Dear All,
I’m wondering how to enter information in MusicBrainz about an audiobook that has concretely only one track but multiple chapters. The file is an M4B file.
Shall I consider having multiple tracks representing the chapters, or should I number all the track with the same number, or is there something else I should consider?
What is the appropriate approach?
Moreover, does anyone know if there’s a way to make Picard to tag correctly M4B files?
Thanks in advance for your guidance.
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Unfortunately Picard isn’t able to tag m4b chapters correctly - you could open a ticket asking for the functionality on the ticket tracker, it seems it hasn’t been requested before: https://tickets.metabrainz.org/
I know I have added m4b releases both split into chapters and as a single track in the past. Until we have a better way of handling these, adding both seems like a good solution, if you are keen to be thorough thorough. Here is a great example of both being entered:
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On a similar note, how should it be handled when there’s both a set of MP3 files as well as an M4B file available for download, like for audiobooks from libro.fm? I can upload the tracks for the MP3s and that works well, but I’d also like to be able to use AcoustID with the M4B file. Should this be a separate release or an additional medium perhaps?
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When a vendor distributes the same audiobook in MP3 and M4B format, each version should be added as an official release in the same release group if the number of files differs, or if the contents of the files differ.
Unofficial tracklists are another matter. For example, I’d like to be able to split M4Bs into tracks and submit/fingerprint those, or submit whole-disc rips as a single track, but there isn’t a good way to contribute stuff like that right now.
The alternative tracklists feature has been discussed off and on for nearly 13 years. Meanwhile, some editors have submitted unofficial tracklists as pseudo releases, but that’s considered bad form because pseudo releases are meant to be used for unofficial translations and transliterations. Also, pseudo releases are problematic because they don’t inherit metadata from the release that they reference. (And doing so would be a significant departure from the way MB works now.)
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Thanks for the response @sibilant! Those are extremely helpful details and I think at least part of what I’ve been doing aligns with what what you’ve described. I was able to get some support in this post on the topic.
I’ve been creating official releases for both the MP3s and the M4Bs from Libro.fm. For Audible, I’ve been making an official release for the AAX file and a Psuedo-Release for the chapters embedded in the AAX file like in the “The Left Hand of Darkness” example referenced in this thread.
You highlighted two major problems I’ve run into: how to link an M4B or AAX release to a release or source containing the chapters for it and how to provide better chapters than those embedded in the original AAX or M4B files. The way chapters are split out-of-the-box in some audiobooks is absolutely horrifying. See this The Eye of the World release.
Compatibility for chapters between releases from the same distributor is also a problem given that some distributors, like Audible, add their own sound byte to the beginning and end of the audio. This results in chapter offsets being different due to disparity in the length of the first track. I’ve added both Audible and Libro.fm releases of Warbreaker which demonstrates this. It also shows how the tracks can be split up slightly differently between vendors.
My solution to connecting the M4B or AAX to its chapters is to associate each release with its distributor then find the releases from the same distributor. This works when there’s only one other release from the same distributor, but doesn’t work so well when there’s more than that. It would be great if it were possible to link directly to the release to use for chapters.
I’ve pondered using a Bootleg release to supply better chapters, but even if I were to do something like that, it wouldn’t be very useful without a way to link a release to it.
Thanks again for the context, it’s really helpful.
I’ve seen some people argue this is a kind of “mastering” and not part of the original recording. Therefore treating different editions as using the same recordings. But that only works when it is split into same length chunks.
Certainly annoying when you’re trying to link up common versions of the same book.
I have some audiobooks where four different versions in a Release Group split the same thing up four different ways. Giving a Single Recording, 4 part Recording, 10 part and 22 part. Which starts to look confusing with all those “compiled in” relationships.
I would argue that Audible recordings should be separate. I understand the reasoning (and the desire) behind the “mastering” argument, but you can’t escape the fact that the contents of the recordings differ, since all Audible audiobooks begin (and sometimes end) with an ident. That also affects the fingerprint, the length, and (if you’re really thorough) the vocal credits. Even long books split into multiple AAX files have vocal announcements that tell the listener that the audiobook has been split so allow for shorter downloads.
Recordings aside, Audible releases must always be separate because they don’t have ISBNs or GTINs. They are a bit like BMG Direct and other record club releases.
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Using the Audnex API, quite a few of my Audible books have ISBN’s associated with them. I should double check if Audible’s API reports the same. I’ve been associating the ISBN with each release where available, but I’m always doing separate releases when the audio differs. Makes me wonder whether I should make separate editions in BookBrainz, but I’ve just been using one BookBrainz edition per ISBN regardless of the distributor.
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Yeah, please try that if you get the chance. I’ve never used Audnex or looked at its source code, but I’m suspicious of that result. Since Audnex is an aggregator, it may be conflating some other release with the Audible release.
Whenever I checked ASIN-to-ISBN tools or CamelCamelCamel, Audible releases never had an ISBN. And I have never seen an Audible release that has an ISBN-10 as its ASIN—not even Audible Studios releases.
So I looked into it, and Audible’s API doesn’t seem to give a field like ISBN, so it seems like it’s added in Audnex. It should be noted that for some audiobooks, the Audible ASIN is the ISBN-10 of the book.
Thanks for checking!
What are some examples of Audible titles that have an ISBN for an ASIN?" I’d like to document Audible and a few other audiobook-related topics in the wiki. If there are Audible titles that reuse an ISBN-10, it would be nice to be able to find out when and why that happens.
Many audiobook players support the “Overdrive MediaMarkers” tag in the following format.
<Markers><Marker><Name>Chapter 1 Title</Name><Time>00:00.000</Time></Marker><Marker><Name>Chapter 2 Title</Name><Time>13:04.000</Time></Marker>></Markers>
I’m able to add these to files (at least mp3 formats, haven’t tried any other) with Picard. Perhaps we could consider adding these as an annotation on these single track releases?
Just tried this release with this script
$if($in(%_releaseannotation%,<Markers>),
$set(Overdrive MediaMarkers, %_releaseannotation%)
)
Seems to work pretty well, at least with audiobookshelf.
Here’s the one that I was referring to: https://www.audible.com/pd/1547608781
Libro.fm has the ISBN-13 for the book as 9781547608782.
Thanks, @jwillikers, this is good to know about! I see that this ISBN is for the e-audiobook release that’s distributed via OverDrive.
I found other examples of ISBN-10-as-ASIN on Audible as well. I think the way you described it is accurate: It’s not that these releases have ISBNs, it’s that sometimes an ISBN-10 is used as an ASIN on Audible.
In Amazon’s databases, it’s possible for a product to have more than one ASIN. This audiobook has the ASIN B09168CSN3 in the Amazon storefront, and 1547608781 in the Audible storefront. Usually the ASIN is the same on both sites, but apparently that is not always true.
Even though they have different ASINs, the Audible and Amazon entities are still linked. The source code of the Amazon page refers to 1547608781 as the audibleASIN
. On the Audible page, scroll down to the reviews and click the “Amazon reviews” tab. The “Report a review on Amazon” link uses the Amazon ASIN. The Audible page uses 1547608781 for everything else, including for purchasing the product.
Neither page refers to this number as the ISBN, and I still don’t see any evidence that an ISBN-13 or GTIN are used at all. Even if an Audible release has an ASIN that’s an ISBN-10, I don’t think we should convert that to ISBN-13 and use it as a barcode. As far as I can tell, such numbers have no meaning in Audible; they don’t map to anything.