Bloxy Beat is a music radio station licensed to Robloxia, serving the Robloxia nation and owned by the ROBLOX government. Its studios are located in Bloxington D.C. and there are two transmitters: one transmitter is on a hill near Bloxington D.C, while another transmitter is in West Brookhaven. It was founded in 2000.
Citizen-uploaded music:
Before citizens could upload music to Bloxy Beat's playlist, music were only able to be added to the radio station's playlist by the ROBLOX government, most of them coming from Roblox, RobloSam, or clockwork. The latter two still have all their uploaded music available on their citizen websites to this day. The first song ever played was Wind of Fjords.
On September 25, 2013, citizens are allowed to upload and publish their music to Bloxy Beat's playlist by sending the flash drive containing the audio file to the studio along with Robux. Robloxians do not receive a refund if the audio they upload violates the Robloxia constitution and/or is copyrighted.
Restrictions and Prices:
Audio files in the flash drives must be either MP3 or OGG and play for under 7 minutes. Prices for audio depend on the length. Audio that have length of under 10 seconds will cost 20 Robux, 10 to 59 seconds will cost 35 Robux, 1 to 2 minutes will cost 70 Robux, and the rest will cost 350 Robux.
Restriction history:
When it was originally implemented, the service only allowed 15 seconds of music and cost a citizen 250 Robux per music file, allegedly set up to prevent misuse of the service. However, a loophole was discovered shortly afterwards, in which citizens could technically upload a full music file by speeding it up to the point where the song's duration is lower than 15 seconds, and the description would notify the government and citizens on how to restore the full music file.
On January 15, 2014, the government increased the music length limit to 120 seconds, 8 times the length of the previous limit, and the cost decreased by 60% to 100 Robux, allowing longer music to be uploaded for a lower price. The government's plan proved to be successful, as it reduced the hassle of uploading multiple short samples of a long audio and also reduced the complications that came with the pricing.
On March 18, 2015, the government allowed sending of OGG files, which have more seamlessness looping than MP3 files.
On September 26, 2016, the music length limit was increased to 6 minutes, while the cost would be changed to a dynamic pricing system.
On October 6, 2016, the dynamic pricing system and limit of 6 minutes would be temporarily retired while some issues would be fixed. About a week later, the dynamic pricing system and limit of 6 minutes were returned.
As of December 1, 2016, the music limit has been increased to 7 minutes.
On an unknown date in late 2018, the cost for audio was changed to 35 Robux instead of 75 for music length ranging from 59 seconds to 2 minutes. Later in 2019, the cost for that length is now 70 Robux.
Sound ID
After a citizen successfully uploads and publishes their music to Bloxy Beat's playlist and is approved for Bloxy Beat, the government will send them a Sound ID. Users can then go to the Bloxy Beat website and search up the ID to bring back their original music file.
Downloading from Bloxy Beat
Bloxy Beat's website doesn't provide a built-in feature to download any audio from their radio channel. However, third-party tools allow downloading of audio from the Bloxy Beat's website.
Bloxy Beat's APM Deal
In late May 2018, the Robloxia government signed a license agreement with APM Music on Earth, a music company that produces and licenses soundtracks for usage in films, TV shows, video games, and commercials. Soon afterwards, thousands of APM Music tracks were added onto the playlist, allowing everyone to listen to Earth music.
When the government did this massive upload, the description was organized with this order:
- the description of the song under "quotes";
- the duration of the song in seconds (normally, for commercial purposes, many songs have cut versions to 60 seconds and 30 seconds);
- genre: there are many genres of music, such as Club/Electronica, Jazz, Pop, etc.;
- library: shows the library of the music. The most known are from Bruton, KPM and Sonoton;
- album: shows the album name;
- and the "Courtesy of APM Music" phrase;
However, for some reason, the composer's/s' name(s) are not mentioned in the description.
Bloxtube Copyright Claims
Many Bloxtubers complained that they've been getting copyright claims (Content ID claims) from the licensed music in their videos, due to the fact that these music are copyrighted. Those Bloxtubers have not earned ROBUX from their videos.
Copyrighted Song Removal
There are two types of copyrighted songs:
- The government's licensed songs. They are copyrighted but licensed by the government to be allowed for use.
- Other copyrighted songs. However, they are not licensed by the government to be allowed for use and are currently being expunged from the playlist.
On May 30, 2018, the government announced on the Government Mayors Forum that they will begin an automated process to remove all copyrighted songs that are not licensed by them from their Bloxy Beats playlist on June 18, 2018. This means that mayors can only use music produced by themselves, the government's licensed music or non-copyrighted music. Most music on the playlist are copyrighted, so government action will not be taken on anyone who has uploaded music that falls into this category before the changes take effect. Such music cannot be played on the Bloxy Beats website anymore.
The government has stated that the main reason for this is to give themself better first impressions to future companies that they want to work with. If an artist or record label found out that their music was being used by a site or user without permission (especially for monetary gain) then it would most likely lead to a lawsuit if action was not taken by the host, which is also the main reason why a region in Robloxia named Brick Bronze was demolished by the government.
On July 4, 2018, after the music removal was completed, a government mini-corruption caused citizens who uploaded copyrighted music would be executed. This was later resolved, although citizens are still skeptical about uploading music to the playlist. This incident lead a mayor named Cindering to complain about Robloxia's government on a mayor forum, which got viral at 200 likes within 5 days.
However, citizens never gave up, and eventually found a loophole that still is not patched. Citizens using the loophole must modify the copyrighted audio enough to be distinguished from the original. They would pitch-shift the audio ( meaning that the original audio will be restored if the citizen finds a counter pitch-shift ) or add a voice clip to the audio ( meaning that the original audio will be restored if they cut the voice clip out ), then send it to the playlist.
This has been criticized for being too sudden, and mayors immediately became concerned about citizens using boombox permits to play such copyrighted music. Some mayors have argued that there will be no concrete way to prevent citizens from uploading copyrighted music even after the change, and that some areas owned by the mayor which rely on copyrighted music will be heavily crippled by the mass removal of music.
On March 10, 2022, an attempt to create a concrete way to prevent citizens from listening to copyrighted music critically succeeded, heavily crippling radio station companies that relied on copyrighted music to the point where they had to file for bankruptcy or were already bankrupt. This sparked unrest among the Robloxian populace, who loved those several popular Robloxian songs before those songs were found out to be created by citizens and later removed on the radio.
Bloxy Beat's Adult Material
On June 22, 2018, Bloxy Beat added non-safe, adult music to their playlist. The government and APM Music was to blame, since the government went on autopilot, going forward to add all the music to the playlist and APM Music never categorized music on whether it abides the ROBLOXia Constitution. Bloxy Beat later removed the music, but it was already too late, with citizens hearing the music. They later added the music again but they made it abide to the ROBLOXia constitution.
Bloxy Beat Bypasses
Bloxy Beat Bypasses are non-safe adult music but are approved by Bloxy Beat, either due to their errors or not being analyzed thoroughly. Sometime in 2014, an unknown citizen found a loophole where one could upload audios via making a plugin which started to make a lot of Bloxy Beat Bypasses. This eventually was patched. In mid-2016, the citizens found another loophole: using render meshes to bypass the Bloxy Beat approval process, ultimately creating Bloxy Beat Bypasses for 10 months, until on April 26, 2017, when render meshes lacked this circumvention power and Bloxy Beat began modifying their approval process to become less lenient.
Citizens have started to find out more ways to bypass music so that inappropriate music can be allowed on the playlist, especially since that approval process modification has made it even more difficult to do so in the first place. Although citizens have been slowing/speeding up music so that the government can simply change the pitch so it creates an inappropriate sound, citizens needed a more reputable source. On May 2017, citizens started uploading normal music with a selection of audio which was silent (silence ranges from 20 seconds to a couple of minutes) then inappropriate music would play to make the approval process successful. Nowadays, this Bloxy Beat Bypass variant is still used today. However, the approval process was made more rigorous in order to stop the Bloxy Beat Bypasses from ever being approved.
Fun Facts:
Some citizens view those who use 'ear-blaster' or inappropriate music as "immature" and "annoying." Citizens usually do this as a form of trolling or just to be able to play explicit music that is otherwise not allowed on the nation. It is often done in areas where players are able to play audio publicly. Weapons such as the A255 family create this, which has lead to the government banning the weapons during peacetime.
There is a bug where some audio files stop playing after a couple seconds. This bug only occurs on the Bloxy Beat's website.
There is another bug where an audio file won't play at all (Mostly on .ogg sound files).
Some citizens have been executed by the government for uploading loud music. The louder the music, the more severe the punishment.
The longest song played on the radio before citizens could upload their own music was Mubarek - Resist (rmx).
There are some music that are on the playlist but are not on the radio channel.