I download, but rarely submit due to the linking system. The system we have is both difficult to use and impossible to get right. I figure all my work would just have to be redone once we have a proper system.

The contribution system is based on trust, and some people abuse that.

I just had a case where someone contributed cast and crew data, stating he took them from imdb. This was rejected of course. He then immediately recontributed the exact same date stating that he checked them from the DVD credits.
I re-checked and contributed, since the existing crew data were a complete mess, and the cast was incomplete, in the wrong order, and with typical imdb fantasy roles. To top it off, the scans were from a profile with a different UPC...

All we can do is repair when we find wrong data, and get it right for our own collections and those that have the same locality DVDs.

In any case you're mistaken in the last bit: it is perfectly acceptable to submit partial contributions. There are e.g. fellow users who do not feel comfortable contributing cast and crew data, so they don't include those in their submissions. Just make sure that the information for the data fields you DO submit is accurate (and preferably complete).

I'd say: just try and start submitting contributions for the data fields you feel comfortable with. Over time, as you get the hang of it more and more, you might feel like expanding the range of data fields you'd like to include!

P.S.
In the contribution screen that opens when you submit a contribution, you have tick the data field boxes for which you would like submit data. Please make sure you mention your data sources in the contribution notes you're asked to submit alongside your data.

Yes and no - there is no requirement to submit a complete profile for a new profile either. Incomplete submissions for new profiles happen all the time, e.g. for pre-release profiles. The only difference is you don't get to check the tick boxes.

Hi Mithi,

Quoting Mithi:

Quote:
ehh ... wait, what? The only valid source for credits is the movie on the disc. No need to cross-reference it with external sources nor is it allowed!

But what happens when on-screen credits are wrong - that is character names or real-life cast names are spelt incorrectly? This does happen!

If a film, for example spells Sylvester Stallone's name with just one "L" in his surname, rather than two, and everyone-and-his-dog knows it's been spelt wrong, surely the sensible thing to do is submit the correctly spelt version of the name, and NOT the incorrectly spelt one, yes?


Pooch

To elaborate a bit further on what KinoNiki said:

DVD Profiler uses a Common Name system to link different credits for the same person to each other. First thing is to establish by what name that person is credited most often. This can be done using the Credit Lookup Tool (CLT), where you can enter all variations subsequently. Each time, the CLT will come back with the number of profiles and the number of titles in which that variation appears. The variation with the highest number of titles (or, if necessary, profiles) is the common name.

That's the name to use in the profile credits. In case a different variation is being used in the movie credits, you should use the "Credited As" field to reflect this.

Finally, there are numerous cases of people sharing the same name. So far, birth years are being used to distinguish such people.

Overall, however, the system is far from flawless. Hopefully there will be a day when a major overhaul will be implemented.

The screeners depends on the voters... especially with covers. How are they to know what the original cover looks like? I mean think about it... do you know what every single cover of every single release (in every single region/locality) looks like?

I've always downloaded.  My local database has always been a bit of a mess as when I added a profile if the UPC wasn't in the database I just used a similar edition and used a different UPC.

In the past half of year or so I've started to contribute.  At first I didn't bother mostly due to the process seeming quite overwhelming as well as the always ongoing bickering about the rules and their interpretations.  I just didn't want to deal with putting in work only to have it declined.  I used to contribute to DVDSpot, that process was pretty straight forward.  I did do cover scans awhile back, but it took a long time for me, and in the end they didn't look very good.  But I got a better scanner and have gotten pretty good at getting good scans out.  I'm sure there are plenty of people that can do better scans, but pretty happy with the scans I produce.  I use GIMP2 and it only takes a couple of minutes to get quality scans, in fact it usually takes the scanner longer to scan it then it does for me to crop, re-size and fix the contrast.

The majority of new contributions I've made have been the ones I mentioned before, where the UPC wasn't in the database.  So for these it's pretty straight forward since most of the data in the profile is correct, I just have to do the scans, and then verify the current information.  Many Canadian releases are nearly identical to the US counterparts, including the Disc IDs.  Some are similar but with different media companies listed, different covers (bilingual), etc.  But some are completely different, different encode, different audio, features etc, but at least the cast is the same.

The one thing I usually don't mess around with is the Credits.  the whole BY thing makes it very undesirable to deal with.  The only time I've added them is for movies that weren't already in the Database, otherwise I use an already approved crew & cast list.  I wish there was a better system, one where there was a single source for every movie/show, seems kind of silly to have to update a dozen profiles for the same source.  But I'm sure it would be a massive overhaul at this point, going through all the profiles for each title.

At this point all of my blu-rays are in with the correct UPC.  There are a few that need to be changed to Canada from US.  I'm going through all my blu-rays right now to make sure the UPCs on the covers match the UPC of the profile, as well as find scans that I can improve upon.  I'm also scanning covers that I don't have a slip for, but have a slip in the db.  Of course I'm locking these ones down and keeping them in my local only.  I am also going to go through and make sure all the Blu-rays have Disc IDs.  Once I'm done getting my blu-rays 'perfect' then I'll move onto my DVDs.

The other thing I don't bother with is the child DVD profiles for Blu-ray/DVD combo packs.  Don't see the point when the movie information is already listed on the Blu-ray (Parent) profile,, and Disc ID listed there as well.

I've contributed quite a few in the past few months, and haven't been declined or even received a no vote yet.  Not saying I'm perfect, but I try to make sure what I contribute follows the rules and improves the DB.  Not sure why anyone would purposefully try to contribute data that didn't follow the rules to the db.  I can understand not liking certain rules, but why not just keep them in your local?  Why try and sneak them in?

I wish that the system allowed for multiple cover scans for each UPC, and the sure having the option of which one to choose.  I know I like my images to be representative of what I actually own, and for the ones that differ from the db I scan myself.  Wish I could easily share them with the rest of the community.  I can understand why only one is allowed, but think it'd be great to have multiple images to choose from.