I'm speechless right now as I'm looking at the Sound Snap website, I mean $149 a year for simple sound effects???  Holy crap, I could just hire someone to make the sound effects and music for me lower than that (possibly if I search around).  Oh well, I'll have to find another website to find sound effects for games because 5 downloads a month is too low to even decide what to use as an effect for one thing.  Sorry about my rant, but any suggestions for a site that has free effects?  - I also have no interest in making them unless I'm forced into it (I'm not musically or effects talented).

Yikes, that sucks.  :-(
That site was a little "too good to be true" for free, but 149$!  I can't imagine they have much of a customer base at that price.

They also have other pricing options, for example 1 month (<=100 downloads) for $29.
100 downloads is easily enough for most standard community games, I would guess, so as long as you get all sounds you need for a game more or less at once (over 1 month), you only have to pay $29 for the sound effects in each game. Which is not really expensive, compared to what art assets and sounds/music usually cost.
We as game developers hope that Xbox users will pay a small bit for our games when we release them, so I think we should have some understanding for the sound-artists that contribute at soundsnap, that they too would like to get some compensation for their work.

Doc

I don't think it's all that bad. 5 free downloads a month with all the previews isn't too terrible of a deal, considering it's free. $149 for one year is also a pretty good deal for sounds and music considering it's unlimited downloads. You could stock up on sounds for your next ten games over the course of the year.

Or take that one month membership Spyn Doctor mentioned. $29 for up to 100 downloads. Bloc has, at most, 8 different sounds in it. Granted I tested probably another 15-20, but that still puts me far less than the 100 allotted for that month. If you need more downloads, another $29 really isn't that bad.

All in all, yes, I'm sad that I can't just get all the sounds for free, but it really was too good to last, especially once they probably found all of the people from this site navigating to theirs. Sound designers are not cheap so they deserve some compensation. I will personally still be using SoundSnap in the future for at least my sound effects and hopefully others do as well to support such a great resource.

Now if only someone started a similar site for visual assets... ;-)

True, I guess I just overeacted a little, I'll just go with a $29 a month price and the sounds will be a last part of my project.  Although for the price, they should update the way you search for the sounds, they are a pain in the butt to find one that is exactly what you need looking through page after page. 

It sucks.. One thing that will change is I will no longer be downloading 10 sounds and "trying them out" to see if they fit the way I want. I wish they would add another plan in there, something like a $10 for 35 downloads or something. I think that would work better than the whole $29 a month.. 149 is way out of my price range though..

Yeah, I think they charge too much. $29 for a month is somewhat high. The prices were actually even higher initially. And initially, you could only download 5 sounds a month for free.

Having provided some sounds there for free as a "thank you" for the other free sounds, I feel somewhat ambivalent about them now charging for access to sounds that I gave away for free -- but the free download is still there, albeit limited.
I wonder if they limit the downloads per mail account -- if so, getting more than 10 per month would be pretty easy...

jwatte:

And initially, you could only download 5 sounds a month for free.

It's still 5 per month: After the fifth free download, you have to wait 30 days before your counter resets and you can download another 5 for free.

Doc

Yea, that was my thought. I know its limited based on the user account, but how are they tracking user accounts? per email? I have 6 or 7 emails right now.. or by Ip address used to sign up?

jwatte:

I wonder if they limit the downloads per mail account -- if so, getting more than 10 per month would be pretty easy..

Cdxrd:

Yea, that was my thought. I know its limited based on the user account, but how are they tracking user accounts? per email? I have 6 or 7 emails right now.. or by Ip address used to sign up?

Should it matter?  Pirating games is pretty easy too, but that doesn't make it right.  I'm surprised an MVP is suggesting this.  Besides the ethics of this, it's likely against their terms of use.  If you don't want to pay for their service or use it within their requirements, don't use it.  Anything else is effectively the same as pirating.  Not to mention it is unlikely you have a right to use any content you get from doing this in any game you are making.

Reality Shift:

Not to mention it is unlikely you have a right to use any content you get from doing this in any game you are making.

I guess you haven't even bothered to read their faq that is linked right from the homepage...Take time to back up your position before voicing it.  Also, I didn't mean this to get to be a heated thread, and anyway jwatte was just pointing out a potential flaw in SoundSnap's system - it didn't necessarily mean that he reccomended it or was going to do it.  Geez. 

Xinixt:

Take time to back up your position before voicing it.

You are misunderstanding my point.  I wasn't saying you can't use soundsnap for games.  My point was that if you gain access to content by breaking the terms of use of a site (for example if the site limits you to one account per person), you probably do not have a valid license to use the content you retrieved by "cheating" the system.

Even if there is a "hole" in the system, it's obvious how they expect you to use the system.  It's a bit weaselly and hypocritical to cheat a system to get content that you are too cheap to pay for and then put it in a game you expect people to buy.

Reality Shift:

You are misunderstanding my point.  I wasn't saying you can't use soundsnap for games.  My point was that if you gain access to content by breaking the terms of use of a site (for example if the site limits you to one account per person), you probably do not have a valid license to use the content you retrieved by "cheating" the system.

Even if there is a "hole" in the system, it's obvious how they expect you to use the system.  It's a bit weaselly and hypocritical to cheat a system to get content that you are too cheap to pay for and then put it in a game you expect people to buy.

Now that's true, I understand now...but what if you're making it for free (Zune), lol something to think about.  All in all, I get your point now, I'll try not to loophole the system.   

Cdxrd:

It sucks.. One thing that will change is I will no longer be downloading 10 sounds and "trying them out" to see if they fit the way I want.

This explains my problem with this, exactly.  Do we have another solution?  It was already hard enough for us to find the sounds we did find.  Now it will be much harder.

Does it not strike any of you as odd that you all want people to pay YOU for your games but you don't want to pay anyone for the assets you use to make those games?

Its even odder when you look at peoples Xbox profiles and see all the nice games everyone is playing while they complain about having no money! (Yeah I know you borrwed all those games from a friend....)

The ZMan:

Does it not strike any of you as odd that you all want people to pay YOU for your games but you don't want to pay anyone for the assets you use to make those games?

Its even odder when you look at peoples Xbox profiles and see all the nice games everyone is playing while they complain about having no money! (Yeah I know you borrwed all those games from a friend....)

Good point.  Just want to clarify I would pay for soundsnap if it had the sounds I wanted.  It barely does.  I am not happy with my soundsnap sound effects (http://forums.xna.com/forums/t/23050.aspx), and to now pay before I know if I will get what I want is too early.  I am looking for another source now.  I used them because they were all I had.  Since it was free I used them.  I was never satisfied! :(  So, now it is not worth it.  I am going to dig some more and see if they have better sounds for me, but most of my efforts with them have come up empty so far.

All that said, I would certainly pay for my sounds, so good point.

Pirating games is pretty easy too, but that doesn't make it right.  I'm surprised an MVP is suggesting this.

I'm not suggesting pirating games, pirating sounds, or breaking any kind of copyright.

What bugs me with the SoundSnap change is this:

1) It used to be free.
2) I contributed my own sounds to SoundSnap under the condition that they be made available freely to others.
3) Suddenly, SoundSnap starts charging for sounds.

Now, there might be an argument that SoundSnap is actually infringing on *my* copyright to my sound. To get around that, they still make 5 sounds free per month. However, the problem with that is that if you have already downloaded 5 sounds from there, then my sound is no longer free to you, even though I made it available on the premise that it should, in turn, be freely available.

SoundSnap may have some system in place to try to monetize their bandwidth usage, pay their mortgage, or whatever else it is they're wanting to do. That has nothing to do with copyright. Whether their system works well or not is entirely up to them. Personally, if I had to use a new e-mail address for every 5 sounds I needed (assuming that's how it works), it would drive me batty -- thus, I either get an unlimited account there, or I make my own sounds, or move to another free sound site. That has nothing to do with piracy.

I believe if you contributed sounds before they went to the pay model, you are entitled to a "free" paid account.  You are also free to remove your sounds if you don't like the new system.  Regardless of whether signing up for multiple accounts could become a copyright issue or not, I think it's an inappropriate thing for a community leader to suggest, as at the very least it violates the obvious intended usage of the site.

Well, for paid sounds, there's Shockwave-Sound.Com... However, I liked SoundSnap much more.
This doesn't seem fair, since the creators put their sounds on there so they could be freely distributed.

I'm still looking for other sources, but haven't found anything yet.

You guys might look into:

http://www.freesound.org/

As far as I can tell, this is all open source, free to use sounds.

Allan Chaney

Allan Chaney:

You guys might look into:

http://www.freesound.org/

As far as I can tell, this is all open source, free to use sounds.

Allan Chaney
www.xnascratch.com

from what i remember, freesound required individual credit for each sound.  which means recording the credits of every sound you used, not something many people will ever do.  they have a user attribution page that is suppose to help out, but it does not work for me (does not show the sounds i downloaded): http://www.freesound.org/usersAttribution.php

i would still have to cross reference all those sounds with the sounds i end up using in the game.  it's a lot of work.

i rejected them in favor of soundsnap, because of this, but now that soundsnap charges, i may have to go back to them.

ultimately, i just want sounds that work, whether they cost money or not, and i find it very hard to find any sounds that work.

jwatte:

Pirating games is pretty easy too, but that doesn't make it right.  I'm surprised an MVP is suggesting this.

I'm not suggesting pirating games, pirating sounds, or breaking any kind of copyright.

What bugs me with the SoundSnap change is this:

1) It used to be free.
2) I contributed my own sounds to SoundSnap under the condition that they be made available freely to others.
3) Suddenly, SoundSnap starts charging for sounds.

Now, there might be an argument that SoundSnap is actually infringing on *my* copyright to my sound. To get around that, they still make 5 sounds free per month. However, the problem with that is that if you have already downloaded 5 sounds from there, then my sound is no longer free to you, even though I made it available on the premise that it should, in turn, be freely available.

SoundSnap may have some system in place to try to monetize their bandwidth usage, pay their mortgage, or whatever else it is they're wanting to do. That has nothing to do with copyright. Whether their system works well or not is entirely up to them. Personally, if I had to use a new e-mail address for every 5 sounds I needed (assuming that's how it works), it would drive me batty -- thus, I either get an unlimited account there, or I make my own sounds, or move to another free sound site. That has nothing to do with piracy.

Ya know, you can get a free pro account as a thank-you for uploading those sounds before the site became paid, Jwatte.

Allan Chaney:

You guys might look into:

http://www.freesound.org/

As far as I can tell, this is all open source, free to use sounds.

Allan Chaney

As far as I can tell the sounds are for non-commercial (ie. could be used for a free windows XNA game, but not one sold on Live) use only: "To perform, display, and distribute copies of this whole work for noncommercial purposes."

of this whole work for noncommercial purposes

We really shouldn't go into trying to define "intended use" or "whole work," but in general the "whole work" of collections means the collection as a whole. There is something recognized as "collection copyright," where the work of compiling and organizing something in itself has copyright. Thus, for collections of free or uncopyrighted works, you can use each individual work under the original free license, but the entire collection as a whole is covered by separate copyright. In the old age, this protected things like dictionaries and indexes, where each individual entry is not copyrightable. In the modern age, this prevents someone from wholesale slurping an entire site of free stuff and then providing a "clone."

Anyway, if you don't like like the terms that SoundSnap offer their service on, you're free to use other services, or use SoundSnap under whatver terms you and them find agreeable.

Lets keep the thread on track and avoid interpretation of licenses as per the FAQ http://forums.xna.com/forums/t/17830.aspx or it will get locked.