Project Three//FiveLast updated: January 26, 2024As I start to write this, it's January 16th, 2024. It's the window of time that acts as a grace period between when the billvstheworld.com domain leaves GoDaddy, and comes to Dreamhost. They make me wait 4 days to change my mind (EDIT 1: I'm sure if I owed them money instead of them losing business, it wouldn't be a 4-day wait, but hey) (EDIT 2: ohn, they let you do it immediately if you want to, which I just-now did.) (EDIT 3: Lots of issues getting my hosting plan configured correctly, but let's not take the romance away with clinical business stuff.) There was a chance here to reflect, and I did. In celebration of getting the domain under our control once-and-for-all. Table of Contents I. Origins II. Finding the Original Image of Materials III. Breaking out the Components a. WAV Files (from the 90s) b. Discs c. Sleeves d. Labels e. Bookmark f. Number Stamp g. QR Code Stamp IV. Rolling List of Existential Crises V. Possible Locations for the Remaining Discs VI. Timeline of Events VII. Epilogue I. OriginsThe situation: In leaving Bill CD's all across the United States over a decade (so far), the limited edition 25 physical discs, numbered, were distributed (like Frank's butt-candy) in order, relatively. Problem is/was that discs 3 and 5 seemingly vanished. The prevailing-winds hypothesis on the situation is that Jim lent Ryan these two discs in order for them to be distributed, a car accident happened, and the CDs were in the glove compartment. Alternative theories involve the discs being separated from their packaging. I recall having one of the Bill CDs in a ziplock bag in my glove compartment for a number of years - though I believe I eventually did reunite that with a disc sleeve that was missing its disc. It's easy here to come to the conclusion that these matched - they likely did.Furthermore, there were a number of years where Ryan thought for sure that he had the cases for 3 and 5, but the discs were not present. It's entirely possible that the sleeves for these discs are somewhere in the dark corners of 46 Woodland Way, but it's best, more sane, and more efficient moving forward to assume they are lost, and actually physically destroyed. While the Bill CD Locations project has taken on a scope in terms of both time and distance that have vastly exceeded my own expectations, the non-existence of discs 3 and 5 has weighed heavily, and it must be fixed. So what's there to do? Make new discs or course. I have master .wavs of all 25 songs, and I'll be able to get the materials to make exact replicas, right? RIIIIIIIGHHHHTTTTTT? Mostly exact - let's examine. II. Finding the Original Image of MaterialsBack in December 2012, after all the original materials arrived, Jim laid out all the materials on one of his black IKEA end tables at Waterford Village and snapped the photo that kickstarted this effort. Of course, locating that image posed a problem, as it was (for some reason) named "Photo.JPG" within my "Artwork" directory on my old laptop that I had transferred to my desktop PC sometime in 2021. The original photo that I saved for some reason, untouched and unrenamed. Once that photo was located, it was time to break out the individual components and see what I had to re-purchase, since none of the remaining materials exist. III. Breaking out the Componentsa. WAV Files (from the 90s)Easiest way to start, had everything. In fact, I have a few old versions of Powersex (Original), which had the loud, squelchy synth found in the "solo" towards the end throughout the entire song, hence the "Undressed Mix" that appears on the final. I have the original version of Desert Sun, with my synthetic drums, pre-Ryan's transformatory Toontrack drums. (Editor's note: The day I heard the final version of Desert Sun was the same day I farted in Jake's car.) The last .wav master I have is "Synkro", which was a prototype of what would become Donuts. wave-files-from-the-90s.jpg - I think I might have been able to get the masters from bandcamp's site, but unsure.  Burning with Windows Media Player, just like I did in 2012. Fascinating to see how the order of songs on the final album differed from the order in which they were produced. b. DiscsBack in 2012, when I purchased the CDs for this project, I chose a very specific model of Verbatim CDs, one that looked like a vinyl record, with a variety of rainbow colors. Luckily, Amazon saves a user's purchase history, in my case, going back to the year 2000, so this was easy to track down, and I was pleased to see that not only do Verbatim still produce these discs, but they make 10-packs! Ordered. That was an easy one. These being for sale still was actually a home run. c. SleevesWell, here's where it suddenly gets more difficult - the original item I bought from Amazon is discontinued, and the company that made it them is now out-of-business. I tried finding the same ones in the second-hand market, but to no avail. I haven't yet given up hope and haven't done a deep search for them, but I might have to settle for the cardboard recycled CD sleeves from another vendor, which is totally fine. Might affect me from an OCD perspective, but from the perspective of someone finding a disc, they don't know about other peoples' discs, so whatever, honestly. They're about 25% of the thickness of the others, but they close on their own, what are you gonna do? d. LabelsAmusingly, the original CDs weren't going to have these labels, but when I discovered that they didn't self-close, annoyingly, I decided to make lemonade out of lemons and include some fun there and attach a Bill face to a Bill CD so they actually shut. For these new cardboard sleeves, they actually do self-shut, so I don't need the labels, but you bet your ass I'm reordering them, and I'm even putting them on the outer edge, where it doesn't even seal the damn discs in, but that's where it was on the originals.So when I tried to find where I bought them originally, I had the name Zappos in my head - nope, that's a shoe company. So a cursory Google came up with Zazzle, yep, that's the one. There was a problem, though. Back in 2012, they didn't allow me to make a label from scratch, so I had to pick a random one, and that random one was named "Honey Badger Don't Care", apparently. And that item itself is no-longer for sale by the original seller. So, a new order goes into the works. The real crime here is that the minimum order for labels you could make back then was 150 labels, 5 sheets of 30, as seen in the image, and I only needed 25, so I kept the original sheets around for at least a while I think, and they eventually got wrecked and bent, started to flake off, so they were trashed many years back. A recreated order was made, luckily the design wasn't that complex.  The recreated label.  Buying 150 in order to use just 2 fucking sucks, but that's the cost of doing business. NINE DOLLARS FOR 5-7 DAY DELIVERY.  I'm gonna have a few extra, maybe I'll drop a few dozen on some MBTA Red Line trains. e. BookmarkLuckily, by 2012 I was doing a better job of actually backing up and archiving at least some things (FlipCam videos and iPhone stuff notwithstanding), so I not only have the full original .jpg I used for the bookmarks, I still have the original .psd, with properly-named layers, should I have needed that. What I don't have is the HP LaserJet 4000 at Maxwell Library, so that'll be a Fedex Office trip for those sweet, sweet dollar-per-page color scans. Recreating this from source and the "Photo.JPG" would have been a mess - but also sort of fun, shame.  Fedex Office to get this shit done right - also our home color printer sucks shit. f. Number StampI fucked up. I think I was doing some sort of COVID-boredom house cleaning and shunted this into the trash (along with the QR code stamp! More on that in the next section.) I figured when the hell would I ever need a number stamp again? Well, now, I guess.A generic-ass number stamp from Amazon, the exact model number is no-longer for sale on Amazon, there's a couple shifty-looking stores that selling it new on Amazon as "from other sources", some with strange store names and way below acceptable satisfaction ratings, so I passed on that one, and simply grabbed a replacement that looked correct. Of course, not all of them have a "/" in them, much to my surprise, and I definitely need that. But other than this, I don't need anything fancy, even a slight mismatch in font affects noone but my internal OCDemons.  Poor thing is ready for a lifetime of stamping, which for it, will end after two stamps, 03/25 and 05/25. Sort of depressing actually. g. QR Code StampI fucked up again! I definitely, super-fucking had that goddamn stamp in this house! I think a few years ago I just again, literally said "when the hell am I ever going to need this, the project is done.I had zero idea where I ordered the original stamp from - but here's where the Photo.JPG provides yet again! I had a clue about where I bought it.  Stamps Unlimited, turns out it's "Rubber Stamps Unlimited", good thing I left the Street name in the original photo, which led me to www.thestampmaker.com  Nearly 750,000 orders between my first and last(?) orders.  Original 2012 QR code that I just left on some company's server for 11 years and it survived. Would I have had to just make a new QR code? Sure, there's plenty of those sites around, but in a world where the discs and bookmarks, are the same, but the labels are recreations, the number stamp close enough, and the sleeves straight-up different (if only by necessity), having the new stamp made from the original stamp's image just feels good.  Not only did I never think I'd need the first QR stamp, I sure as hell never thought I'd need a second. IV. Rolling List of Existential CrisesQ. I need 2 discs, but I have materials to make 10 discs. What do I do?A. Make 2 discs, discs 3 and 5. Make them match their 23 stepbrothers and stepsisters, throw everything into a gallon ziplock bag, and chuck it in the basement in case anything happens to the remaining discs before they are distributed. I could make another full run, but that would be a total number of 33 discs, but also, there's only supposed to be 25 - exclusivity was always the goal, can't let too many of these get out into the wild!! But also, I make the rules, so I can make 25+8 if I want, but I won't.Q. When I burn these two discs, do I add in all the new tracks that have come up since the original release was completed?A. No, absolutely not. It has to match what's on the original Bandcamp, the original CDs, and Spotify. While it's a shame that stuff like Donkey Dinner and Turd Addict can't be pressed to plastic in this capacity, they'll have to be Bandcamp exclusives.Q. Is this a good time to alter/change the QR code?A. No. Maybe this made sense when we no-longer had access to the Billvstheworld.com domain, send it to a place we have full control over, but since not only do we have the domain, AND the original master image of the QR code, there's no need.V. Possible Locations for the Remaining Discs
VI. Timeline of EventsDec. 6, 2012: Ordered discs, number stamp, labels and sleeves Dec. 14, 2012: Jim takes the photo of the original materials on a whim to show Ryan that they all arrived Unknown 2013: CD# 1 placed Unknown 2013: CD# 2 placed Unknown 2013: CD# 6 placed March 6, 2014: Tiburon is wrecked, presumably taking the original CD #3 and #5 Unknown 2014: CD #4 placed July 19, 2015: CD #8 is placed July 20, 2015: CD #10 is placed August 25, 2015: CD #9 is placed August 26, 2015: CD #11 is placed February 24, 2017: CD #14 is placed February 26, 2017: CD #15 is placed February 27, 2017: CD #16 is placed March 5, 2017: CD #17 is placed March 6, 2017: CD #18 is placed September 6, 2017: CD #7 is placed September 9, 2017: CD #12 is placed Jan. 15, 2024: Order places for new discs, new number stamp, and new sleeves Jan. 16, 2024: Order placed for new labels Jan. 25, 2024: Discs 3 and 5 are back and ready for distribution (like Frank's butt-candy) Future: CD# 3 (reissue) CD# 5 (reissue) CD# 13 CD# 19 CD# 20 CD# 21 CD# 22 CD# 23 CD# 24 CD# 25 VII. EpilogueYou're gonna love this - here's how I delayed the project completion by two days and wasted time, and 9 dollars.1. The RUBBLE IT UP stamp came with a free inkpad, just like last time, great. 2. When I made a stamp, my phone's QR code wasn't reading it. 3. I figured the ink was old and dry, so I added water to loosen it up. 4. This made the ink highly useless. (and of course, by this time, I am BURNING through CD sleeves trying to get it a stamp that can be read properly. 5. I decide "fuck it, I'm already 75 bucks in on materials, countless more on time, so I ordered a 9 dollar "archival-grade black ink stamp." 6. It comes in, I slam a new QR code on a sleeve, and the phone's STILL not reading it, no matter how much light. It's kinda finding it, kinda seeing the link, but then the "Click her to open in Firefox" disappears when it loses it, but it never quite goes through.  It never found the cunting thing long enough to let me really click it (.gif frames-per-second be damned.) 7. I'm puzzled, and pissed. 8. I wonder "I wonder if the iPhone camera app's QR code reader just sucks shit. In 2012 I used a dedicated app for that, so I go get that.  YEAH! Goddamn PTHANG read the stupid code before it was even fully in the damn viewport. Thanks, Apple. 9. I move on with my life. 10. New Discs 3 and 5 completed on Thursday, January 25th, 2024, with more blood, sweat and tears that will never be known to whomever encounters these next.   Not bad for a reproduction.  Photo.JPG (2012) and Photo2.JPG (2024) Yeah so I mean in reality here, the stakes could not have been lower, but let's flip-flop it anyway though: +Discs 3 and 5 are back! -But was okay that they were "gone", as I'm sure some discs were in the trash immediately after someone found it +The project will be a complete 25/25, not 23/25! -But nobody but two people cared, maybe even one person +Getting the domain under our jurisdiction deserved a special celebration +It was a good use of money -/+ It was a good and bad use of time +++This was really fun, actually  And forward we press on. ©2024 Bill vs. the World |