How to use the NotOvertheHill Music Player
TC's Ultimate Guide complete with screenshots and step by step tutorial

Uploading music is easy if you remember a few little things before you start:

1. You must create at least one album before you can upload any music. Why? Because your album is like your photo gallery. All songs you upload go into your album. You can't upload music into thin air - you must build a container for it. That's what an album is - a music container - so to speak. Well it's an metaphor, sorta :-)
    
2. MP3 is the only format you can upload. Why? WAV files are not really high quality and they're huge files. M4A is Apple format -for iPods. EB and I don't have an iPod installed on the server, although EB is an iPod freak, TC doesn't have one. Being that EB won't give him a raise, he can't afford an iPod. You can see who has all the money - what little of it there is here. MP3, is by far, the most ubiquitous file format for music on the Web. Heck, even most home DVD players can play MP3's - not to mention that all fancy cars have MP3 players built in. I don't have a fancy car, but EB does, ask her :)
    
3. If you remember those two things before you get all excited and start uploading Gene Autrey's Home On The Range in WAV format or 45 RPM, then you won't get so frustrated and you won't have to take Tylenol, Advil, or Vodka - or whatever it is you use to cure frustration and headache.
    
4. You must have MP3 files physically on your computer to upload. You can't listen to music in WinAmp or Windows Media Player and upload the playlist. You can't listen to music on the Web and save a shortcut to it and upload the short cut..won't work - not now, not ever. If you do those kinds of things you're not going to hear anything. You must have MP3 files located on a CD, flash drive, or hard drive to upload. You cannot upload what you don't have, right? Most of you can upload images with reckless abandoned, but you seem to be stuck uploading music. You couldn't upload pictures if they weren't on your hard drive and the same is true for music. You must have the actual MP3 file on your hard drive before you will ever be able to upload music.
    
5. I'm not going to dwell on where you can get MP3 files. Just a few comments. You can "rip" (as they say) music from any CDs you have by using a program created for "ripping". Just make sure when your rip a CD you save the ripped file on your hard drive as MP3. You can buy MP3 files for under a dollar all over the Web - including Wal-Mart (if you live in the U.S.A.). Google it.. you'll find dozens of places that will sell you MP3s. Some public domain MP3 exist - and you can get them free. Most of them are old - but if you like classical music you might be able to download some good free MP3s of Beethoven, Bach, Chopin (wood), Wagner, Mozart, etc.. You can also download a file sharing client and get MP3s from other people...this is generally illegal in the USA and most of the world. If you choose to get your MP3s this way, that's your business, just remember it's illegal. Also, spyware/adware/malware abounds in some of these file sharing clients - so beware.
    

Napster is the most famous file sharing client of all time. It is no longer free and the MP3s you can get with Napster are legal. However, legal comes at a price. They're not free...get my drift??

FOLLOW THE YELLOW BRICK ROAD...
 

Now, follow the yellow brick road below and you'll be the Wizard of Music Uploading.

Follow the yellow brick road...

STEP 1.

No matter where you are on the site, you can click "My Account" in the toolbar, and return to your account page. Once there, click "Submit Items". Then click "Upload Music" (DUH!)
 

STEP 2:

If you haven't created an album yet, do it now. Call it whatever you like. You can call it Rotten Tomatoes Eat Mustard - if that tickles you. Just remember you need to container to hold your songs. Right?

STEP 3:

Now that you have your album created it's time to get down to business. Let's upload music! Can you guess which link to click? RIGHT! "Upload Song". You get an "A".

Now here's a trick you're going to love and commit to memory. If you look at the picture you below you would be tempted to file out all the stuff (Title, artist, etc.) first. Right? Nope. It's much easier to click the Browse button first and select the MP3 file on your computer that you want to upload. That way, if you see something in your MP3 collection on your computer and you think "Wow! I didn't know I had Frank Sinatra's 'Mustard On A Spring Day' - I think I'll share that..it's my favorite song" and you just got done typing "You Make My Skin Crawl With Your Squeeky Voice and Your Cankles" by Upfreem Goddard..you don't have to go back and remove all the stuff you've already typed just because you want to upload Frankie boy.

Browse first, find the song, then fill in the other information. You must include the Musician Name (or group name) and the Song Title - and, of course, you must have already created at least one album. If you only have one album it will will appear automatically - the first album you create will always be the default album. If you add other albums and you want to upload a song to a different album, select it by using the arrow next to the Album selector form.
 

 

STEP 4:

After you click "Browse" a standard Windows Explorer window will appear. You can browse your entire computer for MP3 files. This is a good time to remind you that if you keep all your MP3 files in one place you won't have to browse all over you computer - just browse to that folder and have at it.

See below as TC selects an MP3 file to upload ---

 

 

TC selects "Doobie Brothers - What A Fool Believes" (great song, by-the-way). As he hovers over the title the file type, artist, size, and playing time appear...see? (LOOK !)

After selecting the MP3 file, you can type in the information required. Items marked with an asterisk are MANDATORY...they must be filled in before you can proceed. So make sure you fill in the fields with asterisks or your MP3 is not going anywhere...OK? After you've selected the MP3 file on your hard drive, and typed in all the required information, click the blue "Upload Song" button (see below):
 

After you've clicked the "Upload Song" button, you'll see the progress indicator. You need to be patient here. No matter how fast you think your connection is, upload speeds are never as fast as download speed...NEVER. So if you've got Turbo Cable at 15MBPS, you ain't gonna upload that fast. You might upload at 200KBPS (KILOBYTES OR KILOBITS PER SECOND). OK? Be patient. You might download a 10 MB file in 5 seconds, but it is going to take you a lot longer to upload a file that size. Patience is a virtue. Go grab a cup of coffee..or grab a spoonful of mustard..do something beside sit there and think your MP3 isn't going to make it. It will..just chill out :)

If you're patient, and don't stare at the screen while your MP3 is uploading you'll be rewarded. Remember that a watched pot never boils.

Grab a cup of coffee or a drink of something and when you come back there's a 99.9% chance you'll see this..and if you do..you'll be happy!
 

All you have to do is go to your profile page and look at your music player, and you'll see the song you just uploaded in your music player...how about that!