A funny thing happened the other day - respectable music blog I Guess I'm Floating submitted a mix to the Summer Mix Series - putting the site into a realm of visibility that it has not experienced before. Furthermore, Hype Machine tweeted about it and brought even more traffic. I am quite grateful for the exposure to say the least but there's a downside to such visibility - I like to call it Death By Popularity. Let me explain.

Aside from the fact that my Dreamhost shared server likes to crap out if too much RAM is being requested of it (a common problem with too much incoming traffic) the quality of submissions seems to drop exponentially with such visibility. I can fully affirm the notion that people don't really read on the Internet - I have received loads of submissions from people that ignore every guideline put forth for submissions; mixes that are too long, mixes without album art or tracklisting, mixes with no theme and loads of mixes comprised of Best Of Summer tracks - a concept that I specifically point out in the Guidelines as being unwanted.

So, I'm not complaining - I'm proud of the site, the concept and the execution. I'm just a little bummed that once it reaches a wider audience the imagination and creativity levels drop so harshly. I'll be ending the 2010 Series pretty soon so if you've been slacking on finishing that conceptual mix of yours, please get it in there. In the meantime, be sure to check these out:

• A Day in the Life - one song for every hour of the day comprised of a nice mixture of familiar favorites and a few unexpected surprised.
• Tender Times - the latest compilation from yvynyl - one of the most rabid consumers of music I've ever encountered. It's not themed per se but it's music that should be heard.
• Whales - a mix of ambient music inspired by Eno's liner notes on Music for Airports.. an excellent arsenal to have at hand when you need to really get some work done.

As an addendum I'll say that there are still lots of quality mixes being submitted as well as the frustrating ones and I'm certainly not trying to be a complainer - it's just an interesting phenomena.