I think that it’s necessary to clarify some aspects of this fields to avoid destructive edits.
For example in https://musicbrainz.org/edit/56215749 the editor most likely thought that, as this is a digital release, it does not have a physical barcode. It would be helpful to rename the field as “barcode / digital UPC” or something similar as to avoid this kind of edits.
Also, automatically transform “https://itunes.apple.com/album/*” to “https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/*” would help to avoid the idea that a release with the former syntax is a worldwide one (when in reality both of them are identical) (view the related edit https://musicbrainz.org/edit/56215750). Maybe with a message to clarify that this is the case.
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I agree with your first point. But for the second point, is really https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/ identical to https://itunes.apple.com/album/? Can’t some releases be US only? Also, why would you re-add a Mexican iTunes link to this release if it already contains the one without any localization?
I re-add it because, as I said, apple.com/album is US localized. And yes, some releases can be US only but then they wouldn’t be available in other stores. As you can see, I make sure that the UPC for both releases is the same.
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Yes, there are many iTunes releases that aren’t available across all of iTunes. Also, some have different labels, barcodes, etc due to country restrictions enforced by the label. ALL iTunes releases have barcodes, and iTunes is NOT a worldwide distributor.
I know all of that, I’m just saying that I don’t think that the link without localization is equal to the US link.
It’s not. It’s the same as the country you reside in if you live there, if entered in US, it’ll equal the US link. Entering in the country specific links makes sure that it is indeed available in that country. I’ve seen the non country specific link on releases before, however, not work for US releases and still marked worldwide. Which means it worked for the person that entered it and they thought that meant it was worldwide. I think that used to be the case, but it doesn’t seem to be anymore, so we should probably get away from that line of thinking.
This was exactly the point I was making. Assuming the release I linked is indeed Worldwide and has the non-localized store link attached already, surely it doesn’t need another store link with the Mexican localization?
Doesn’t need it, but it doesn’t hurt, IMO.
I think they are identical. This URL, https://itunes.apple.com/album/1435538373, shows me the US store even though I live in Europe. The same thing happens with upc lookups: https://itunes.apple.com/lookup?upc=644110037701 outputs the same US-specific data as https://itunes.apple.com/us/lookup?upc=644110037701 and if an album isn’t available in the US, both lookups output zero results.
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They are. I have tested it multiple times. And MB recognizes this: For example, in this case Release “Make Believe” by Kero Kero Bonito - MusicBrainz you can see that the link without country code in the URL is shown as “iTunes US”.
Good to know. I had been told differently previously. However, that was several years ago when everyone said that if you didn’t have a country designation and it worked that it was iTunes wide.