Clarifications

Dear members,

I would like to make some clarifications concerning the recent
developments involving my entry in the SoOn 2009 Compo generously
sponsored by Mr. Christopher Vaisvil.

Firstly, let me state that, despite all that has been said and all the
setbacks that transpired, I believe "The Saba Storm" is rightly the
winner of first place in this contest, since it was seen in the end
that it received the highest number of legitimate votes.

Let me say that Mr. Vaisvil and his colleague Jeroen Broks a.k.a. "Tricky" have spent their most valuable time in evaluating and
tallying the votes and I believe they have been most careful to be
fair in every respect.

However... I will be direct... there occured some unpleasant glitches
that resulted in reactions... not only from Graham and Michael from this list, but also between myself and Mr. Vaisvil through private e-
mails.

It became a necessity for me, after witnessing the to-and-fro in MMM,to point out some of the relevant issues from our dialogue with Mr.
Vaisvil in order to clear some misunderstandings.

Mr. Vaisvil implied to me that he was quite stressed out for the past
week due to this event. By having voiced my concerns about the
proceedings of the contest, I fear I have perplexed him to the extent
that our communications are now broken. The situation has not changed
despite the amicable message I sent him today which he hasn't yet
replied to. I suspect that he didn't receive it at all.

The nature of my concerns about the contest, which I shared with Mr.
Vaisvil, center on these points:

1. On November 3rd, Mr. Vaisvil mentioned the possible
disqualification of "The Saba Storm" based on the perception that one
same person was sending duplicate votes in my favour from different e-
mail accounts, which, I assured Mr. Vaisvil, was not the case. To be
precise, I told Mr. Vaisvil that I had no power over my voters to
listen to all the songs, though that was the ideal which I too shared,
and I pointed out that listening to all the tracks was not deemed a
prerequisite to the voting process no matter how undesirable. It was
either that people were agreeing with my choice in the example I gave,
or did not concern themselves with the details.

2. Second, there was talk, dated November 4th, of removing votes with
similar content (so-called "duplicates") in the midst of the voting
phase, which was dismissed later on.

3. Third, there was the premature announcement, dated November 8th,
pushing "The Saba Storm" to second place due to not counting the votes
that later appeared out of the spambox - although Mr. Vaisvil had
revealed to me earlier (November 4) that my entry was coming first so
far even not counting the "duplicate" votes.

4. There was the misspelling of my name alone among all the entries in
the premature announcement, which I found rather irritating.

5. Mr. Vaisvil appeared to be complaining about "irregular" and
"duplicate" votes in the final declaration of the winners (November
9th), inadvertently giving the impression that Ozan Yarman was
undeserving of the first position and was a culprit who attempted to
rig the contest. This insinuation was cemented with Tricky's earlier
statement regarding the rejection of votes "because of
fraud" (November 8th).

Despite these unfortunate proceedings, and the unintentional
neglecting of two Turkish votes that could have been counted, I had no
doubt that I earned the prize money, which was promptly delivered to
me by Mr. Vaisvil.

While thanking him for all that he has done, I found the space to
voice my concerns with the contest in case a new one was held in the
future. My words were not well-received and I witnessed a rather rash
riposte, so I donated my winnings to a charity organization.

I also would like to interpret Graham's words to mean that it was
unfortunate that the prize money was distributed without waiting for
protests to the voting procedure.

I write this letter in the hopes that misunderstandings will be cleared.

Cordially,
Oz.

✩ ✩ ✩
www.ozanyarman.com

>"I also would like to interpret Graham's words to mean that it was
unfortunate that the prize money was distributed without waiting for
protests to the voting procedure."

Graham, if that is indeed what you meant (IE that Chris's first award announcement was pre-mature and not necessarily that Ozan was undeserving or 'cheating')...I apologize for taking your words as an insult to Ozan and judges involved in the contest.

________________________________
From: Ozan Yarman <ozanyarman@...>
To: MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Tue, November 10, 2009 3:05:53 PM
Subject: [MMM] Clarifications

Dear members,

I would like to make some clarifications concerning the recent
developments involving my entry in the SoOn 2009 Compo generously
sponsored by Mr. Christopher Vaisvil.

Firstly, let me state that, despite all that has been said and all the
setbacks that transpired, I believe "The Saba Storm" is rightly the
winner of first place in this contest, since it was seen in the end
that it received the highest number of legitimate votes.

Let me say that Mr. Vaisvil and his colleague Jeroen Broks a.k.a.
"Tricky" have spent their most valuable time in evaluating and
tallying the votes and I believe they have been most careful to be
fair in every respect.

However... I will be direct... there occured some unpleasant glitches
that resulted in reactions... not only from Graham and Michael from
this list, but also between myself and Mr. Vaisvil through private e-
mails.

It became a necessity for me, after witnessing the to-and-fro in MMM,
to point out some of the relevant issues from our dialogue with Mr.
Vaisvil in order to clear some misunderstandings.

Mr. Vaisvil implied to me that he was quite stressed out for the past
week due to this event. By having voiced my concerns about the
proceedings of the contest, I fear I have perplexed him to the extent
that our communications are now broken. The situation has not changed
despite the amicable message I sent him today which he hasn't yet
replied to. I suspect that he didn't receive it at all.

The nature of my concerns about the contest, which I shared with Mr.
Vaisvil, center on these points:

1. On November 3rd, Mr. Vaisvil mentioned the possible
disqualification of "The Saba Storm" based on the perception that one
same person was sending duplicate votes in my favour from different e-
mail accounts, which, I assured Mr. Vaisvil, was not the case. To be
precise, I told Mr. Vaisvil that I had no power over my voters to
listen to all the songs, though that was the ideal which I too shared,
and I pointed out that listening to all the tracks was not deemed a
prerequisite to the voting process no matter how undesirable. It was
either that people were agreeing with my choice in the example I gave,
or did not concern themselves with the details.

2. Second, there was talk, dated November 4th, of removing votes with
similar content (so-called "duplicates" ) in the midst of the voting
phase, which was dismissed later on.

3. Third, there was the premature announcement, dated November 8th,
pushing "The Saba Storm" to second place due to not counting the votes
that later appeared out of the spambox - although Mr. Vaisvil had
revealed to me earlier (November 4) that my entry was coming first so
far even not counting the "duplicate" votes.

4. There was the misspelling of my name alone among all the entries in
the premature announcement, which I found rather irritating.

5. Mr. Vaisvil appeared to be complaining about "irregular" and
"duplicate" votes in the final declaration of the winners (November
9th), inadvertently giving the impression that Ozan Yarman was
undeserving of the first position and was a culprit who attempted to
rig the contest. This insinuation was cemented with Tricky's earlier
statement regarding the rejection of votes "because of
fraud" (November 8th).

Despite these unfortunate proceedings, and the unintentional
neglecting of two Turkish votes that could have been counted, I had no
doubt that I earned the prize money, which was promptly delivered to
me by Mr. Vaisvil.

While thanking him for all that he has done, I found the space to
voice my concerns with the contest in case a new one was held in the
future. My words were not well-received and I witnessed a rather rash
riposte, so I donated my winnings to a charity organization.

I also would like to interpret Graham's words to mean that it was
unfortunate that the prize money was distributed without waiting for
protests to the voting procedure.

I write this letter in the hopes that misunderstandings will be cleared.

Cordially,
Oz.

✩ ✩ ✩
www.ozanyarman. com

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Ozan Yarman wrote:

> I also would like to interpret Graham's words to mean that it was > unfortunate that the prize money was distributed without waiting for > protests to the voting procedure.

What I meant is that it's a shame I missed the deadline. I have downloaded the tracks now, but I still haven't listened to them, so I can't say what my vote would have been. But as you won anyway, it doesn't matter, does it?

Graham

Goes to show you that there is more than one way to skin a cat!

Thanks for elucidating your point Graham. Still, I would like to know
what you think of The Saba Storm.

Oz.

✩ ✩ ✩
www.ozanyarman.com

On Nov 11, 2009, at 2:05 AM, Graham Breed wrote:

> Ozan Yarman wrote:
>
>> I also would like to interpret Graham's words to mean that it was
>> unfortunate that the prize money was distributed without waiting for
>> protests to the voting procedure.
>
> What I meant is that it's a shame I missed the deadline. I
> have downloaded the tracks now, but I still haven't listened
> to them, so I can't say what my vote would have been. But
> as you won anyway, it doesn't matter, does it?
>
>
> Graham
>

Ozan Yarman wrote:
> Goes to show you that there is more than one way to skin a cat!
> > Thanks for elucidating your point Graham. Still, I would like to know > what you think of The Saba Storm.

I think it's excellent, as I thought I said before. The kind of thing I would have bought maybe 10 years ago if you had a full CD. For a first effort in that style it's really impressive (something I've tried and failed to do over those same 10 years ;-) and I really encourage you to finish the album.

I'll try and listen to all the tracks in the competition before I got to work. If they're up to the same standard it'll be a treat.

Graham