Even though I have called the saturation of information nonsensical at points in this discussion my argument has never been truly against its inclusion but the database in its current form breaks layout which again I will say usability organization function should always come first.
To understand me a little I spent 7 years a QA specialist in the gaming industry
I volunteer test for Vivaldi Web browser and I am the CRM for a web service firm that designs hosts and markets web sites for many important clients and never have I ever heard anything like ok this will break something because we feel this needs to happen at all costs.
the redesign looks great and I fully support it thank you for the insight but I also see it is no where near roll out so im saying that even though its valid information we also can not allow release groups to break so we need to do something in the intern.
Anyway everybody agrees that MB ergonomy needs improvements.
But frankly this little issue (many country flag rows) is not heavily hindering my eyes.
I would prioritise many other issues we have in our backlog, like mobile browser compatibility or even more drastically heavily needed so badly hard collection highlighter.
I was going to comment on this before I went away for the weekend. (Music is always better live 
). Nice to see how the discussion has flowed.
The accuracy here is great. Love it. Okay, so the GUI needs to catch up. Interfaces always evolve. We should not avoid adding data just because it breaks the pretty looks of the website.
No doubt someone could knock up a script that can tidy up the list.
I have other questions though about the exact data and its source.
Why such a short limited list of countries? I see so many missing. Are these just where Spotify\iTunes\etc have registered offices?
- Is this list specific to this release?
- Or is this release where Spotify are trading today (2019)?
- Or is it a correctly historic list for 2017 the week when that track was released?
- Or is it a list that came from record company on release day saying “available in these markets today”?
Personally I think it needs some kind of special handling for the Digital Releases like this.
I also would like to see some actual proof uploaded. Just like when we point to a cover of a CD as reference. All I’ve seen so far is a link to a track for sale on one of the sites and no details of how to tell which markets were there in the original release day.
And also mentioned above, what happens with a Digital Release that is released to Spotify, Amazon, iTunes and the bands own website? All going to cover different geographic areas.
One suggestion I’d use is to turn Spotify \ Amazon \ iTunes into areas that can be selected on the countries list. So instead of “Worldwide” or “Canada” it is “iTunes” or “Spotify” that is selected as the release location.
I think this suggestion right here would solve every concern I have because the current iteration of the database is very much music built around traditional physical media data entry. What needs to happen is both physical media and digital data need entirely separate methods of handling each respected for what they are but also seamlessly woven into a clean modern database. The question is how do we get there? I think people thought at first thought my issue issue was the data infact not at all its the absolute mess that data makes of the current layout as I said I am a former QA specialist from the game industry who works for a all in one web service company so my entire job have always been about a flawless user and functional experiences ;
My problem with this is that it’s not useful. Being released on Spotify for one release has a different meaning to another. For example, a Spotify album released in the US and Mexico and another Spotify album released in Liberia will be classified as the same (ie, sold on Spotify) but the areas of actual distribution are different. It’s also important that we treat data consistently. We don’t document where a physical release can be bought (we don’t have an area called “HMV” or “Barnes & Noble”), because how we have chosen to define a “release” mainly centers around the actual content, manufacturing process and appearance of the release, not its distribution method.
@silentbird because I said we handle the release types could we not just do for example Itunes> then make a list of available countries
Perhaps we need to think about what we mean by “Release Country” as part of the release event. Are we confusing this with “Available in Country”? For example, a CD released in one country is shown as having one release country, even though it may be available for purchase in other countries. How is a digital release any different? It is typically released in one country, yet available in many countries.
Hi, everyone.
The official styleguide has constatnly avoided this issue. I think it would serve everyone if an official instance was taken.
I have coded a little php script that’s publicly available in https://etc.marlonob.info/mb-importer/ in an attempt to more accurately gather data for digital releases (the code was written for personal use, and I must clarify that I’m not a programmer). But I think in the process of codding it I may have gather some relevant insight on the matter.
My instance on this issue when I first joined MB was that most digital releases should be [worldwide], since in those cases, for example, when a release is available in every iTunes’ store, is clear that the intention is for it to be available everywhere and that the limit of some territories is a technical issue of Apple and not the artist/distributor’s.
But then it was pointed to me (and that make sense) that technical and legal issues have always determined different releases. There are albums released almost world-widely but in every country they have a slightly different copyright notice an probably a barcode also. Everyone of those releases have a place in the database. The case is, in theory, every release group should have dozens of different releases, one for each country in which it was licensed and sold.
Now, is it better for the database to have only a couple of countries or to have all of them? I think, the answer is the latest. The important thing is to have as much particular data as possible.
For those more interested in the album concept, the release-group should be enough for that. A concept of main release may be useful, similarly to how we have a main cover image automatically assigned to the first release on the list, but that can be mapped to a particular release in special cases.
But, first: what defines a particular digital media release? For physical releases, this is relatively clear: any difference in the packaging or the content suffice to make a different release. But with digital media, those differences are less available to the consumer.
Now, sometimes the vendors make little changes even to the track or artist names. Some of them include every credited artist as a track artist, some only the album artist, …. I have find that the the only reliable identifier is the UPC. The problem: most vendors make this data hard to access, if at all.
But, back to the matter of the thread. My script function under the assumption that a digital release is the same if, and only if, they share a UPC, and query Spotify, Deezer, and iTunes APIs looking for specific information on the release.
So, about the countries. Only Spotify provide a list of available markets. For iTunes, the only way of knowing is to request every iTunes country-store to see if they have it available or not. Deezer doesn’t provide that information.
Specifically about the Spotify API: No, the countries are not always the same. Most of the time, they are all the countries in which Spotify is available, but not always. Sometimes is only one country, sometimes, territories like North America (mx-ca-us) or or North + Central America or Latin America, etcetera. Now, what appears in those lists is the intersection of two sets: A) Countries where Spotify has pressence; and B) Countries where the specific-upc album was released. So, that may not be all the countries where it was released, but all of those countries have a valid release event, and that is what gets registered. For now, this is the most complete info that we have access to.
So, the question is: If not all knowed release events, what should the criteria be? Before I automated that task, I would (manually) test for three kind of countries: 1.- The artist’s area; 2.- The register’s area (ideally, the country in which the ISRC was registered), and; 3.- Mexico, which is my country.
Some people have a problem with seeing Mexico so prominently present (even tho I have never seen a comment when the us is the only country for releases by artists or labels from uk, au, or basically any other country) in an otherwise “not-mexican” release. The thing is, for example, maybe for a Norwegian person is more important to know which releases of Mutter by Rammstein are available in Norway for streaming that to know that there was a German release for an album by a German band. I don’t think that it has to be reminded that browsing it is not the only —not even the main— object of MB.
What I do find to be terribly missing from MB for digital media is a service for snapshots of vendors APIs / album pages. In the same manner in which the CAA is useful as a source to find the particularities of a physical release, having a snapshot for the sources of digital releases may serve the same propose and, given that the CAA is already maintained by the Internet Archive, I think this may not be so complicated.
So, what would be the difference between a (the?) release country and a country in which is available? The label’s headquarters location? The artist’s area? The ISRC country?
In physical media, there is a legal, mostly clear, difference between being commercially released and imported.
As I commented on one of these edits:
Yes, please. It’s a nuisance – and it’s a false accuracy anyway, since iTunes, Deezer, Spotify, AppleMusic and other linked stores will never share the exact same release country range, which thus will always be either wrong or incomplete
Hi guys Did I not say this would happen I was worried about this from the start
I confuses me that it is such a bizarre list of seemingly random countries. Why that list? What is special about those countries? Why leave countries out? It just seems like a random list.
It is not random, it was taken from Spotify online store web service, which is not really trivial info to find out (there is a nifty @tatsumo tool for that).
It probably is the countries in which the store sells and where you can buy from.
I have never bought any download album but I know some online stores, like PlayStation Store will only accept credit cards from Japan.
So maybe there are some country checks also for those download albums.
But if we choose to not care, I am not strongly in favour of any choice because, as I said, I am not a digital guy.
Well I agree with the reverts I feel somewhat vindicated I approve of the one i see I do so with the following note the information is needed but cant be shown effectively right now
Thank you for that. First time I seen any reference. And yet iTunes will be a different market? And again Deezer. So the list is still incomplete.
Agree with this point ^^^
I’ve also seen these lists appear on older digital releases - but cannot tell if the editor actually check for that exact date or assume that today’s country list would fit. It would be a guess on the part of the editor if the names and dates are correct for the older release.
I think something like [Spotify Market] [iTunes Market] would help add the clarity. That can then link out to a page that shows the varying markets as they change over the years for each of those shops.
I am like you @jesus2099 - all my music is physical media. I’m not a streamer or digital purchaser. I like accurate data.
My OCD and QA experience makes me go nuts as it is so hopefully a overhaul comes quick because im all for the data not the page breaking 
As we don’t create one duplicate release for each store, we just combine all countries, so it is not incomplete.
But I really don’t mind giving up tracking countries for digital releases if nobody really cares.
But for physical I will always prefer a to-be-completed list of confirmed countries rather than replace it by a wrong guess [Europe] or [Worldwide].