## tone.room.tape.

Thanks @Virtuoso - that's exactly my workflow


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## storyteller

I’m not saying this to support Spitfire per se, but I think there seems to be a greater effort by the masses to not assume responsibility for their actions and to instead place negative feelings on innocent parties. As a human, I believe in compassion. I believe you go the extra mile for Love. In terms of business, I think you often have to take the path of absolutism in your terms, conditions, etc. due to business transactions being a form of a contract. Each party should honor the terms of the contract they entered into. Of course, if an error exists from the businesses fault, then they should own up and make exceptions to their own error. Just as an error by the other party should be resolved fairly. At the end of the day, this is a fair way to operate, but so many people today believe “fair” only exists when their own mistakes are blankety forgiven. As a human, yes, forgive. As a business, the arrangements are professional, contractual. These are two, distinctly different scenarios. 

My thoughts at least... probably an unpopular opinion. I also believe that contracts should be “fair” as well and not weighted to one side or the other... but that is a different argument for a different day.


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## sostenuto

Hmmm .... Not much uncertainty here, it seems. A Contract is an offer by one party and acceptance by another. Spitfire made an offer in writing, and the OP accepted by submitting his project within the time frame offered.
How is this misconstrued as a 'mistake' by the OP ?? How is SFA fairly, and properly defended here ?

 Plz note the above question marks ..... No contestant in this particular rumble.


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## Polkasound

tone.room.tape. said:


> And for the ones, saying "if this is true" :



The only reason we have to say that is because we haven't yet heard from Spitfire. There's no reason not to believe you, but Spitfire must be given an opportunity to address the complaint if they so choose.


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## tonaliszt

For myself and the people, I personally know who have submitted to competitions like this, submitting at the last second is is extremely common. 

Given that Spitfire probably has the largest support team of any scoring competition out there, I can't see why they wouldn't want to help you.


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## Zero&One

Asking Spitfire to allow this submission made me think of this 😂


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## storyteller

sostenuto said:


> Hmmm .... Not much uncertainty here, it seems. A Contract is an offer by one party and acceptance by another. Spitfire made an offer in writing, and the OP accepted by submitting his project within the time frame offered.
> How is this misconstrued as a 'mistake' by the OP ?? How is SFA fairly, and properly defended here ?
> 
> Plz note the above question marks ..... No contestant in this particular rumble.


My mistake. Didn’t see there were actually two separately posted times.


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## emilio_n

I think the two points exposed here are valid:

1.- If Spitfire put different deadlines in two different comments must accept all the entries that arrive before the lettest one.

2.- All of us are lazy, busy or we send the assignments in the last minute because we want to change or include something trying to send the best of our work. Not only in contests, in all the things that have time limit is a good practice give extra time to avoid any problem. This contest was active during a month so sent the file in the last hour is not the best practice. 

Said that I am the kind that sends everything in the last minute as well. I submit my entry two days before the deadline but this is not a reason to give lessons. Is just advice. 
The point is they must accept your entry is not a "technological matter" is that they don't take care to put the same information in all the places.

Good luck!


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## Karl Feuerstake

Gonna be hard to hear it, but never, ever do anything at the last minute. Lesson to be learned.


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## peladio

Supreme being said:


> All the Op gets is people pointing fingers going "that should teach you".....not very nice



Did you expect something else from self righteous Spitfire fanboys who've never waited for the last minute..what a warm welcome to the forum..


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## snattack

I've had similar issues, I tried applying for the Blizzard composer job a while back, and was postponing the application putting together a showreel, specific demo, and all that. Just to find out the ad was removed a couple of hours before I tried applying.

After that, I always submit a "pre-done" submission just in case. Lesson learned I guess.


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## Ronny D. Ana

That is what it is:

Seemingly a nice company full of support and grace of charity. Letting you into their aims, motivations, …
Clearly a company calculating as hard as bone, lacking goodwill, lacking fair dealing, …

I can not believe that personable people like Homay Schmitz, Oliver Patrice Weber or Christian Henson agree with this behavior. So please guys raise your voices and clarify this situation. Let me still believe that you are a generous familial company unlike a strong calculating enterprise.

p.s.: Sorry for my English, I am not a native English speaker. I was born and raised in Vienna (and love to live here)


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## yiph2

Ronny D. Ana said:


> That is what it is:
> 
> Seemingly a nice company full of support and grace of charity. Letting you into their aims, motivations, …
> Clearly a company calculating as hard as bone, lacking goodwill, lacking fair dealing, …
> 
> I can not believe that personable people like Homay Schmitz, Oliver Patrice Weber or Christian Henson agree with this behavior. So please guys raise your voices and clarify this situation. Let me still believe that you are a generous familial company unlike a strong calculating enterprise.
> 
> p.s.: Sorry for my English, I am not a native English speaker. I was born and raised in Vienna (and love to live here)


Henson is not the CEO of the company, and Oliver and Homay are only employees, I don't think they can do much


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## tone.room.tape.

Thanks to all the people, who support my point of view! 
I'm still quite astonished, that there are quite a few people, who see this differently. But to each their own, I guess.


Here is what they told me in the now second answer I received a few hours ago:

_" Due to the fact that the submission deadline has now passed, we are no longer taking questions about the Westworld competition. Good luck! "_

So this second support member obviously didn't read my mail at all.


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## yiph2

tone.room.tape. said:


> Thanks to all the people, who support my point of view!
> I'm still quite astonished, that there are quite a few people, who see this differently. But to each their own, I guess.
> 
> 
> Here is what they told me in the now second answer I received a few hours ago:
> 
> _" Due to the fact that the submission deadline has now passed, we are no longer taking questions about the Westworld competition. Good luck! "_
> 
> So this second support member obviously didn't read my mail at all.


Um what kind of answer is that... Spitfire should do better...


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## tone.room.tape.

Maybe they get quite a few mails about the competition still and are instructed to ignore them, to concentrate on the actual support issues. So I answered and summarized it to one sentence:
_" Please read - you had a typo in your terms and conditions and therefore rejected my entry. "_


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## Ronny D. Ana

tone.room.tape. said:


> Thanks to all the people, who support my point of view!
> I'm still quite astonished, that there are quite a few people, who see this differently. But to each their own, I guess.
> 
> 
> Here is what they told me in the now second answer I received a few hours ago:
> 
> _" Due to the fact that the submission deadline has now passed, we are no longer taking questions about the Westworld competition. Good luck! "_
> 
> So this second support member obviously didn't read my mail at all.





yiph2 said:


> Henson is not the CEO of the company, and Oliver and Homay are only employees, I don't think they can do much


That was not the point of my post! If it is because my English is not my native language I apologize!
I do not know who is a CEO of the company (whatever this means, but probably something important) but I know they work for Spitfire Audio. And as they are in the public and represent Spitfire Audio I feel a mismatch between their mindset and the things that happen here.


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## Ronny D. Ana

tone.room.tape. said:


> Thanks to all the people, who support my point of view!
> I'm still quite astonished, that there are quite a few people, who see this differently. But to each their own, I guess.
> 
> 
> Here is what they told me in the now second answer I received a few hours ago:
> 
> _" Due to the fact that the submission deadline has now passed, we are no longer taking questions about the Westworld competition. Good luck! "_
> 
> So this second support member obviously didn't read my mail at all.


This support member works for an 1st level support. It only has checklists and works like bots. So it’s not it’s fault.
Believe me, I had a couple of customers which have this (mostly “ITIL branded”) behavior which I stopped to support very fast!!


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## yiph2

Ronny D. Ana said:


> That was not the point of my post! If it is because my English is not my native language I apologize!
> I do not know who is a CEO of the company (whatever this means, but probably something important) but I know they work for Spitfire Audio. And as they are in the public and represent Spitfire Audio I feel a mismatch between their mindset and the things that happen here.


CEO is the director of the company and runs the whole buisness


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## Fab

If the competition information had discrepancies for the deadline time, then submissions which failed to upload due to the those discrepancies should be accepted.

Imagine if the typo error was PST and GMT!


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## tone.room.tape.

Fab said:


> Imagine if the typo error was PST and GMT!



Then at least I probably wouldn't be the only one..


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## Karl Feuerstake

Supreme being said:


> Yeah, rub his face in it or be a nice guy, your choice...



Nobody else is gonna own your mistakes. You make your own path. Best thing you can do for yourself is learn from them. Smiles and hugs don't teach lessons, and definitely don't teach self-reliance, which is a _critical skill_ to a composer, a job that is extremely lonely.

The OP had a full month to complete their submission. Whenever they found out about the competition, their first decision should have been to give themselves a certain amount of time before the submission due date to send off their entry, in case any number of things complicated it, so they would have a buffer zone of time.

Things that can go wrong especially if you've given yourself only 1 hour prior to submission deadline:
-Internet drops out because of a variety of factors. Extremely common in my area.
-Youtube upload services goes down. Can and will happen sporadically.
-Variety of things go wrong with your DAW and exporting the file, ranging from inability to export video, corrupted project file, exports that pop and click, the list is nearly endless
-Real life events interrupting you
-Failure to properly remember the deadline time (on in this case, confusion over a single hour's difference.)
These are just some of the events that might occur during the last minute that I could forsee. The OP is probably quite naive for not preparing for any of these issues, so fortunately they can learn from this. Don't do things last minute. I had to learn the hard way too. I am not saying I am better than them or lording it over them in any other way. I am saying this is a learning opportunity, and one that _should_ be valuable to a composer.


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## R. Soul

Whether you submit your tune or not, your chances of winning are about the same.

There's over 3000 entries, right?


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## sostenuto

^^^^ totally misses the point of OP complaint ... imho


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## Paul Cardon

SO TWO THINGS:

1. My guess is they've gotten hundreds of follow up emails that are erroneous, people trying to weasel their way into getting a last-minute submission in that did go over the cutoff. It's way easier for them to just get on with it when it looks like they have upwards of 10,000 submissions.

2. And not to make this too much of a double whammy, and it's not meant to hurt your feelings, but yours is a bit on the repetitive side, not too varied or unique. Great work on finishing your entry, but there's some high-level pros that got in on this thing. I doubt 99% of us have any chance of winning this thing, and 1% of 10k is still 100 entries.

I did tons of remix competitions and whatnot years back when I was full-in on doing EDM, and I can't tell you how many times I thought I was snubbed or wronged by a competition, and a lot of them I felt like I really did have a fighting chance against the people that did win, but I can tell you right now that it's REALLY not worth the anguish to get too emotionally invested in an online contest, especially one like this with SO MANY ENTRIES, WOW.

I know that feeling of getting in on a really cool contest with some really cool names attached to it. It feels like a shot to the top. If you're early in your career, this may feel like the biggest opportunity you've ever had, but it's truly peanuts in the grand scheme of things.

Statistically speaking, this contest was never anyone's ticket to fame or opportunities, and getting yours entered in the competition does not change that. Keep up the hard work and keep pushing on, making new stuff, and getting better so you have more to show for yourself! This isn't a crusade that'll do anything but frustrate you whether you get them to let your entry in or not. Perspective. Move on and keep at it.


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## Polkasound

Karl Feuerstake said:


> Nobody else is gonna own your mistakes.



I agree with everything you wrote in your post about planning for issues that may arise. It's solid advice. In this case, however, there is no blame to be shifted to the OP. He followed the rules and submitted his entry on time.

"Nobody else is going to own your mistakes" should be directed entirely at Spitfire, because they're apparently not taking ownership of their typo.


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## tone.room.tape.

*Summary of my point:*
I can live with my entry not making it into the competition
but
I'm disappointed by the reaction of Spitfire Audio ignoring my messages about their mistake being responsible for it!


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## Polkasound

Paul Cardon said:


> My guess is they've gotten hundreds of follow up emails that are erroneous, people trying to weasel their way into getting a last-minute submission in that did go over the cutoff. It's way easier for them to just get on with it when it looks like they have upwards of 10,000 submissions if you take a look at some search results.



The right thing to do usually is _not_ the easy thing to do.

If I were Spitfire, I would re-open the entry window for a short time to accept the submissions of everyone who claimed to have been shorted by my typo. It would mean a lot more work on my end, but it would be the right thing to do.


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## dzilizzi

I get OP's complaint. And I do somewhat agree. But I also know they gave over a month and said you could update until the last minute. Which means you enter with a good enough submission and go back and fix whatever bothered you. 

But it also sounds like a generic statement they are sending out to any questions.


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## j_kranz

Virtuoso said:


> They clearly don't know how the industry works.
> 
> "Projects are never completed - only abandoned!"



They clearly forgot the 'procrastinate for hours on VI-Control' section of the process...


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## Paul Cardon

Polkasound said:


> The right thing to do usually is _not_ the easy thing to do.
> 
> If I were Spitfire, I would re-open the entry window for a short time to accept the submissions of everyone who claimed to have been shorted by my typo. It would mean a lot more work on my end, but it would be the right thing to do.



Sure, but they're a company with schedules that have probably already divided up all the entries amongst their team with a deadline while they're all working remotely because of a pandemic and still all simultaneously working on other library projects, and it's near or over 10,000 entries! And how do they verify that any of these people truly did get snubbed by the typo and aren't just trying to get their submission in late? I really bet they never expected this many and they've gotta be slammed right now. It all sucks, sure, but you can't really put yourself in their shoes. It's not like a library where they get more purchases and good press because they update or fix issues. There's literally no big net positive to re-opening submissions and instead opens the window for even more lazy/late entries. Only downside is a handful of people waxing frustration on a forum, dwarfed by the 9,999 other entries they already need to be sprinting through right now.


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## tone.room.tape.

@Paul Cardon Thanks for the feedback! I usually do more "standard" music, so I was quite overchallanged with doing something like this. I guess, that's the reason, why my version is not too varied or unique. I even used a new DAW, because of switching from Mac to Windows. I mostly took part at this challenge, because it was a nice and difficult task, which helped me to get a better understanding of using Bitwig. And because I appreciated the chance to work with such great footage.
So I'm really not here, because I think, I lost my chance of winning this but just for the above mentioned reason.


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## Mark Evans

Not that you'll be taking them to court but on the face of it you'd have thought the time given in the 'terms and conditions' would have more legal validity than the one just on the website, and their response is pretty irritatingly flippant. Rather like me saying, at least you've got your disappointment in early. And learned the hard way that internet time is not the same as real world time.


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## Polkasound

Paul Cardon said:


> And how do they verify that any of these people truly did get snubbed by the typo and aren't just trying to get their submission in late?



They may not be able to make those determinations, and that's exactly why doing the right thing is often not the same as doing the easy thing.




Paul Cardon said:


> Sure, but they're a company with schedules that have probably already divided up all the entries amongst their team with a deadline...



Yes, this is a distinct possibility.

If I were Spitfire, I would look for _every possible way_ to include those late entries, even if it meant burning the midnight oil. If including those late entries would be a logistical impossibility, then at the very least, I would acknowledge every person who emailed within an hour of the closing of the contest citing the same issue as the OP, accept responsibility, apologize, and offer them something. Maybe a free library. 

But there is absolutely no way under the sun I would brush off my own mistake under the rug with no regard for anyone it affected. I'm just not built to treat people that way.


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## Jeremy Spencer

Unless I’m counting wrong on YouTube, where are people getting the idea that there are thousands of submissions? I’ve even seen some posts saying 10,000. Based on YouTube, I’m only seeing around 600.


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## Paul Cardon

Wolfie2112 said:


> Unless I’m counting wrong on YouTube, where are people getting the idea that there are thousands of submissions? I’ve even seen some posts saying 10,000. Based on YouTube, I’m only seeing around 600.


Hard to say for certain, but doing a Google search with YouTube.com as the site restriction and a quote search for the hashtag (restricts it so that exact phrase needs to appear to show as a result) pulls up a whole lot of results. Not scientific by any means, but yeah.


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## Macrawn

Some of you people are nuts. First if you waited unitl the last hour to submit you should expect issues, period. Maybe some dude accidentally posted something wrong at some point and a few people had wrong information. Ok. If they had a contract or were selling you something and you paid for it this would be a big deal. It's a free contest. You want them to tie up a bunch of people's hours going through a bunch of emails, reopening the system to get these people in, and it could very well be some of them really did miss the deadline and are still trying to get in. I'm sorry but no. They have to draw the line somewhere , they have an insane amount of tracks to go through as it is. 

Chalk it up as a lesson learned. NEVER wait until the last hour of a deadline and think you won't have some issue. Your internet will go down, your machine will lock up, you will have an emergency that prevents you from finishing. Submit one day in advance, in case you do have an issue from now on. 

Stop emailing Spitfire about it and move on dude. This isn't an entitlement program, and not a paid for service. Set your expectations accordingly.


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## Zero&One

Macrawn said:


> Some of you people are nuts. First if you waited unitl the last hour to submit you should expect issues, period.



However, he did not experience any issues. Except, he stumbled across an error Spitfire had made...
Unless I've read this thread wrong?


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## José Herring

I tell my teen son, if you're on time for work, you're late.


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## Zero&One

@ka00 yeah I get that. But as the OP has stated, he isn't bothered he isn't in the competition, more so the response to _their_ error.
The competition should have closed during business hours, so they could respond to issues like this. 

Not sure who would have picked this issue up after 5PM? 
7hrs early that would be.


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## ynwtf

Ronny D. Ana said:


> This support member works for an 1st level support. *It* only has checklists and works like bots. *So it’s not it’s fault*.
> ...



I LOVE that you refer to the first level support staff as, "it" lol. That's great! I totally agree btw, with support in general for any product I've needed help with. "Its." Every. Last. One of them! lol


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## Polkasound

Macrawn said:


> They have to draw the line somewhere , they have an insane amount of tracks to go through as it is.



I agree that it's best not to wait until the last hour, but that is not what this issue is about. There were no technical glitches. There were no family emergencies. There was a typo which gave wrong information, misleading people into thinking they had one more hour to submit their entry.

Let me ask you this: Suppose the typo misled people by telling them they had an extra three hours. Or 24 hours. Or 48 hours. Or three days. At what point do you stop blaming the contestant for submitting too close to the cutoff, and start blaming Spitfire? Where is that threshold for you?

For me, the answer is very clear. If Spitfire says 23:59 GMT, and they reject a submission sent to them on or before 23:59 GMT, Spitfire is 100% at fault.


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## sostenuto

Polkasound said:


> I agree that it's best not to wait until the last hour, but that is not what this issue is about. There were no technical glitches. There were no family emergencies. There was a typo which gave wrong information, misleading people into thinking they had one more hour to submit their entry.
> 
> Let me ask you this: Suppose the typo misled people by telling them they had an extra three hours. Or 24 hours. Or 48 hours. Or three days. At what point do you stop blaming the contestant for submitting too close to the cutoff, and start blaming Spitfire? Where is that threshold for you?
> 
> For me, the answer is very clear. If Spitfire says 23:59 GMT, and they reject a submission sent to them on or before 23:59 GMT, Spitfire is 100% at fault.



This Forum seems to be loaded with frustrated individuals who jump at the opportunity to repeat 3rd Grade level advices which most adults should question in terms of relevance here. I thought one rambling post came from the grave of my dear, long-departed, Dad & Mom. Free speech is wonderful, but I lose respect quickly for those who ignore the obvious and fundamental basis of OP's Thread. 
Their obnoxious lectures should make clear to all what their basis for responding truly is ... admonish OP as a grade school student deserving of discipline and criticism. 
Read his Post and find another vent for your pathetic need to feel better by criticism and lecture ! Unless you can, and prefer to, dispute OP's factual emphases on SFA's clear error, what value to you add by diverting to some ancient, youth-oriented advice? Do you honestly believe OP does not know and believe everything stated about 'not waiting to last minute' ??? Really ???


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## José Herring

sostenuto said:


> This Forum seems to be loaded with frustrated individuals who jump at the opportunity to repeat 3rd Grade level advices which most adults should question in terms of relevance here. I thought one rambling post came from the grave of my dear, long-departed, Dad & Mom. Free speech is wonderful, but I lose respect quickly for those who ignore the obvious and fundamental basis of OP's Thread.
> Their obnoxious lectures should make clear to all what their basis for responding truly is ... admonish OP as a grade school student deserving of discipline and criticism.
> Read his Post and find another vent for your pathetic need to feel better by criticism and lecture ! Unless you can, and prefer to, dispute OP's factual emphases on SFA's clear error, what value to you add by diverting to some ancient, youth-oriented advice? Do you honestly believe OP does not know and believe everything stated about 'not waiting to last minute' ??? Really ???


We're all preachin' papas over here. No doubt about that. 

But the lesson stands. Don't wait to the last hour to submit something because, ya know, shit happens.

We've all been there.


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## ka00

I actually think both things are true: anyone submitting something should do so as early as possible AND Spitfire should own their mistake and cut him the requested slack.


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## Jeremy Spencer

sostenuto said:


> This Forum seems to be loaded with frustrated individuals who jump at the opportunity to repeat 3rd Grade level advices which most adults should question in terms of relevance here. I thought one rambling post came from the grave of my dear, long-departed, Dad & Mom. Free speech is wonderful, but I lose respect quickly for those who ignore the obvious and fundamental basis of OP's Thread.
> Their obnoxious lectures should make clear to all what their basis for responding truly is ... admonish OP as a grade school student deserving of discipline and criticism.
> Read his Post and find another vent for your pathetic need to feel better by criticism and lecture ! Unless you can, and prefer to, dispute OP's factual emphases on SFA's clear error, what value to you add by diverting to some ancient, youth-oriented advice? Do you honestly believe OP does not know and believe everything stated about 'not waiting to last minute' ??? Really ???



Thanks, Dad.


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## sostenuto

josejherring said:


> We're all preachin' papas over here. No doubt about that.
> 
> But the lesson stands. Don't wait to the last hour to submit something because, ya know, shit happens.
> 
> We've all been there.



Hey ! No question ! I respect and support the advice. I just choose to express personal dispeasure at so many articulate posts stating the obvious ! I have no awareness of OP whatsoever, yet would bet serious pesos that he agrees fully. Free speech and Forum implications rule ! I see no benefit in long reprimands to do the obvious ...... especially when thta is not hte clear issue raised. No worries !


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## sostenuto

Wolfie2112 said:


> Thanks, Dad.


That's exactly what I was ready to post hours ago as You and several others chose to go down the path of grade school advice to OP.


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## rgames

Spitfire seem to be following the same trajectory as EWQL back in the day.


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## Macrawn

sostenuto said:


> This Forum seems to be loaded with frustrated individuals who jump at the opportunity to repeat 3rd Grade level advices which most adults should question in terms of relevance here. I thought one rambling post came from the grave of my dear, long-departed, Dad & Mom. Free speech is wonderful, but I lose respect quickly for those who ignore the obvious and fundamental basis of OP's Thread.
> Their obnoxious lectures should make clear to all what their basis for responding truly is ... admonish OP as a grade school student deserving of discipline and criticism.
> Read his Post and find another vent for your pathetic need to feel better by criticism and lecture ! Unless you can, and prefer to, dispute OP's factual emphases on SFA's clear error, what value to you add by diverting to some ancient, youth-oriented advice? Do you honestly believe OP does not know and believe everything stated about 'not waiting to last minute' ??? Really ???


Listen,
Its people posting threads like this that make companies not want to do competitions. Someone waiting last minute, had a problem with their submission because of a type in the fine print, (where the website itself had the correct information). They expect the full force of customer support to stop the presses and correct it, for them and everyone else. Who in their right mind would want to do a free competition when every darn thing you do is going to be held under a microscope, and any tiny mistake is going to cost you hours of labor to correct? So maybe a little 3rd Grade advice is in order here. This stuff does tend to come up when adults act like kids, which happens pretty often. The utter injustice of this situtaion... please with everything else going on in the world right now. Really????


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## sostenuto

sostenuto said:


> Hey ! No question ! I respect and support the advice. I just choose to express personal displeasure at so many articulate posts stating the obvious ! I have no awareness of OP whatsoever, yet would bet serious pesos that he agrees fully. Free speech and Forum implications rule ! I see no benefit in long reprimands to do the obvious ...... especially when thta is not hte clear issue raised. No worries !


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## Macrawn

sostenuto said:


> Hey ! No question ! I respect and support the advice. I just choose to express personal dispeasure at so many articulate posts stating the obvious ! I have no awareness of OP whatsoever, yet would bet serious pesos that he agrees fully. Free speech and Forum implications rule ! I see no benefit in long reprimands to do the obvious ...... especially when thta is not hte clear issue raised. No worries !


You're welcome kid. Get to work before everyone else and be the last to leave like me and you will be fine.


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## Polkasound

josejherring said:


> But the lesson stands. Don't wait to the last hour to submit something because, ya know, shit happens.



This is good advice in general, but... if Spitfire's typo was off by one week instead of one hour, and people complained about their submissions getting rejected, would you suggest they should not have waited until the last week? The one who really ought to be learning from this is Spitfire.




Macrawn said:


> ...because of a typo in the fine print, (where the website itself had the correct information)...



This is a contradiction, because the fine print IS part of the website.


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## Macrawn

Polkasound said:


> This is good advice in general, but... if Spitfire's typo was off by one week instead of one hour, and people complained about their submissions getting rejected, would you suggest they should not have waited until the last week? The one who really ought to be learning from this is Spitfire.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> This is a contradiction, because the fine print IS part of the website.


It was correct on the front page, mistake in the fine print is what I gather. Yes a contradiction.


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## peladio

Macrawn said:


> You're welcome kid. Get to work before everyone else and be the last to leave like me and you will be fine.



So inspiring, I didn't know Michael Jordan was a member of this forum..

Could you please share more of your life-changing wisdom?


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## sostenuto

Macrawn said:


> Listen,
> Its people posting threads like this that make companies not want to do competitions. Someone waiting last minute, had a problem with their submission because of a type in the fine print, (where the website itself had the correct information). They expect the full force of customer support to stop the presses and correct it, for them and everyone else. Who in their right mind would want to do a free competition when every darn thing you do is going to be held under a microscope, and any tiny mistake is going to cost you hours of labor to correct? So maybe a little 3rd Grade advice is in order here. This stuff does tend to come up when adults act like kids, which happens pretty often. The utter injustice of this situtaion... please with everything else going on in the world right now. Really????





Macrawn said:


> You're welcome kid. Get to work before everyone else and be the last to leave like me and you will be fine.



Keep your personal, sarcastic and pathetic salutations out of the adult discussion ! I doubt you are qualified to speak for any of the regular library providers here, but if so ..... get your act together and make sure your promotions are stated professionally and accurately ! Do you get it .. kid ??


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## Macrawn

peladio said:


> So inspiring, I didn't know Michael Jordan was a member of this forum..
> 
> Could you please share more of your life-changing wisdom?


Naw, that's Larry Bird, but the advice works from personal experience.


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## Jdiggity1

I'm gonna need to find more naughty corners...


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## mekosmowski

Assuming the time discrepancy is accurate, it would be a nice touch for Spitfire to offer a library worth up to 100 GBP to all those who inquired about this issue within that 1 hr window as an apolology for the discrepancy and not having the entry counted. There are not likely to be many such people, so this will not be overly costly for them. It is soft money for them. And they'd have a reputation of owning and generously correcting errors.

As far as OP submitting well before deadlines in the future, yes, this is cheap tuition for that particular life lesson. However, OP did nothing wrong. Best practice is to submit early, sure, but a deadline is a deadline and that should work both ways.

As far as fine print vs. general website? I think OP should be lauded for reading the actual rules of the competition. If OP noted this discrepancy earlier, best practice would be to inquire. But, OP, to the best of my knowledge, is not on retainer to review legal documents and verify advertising accuracy for Spitfire.

Assuming all is as OP describes, I think OP has ample justification to feel dismissed and not heard by the company.

We all, *especially* those of us here, want to be heard. OP's lesson of submitting early has been thoroughly discussed. Companies, too, can learn from this. Even if the initial response was along the lines of, "We'll look into this." with an ultimate response of, "You're right, but, sadly, there's nothing we can do at this point." OP would likely have been upset but maybe not angry. Offering a token recompense would be the best practice, but, like OP submitting early, not required. Having someone laud a company for offering a token recompense for this kind of error, though, is simply good marketting.


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## Polkasound

@mekosmowski , very well said. You have that Mike Greene way of articulating thoughts in a very eloquent way.


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## vgamer1982

If you actually work on a TV show and submit your music for review in the last hour before the drop dead, you won't get hired again, so......


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## tone.room.tape.

I just noticed, that Spitfire now removed the terms and conditions from their page, so I guess they are aware of the problem.


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## Loïc D

Supreme being said:


> I really don't like the snobbish elite attitude on this forum, mods, can you just delete my account?


I don’t think there’s a snobish attitude, but rather advices from professionals working in the industry for years (which I’m not). 
Maybe a bit patronizing but a good attitude here is to listen to what experienced people say and take the benefit for you. 

It often helps a lot and it made me improve a lot my skills & productivity.
There’s a lot a fantastic resources here and great people too who don’t count their hours sharing their tips (hats off to Charlie Clouser).

Indeed it seems that Spitfire was mistaken and I can understand the feeling of injustice of the OP.
But it’s their contest, their rules so they can do whatever they want...
I guess they removed the rules just because the due date is passed, not to sneakily avoid their responsibilities. This is pretty common with contests.
(I don’t work for nor support SA in any way)

They are tons of contests around and I’m hopeful SA will run some in the future (with aligned due dates this time).


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## tone.room.tape.

To me, this discussion took quite an unexpected course. I am new to these forums and I didn't expect people to completely ignore what's been written and still being able to give advice. But this is how it works, I guess.

To clarify a few things.
- I only noticed that typo, after my submission didn't work.
- I only looked at the terms and conditions, because there were some extra infos - for example that one was not allowed to make any changes to the scene. I found that, when I thought about increasing the dialog volume in some places. So I left that page open in my browser.
- If they told me, they were sorry for their mistake but that they could no longer forward any more entries to the judges, I would have been ok with that. I was just disappointed that they completely ignored me, after I made my point clear.
- I have noticed all your advice about not waiting for the last hour. It's a good advice for important stuff. This is a hobby for me and it wasn't the most important thing to me that my entry would make it into the competition. I'm only here, because I wanted to talk about something, that to me is quite a disappointing experience with a company.

Some people say things like: Spitfire Audio are great for doing something like this competition for free. - In my opinion, they are not doing this for free nor because they are so nice .. This is like an advertising for them, where they get new customers, followers and people's data. So that's the reason, why I expect something from them in exchange, namely to treat anybody fairly.


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## tone.room.tape.

LowweeK said:


> I guess they removed the rules just because the due date is passed, not to sneakily avoid their responsibilities. This is pretty common with contests.



That could be true as well. Though, they already updated their site after that, with something like "we are no longer accepting submissions" but then the terms and conditions were still there.


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## toomanynotes

Supreme being said:


> I really don't like the snobbish elite attitude on this forum, mods, can you just delete my account?


:emoji_snowflake::emoji_snowflake:


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## toomanynotes

I think the OP should hire a lawyer. I learn’t this lesson years ago, I used to leave everything last minute and got punished for it. Never trust the small print! I said to myself this time....don’t make the mistake. So I sent it in 24hrs before..although 3hrs before would have been...ok? Maybe..dunno, risky. Today if i eff up, I say to myself..’Told u so’🤣😂🤣


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## toomanynotes

tone.room.tape. said:


> That could be true as well. Though, they already updated their site after that, with something like "we are no longer accepting submissions" but then the terms and conditions were still there.


Don’t worry man, it’s not a big deal. Use your track for a showreel of something.


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## Ned Bouhalassa

Shouldn’t ‘being’ have a capital B given that it’s supreme?


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## mc_deli

Is this a game-changer?


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## Zero&One

mc_deli said:


> Is this a game-changer?



That's so 2019. This was a time-changer


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## Beluga

tone.room.tape. said:


> To me, this discussion took quite an unexpected course. I am new to these forums and I didn't expect people to completely ignore what's been written and still being able to give advice. But this is how it works, I guess.
> 
> To clarify a few things.
> - I only noticed that typo, after my submission didn't work.
> - I only looked at the terms and conditions, because there were some extra infos - for example that one was not allowed to make any changes to the scene. I found that, when I thought about increasing the dialog volume in some places. So I left that page open in my browser.
> - If they told me, they were sorry for their mistake but that they could no longer forward any more entries to the judges, I would have been ok with that. I was just disappointed that they completely ignored me, after I made my point clear.
> - I have noticed all your advice about not waiting for the last hour. It's a good advice for important stuff. This is a hobby for me and it wasn't the most important thing to me that my entry would make it into the competition. I'm only here, because I wanted to talk about something, that to me is quite a disappointing experience with a company.
> 
> Some people say things like: Spitfire Audio are great for doing something like this competition for free. - In my opinion, they are not doing this for free nor because they are so nice .. This is like an advertising for them, where they get new customers, followers and people's data. So that's the reason, why I expect something from them in exchange, namely to treat anybody fairly.



Welcome anyway!  Most composers show a submissive behavior towards sample developers, this has always been like this. I'm guessing it's extended, willful obedience to authority resulting from the overall low self-esteem most composers have. There seems to be an additional Spitfire cult around these parts of the Internet which is why the overall group-reaction (blaming the victim) was unfortunately very predictable. There is no way you can win this discussion here so my advice would also be to move on.


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## toomanynotes

Supreme being said:


> Just proved my point idiot


Stop moaning little boy


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## Jeremy Spencer

I wonder if Staypuft submitted an entry?


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## Loïc D

Wolfie2112 said:


> I wonder if Staypuft submitted an entry?


Why not ? It just takes a rip of the Ride of Walkyries...


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## Mark Evans

Notification popped up on my tablet that there had been new posts on this thread, but for a split second I thought it was an email informing me my entry had been rejected due to a typo on my submission form and I was momentarily 😟 and 🤭 ha


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## shelllink

Yogevs said:


> There's a one hour difference between the two.
> There's also a lesson here for you.
> 
> NEVER WAIT FOR THE FINAL FINAL FINAL MOMENT IN A DEADLINE TO SUBMIT SOMETHING.
> 
> What if there was a power shortage? No internet? Website down? Your computer crashing?
> 
> I agree - it's super annoying... but come on...


it's true. Although I've manage to upload ( it was 10 mins to 00:00) but I didn't manage to mix my music at all. In fact I've spent a day for it because when I noticed that competition it was last day of the entry.. so the only thing I did I got the "right mood", as I understood, put a limiter and uploaded. It would be sad if I couldn't uploaded the video.
And I think I need to thank Cubase developers for that video export option. it was quite useful.


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