I am interested to hear more on this topic. I think it could end up own a rabbit hole though. One can argue that a poster is not cover art, yet there is a checkbox for it. You could even go further and say an Obi is not cover art, but more packaging.
When I add a CD, I include all that I can. If there was a post card folded inside, I include that if I can, although it is not cover art.
To also be clear, when I suggest to upload the above as cover art, I still intend to place the date in the release event area. I would not expect one to open images to see the date. I would be posting the image as proof of edit. Otherwise, the only option is to take my word for it. Ten years later, if someone questions the date for whatever reason, the email I have will likely not be found anywhere. At that time, how would one verify the date? As mentioned, the Spotify link contains on the year, no day and month.
the Poster cover art type is for packed-in posters. I’ve got several releases where the booklet comes in the form of a poster on one side, and all the booklet details on the other. I can grab a few pics, if you’re interested…
also, when you look up the release via Spotify or Deezer’s API, it does give you the exact date, as is shown by a-tisket.
This is simply how digital releases work. MB has 750,000+ digital releases, and there is a system of trust in data that editors provide. We have good data without email screenshots. This seems like a solution in search of a problem to be honest.
If you are worried about evidence you can usually provide a link to a announcement, on social media or a label website. And use the internet archive way back machine to archive the link for posterity. There are lots of ways.
For Spotify you can use a.tisket or other tools which will expose the full release date (only reliable modern releases, not reissues).
If you want to link to pictures as proof of edits (definitely not required) then I would store them somewhere else, the CAA isn’t really ‘edit note image archive’.
In MB parlance packaging + contents is specifically what the CAA is for.
I have not yet looked at this tool. I will though soon.
I have seen those, I think. If you refer to the booklet being a folded style, then you unfold it to make a poster. This still, however, is not “cover art”, but inside art. I am being dramatic, but please see my point.
Can I be devil’s advocate though? Use of the API is not normal. A regular user will not see or use it. If it is not “readily available”, the guideline for what makes a release, should it be used as a reference? I tried looking up a few digital releases to see if they were in the DB, and what I saw just turned me off. I see the barcodes and all this data that my release just does not have present on it. Which do I have, I have no idea. None of my digital releases have a barcode in the metadata… although it seems that newer iTunes releases do include this.
So it seems the opinion is that such things (the image above) are not appropriate? This means that in order to get proof of edit, we need to use tools to get information that is not otherwise disclosed. That seems like it is against the idea of MB, if we do not want to download a PDF to get info, do we really want to access an API to do the same, which is more effort?
We can agree to disagree here, and that is fine. I see it this way… CD releases have cover art which provides most all that is needed. If a recording is on that cover art different than another, it is added as such. The cover art provides the content and MB documents as-is. For digital, it seems that standard reverses. We no longer care about what is in the release, but what we can uncover through APIs, searches, etc.
For this release, that email is the “source”. Without it, I would not have a download unless I happen to find it sort of at random. It also provides the link, which is used in MB as a reference, but it will not be active indefinitely. So when that link dies, there is no longer proof.
I do not see it that way. I see it as a verification. People are people, and people make mistakes. I might add the date with positive intention, but overlook a typo. Having something that shows the source of my edit will counter that, in that someone can confirm my work.
I see MB as a source of data, a music bible. In order for that to happen, simply relying on the word of a person for things that can otherwise be proven seems counter intuitive. If I can prove, I feel I should. If I cannot, I believe I should state my case in the edit and explain myself. Then it is clear to others whether to accept or not accept my statement.
*** To all ***
Please again do not take my comments as argumentative. I am only providing the logic in my head. I mean no ill will to anyone’s opinions.
Mailchimp emails have a ‘view this email online’ link at the bottom btw, that everyone can look at and view the email. I would consider an archived copy of that page excellent evidence btw! And it’s accessible for everyone, including visually disabled.
The issue with using the CAA as supporting evidence isn’t that I think that’s bad to have, it’s just not what I expect to have in the CAA tab
I believe you are correct, I do not recall a CD ever having the full release date. I typically see MB relying on other sources, which also have no proof of source.
Yes. I did raise this issue prior. I would like to have a section where I can upload proof of edits, not in cover art per se, but somewhere. I can agree with you that cover art section may not be the best pace for such things, however, there is no other location for this. Personally, I consider this to be cover art, similar to the booklet of a CD. This is just my opinion though.
Yes, I am well aware of those details. Your point here is valid, and I will look at it for a solution for this. Would you add such a link as a reference, or just in notes? Personally, I prefer this stuff to be more front and center. Things get lost in edit notes easily, especially as more edits are applied.
I have looked at atisket. There is a lot going on in there. I am not a fan of all of that with a Submit to MB at the end. It reminds me of comments I received on merge edits early on in my MB days… I hesitate on a merge with too many recordings in it. This was on recording merges. Today, I agree. A recording merge of 3-4 (2 is required) is reasonable, but a merge of 10 is not.
EDIT: To be clear, this is a really neat tool. I have been playing with it (not submitting) and really like what it does. It is similar to what I have been debating on making for iTunes. While the iTunes artwork finder is nice, I like the idea of a script that pulls the JSON output from the API and places it into a formatted visual display with save/export options.
Regarding the edit in question here, with the PDF turned PNG of the email, I will hold off on further additions of such releases for now. The comments received from this post are very positive to me, and I would prefer to wait for a final outcome of sorts.
My logic I hope has been explained, and my collection will retain such things regardless as they are important to me. My goal with this initiative to look at promo adds is simply to provide further value to MB, so the opinions of the editors here means a lot.
I do not mean to be a bother and hash this out more than needed. I am simply wanting to get a process and procedure to make such submissions easy… this is wanted, this is not, this goes here and this goes there, etc.
The email I presented is not anything special, I am not sharing any communications that are personal in nature. While those emails often contain great information, the fact remains they are personal in nature. It is the fact that the email was sort of public that I thought there is value.
You get posters in CD boxes quite often. This is why there is a tickbox. It is part of the package that is being identified. An advert to say when the music was released is not really part of that release.
Everything that is part of the package that is purchased goes onto the cover art section. It is part of the ability to identify it from similar releases.
Have they fixed the old bug where it used to give the original CD\LP release date and not the Digital Media one?
I understand @thwaller’s nervousness of using that API. I don’t use it as I know there is data in there that is misleading. I still do not understand why the Release Country on MB gets filled with that list of “available in this shop in this country today” list. (But lets not go there - my opinions on that are in other threads)
I don’t know how Internet Archive works, but I see people archiving other data there. It almost sounds like it is worth you investigating in an account to start a Library of this kind of data and stash these documents there. This is related data, but does not really fit under “cover artwork”.
I like the sound of a MusicBrainz reference library. Sometimes I have done a heap of research on an obscure band and know it will be lost in an edit note, and the URLs will decay. It would be good to have a “knowledge dump” somewhere.
But I have also added plenty of edits to the database where “date set because it is in this fan club email in my inbox”. Much of MB is on trust
An email address is very personal. This is a limited access mailing list, and not a public advert. This is why email addresses need cropping from something like that.
That is a shame - I think your additions are great!
You are building a new burden to carry here with additional screenshots. I think as you add more digital media releases you will relax into the idea that they don’t have all the same ‘tangible’ attributes as physical releases, and the CAA isn’t where the focus is.
Anyway, even if you don’t keep adding these for the moment I hope you still have plenty of editing to keep you busy
Just to reiterate, it’s definitely interesting data.
Are you sure you don’t want to look into archiving the email link with the wayback machine? It should have the date there, and it’s hosted by the same people who host the CAA so it’s got the exact same longevity
Thanks for the info in your reply. I will for sure look more into the Internet Archive. I have used it a small amount, but I am not aware of its full functionality. My use has been limited to looking at pages after they have changed, wanting to see the prior version.
I understand the point of materials like the email not fitting under cover art. There is currently no place for such items, which I hope one day will change. Say I place this in Internet Archive, where does the link go? Is that a reference? I feel that if that work is done and it is only placed in the edit notes, it will get lost in there. Lost meaning it will take a good amount of looking to find it vs it being front and center.
It could also be that I place too much importance on such things. I get the feeling that while others think it is neat, nice to have, etc, it is not really important to the release. Do you think there is any importance to it vs the neatness? Specifically, does it add any value to the history and origin of the release?
@IvanDobsky - BTW- thanks for the artwork catch. I removed all so I can evaluate. It seems I have a mix up on my end, as you pointed out a mixing of DE and FR.
To clarify, I am holding off so I can digest all of the feedback provided. I will for sure continue to add, but I want to do it with a clear process. I also have in my sights a collection of CDs that have no artwork, they came as a CD with printing in a plain jewel case. Not CDr type, real pressed CDs. That will introduce another issue with me as I can trace each of those to the person and exact location they were acquired. That is information that cannot be found anywhere, no matter how much research is done. The likelihood of seeing one of them is also slim; however, they were released and if you knew where, anyone could have acquired them.
I will for sure look into it. As mentioned prior, my experience with them is limited, so I have some learning to do.
The way I see it is that it’s not lost, it’s filed exactly where it should be. With the edit it’s providing evidence for.
99% of users don’t want all the evidence and notes ‘up front’, they just want the data that has emerged. The remaining 1% can browse the edit history. The system really works well imo.
If something is really interesting/provides context for the whole release, the annotation puts it up front.
Promo images are slightly different… there could be an argument there for the CAA, but I would not put things in there with the main aim of backing up edits.
Not as limited as you might think, we all use them every time we add something to the Internet Archive Cover Art Archive (CAA)
LOL! Yes, but that is not really me using it, but me feeding a system that does.
Yes, it is not a matter of distrust. Just yesterday I made a mistake, and @IvanDobsky caught it, thankfully. Mistakes can happen, and when a person supplies a source of their edit, mistakes can be uncovered quickly. I have made plenty of errors, some I caught myself and some others have. The process in MB is almost welcoming to errors… but that is a different topic.
I do not believe any editor has ill intent. Think that in many years from now, there is a release that has a different date between Discogs and MB, and there is no proof on either side and no other info can be found. If the person who added the date had provided proof/evidence, this would not be an issue.
If the printed document is with the CD-R, then it is valid to go into the Cover Art section. I’ve done this with various demo CDs.
Edit histories can get lost. Some merges will detach them. And spend time editing something like Pink Floyd and you get 18 pages long Edit Histories as all the irrelevant data about recordings ends up in there. Wading through pages and pages of copyright data and details of who played which instrument when what you really want to know is about that CD.
Important info on a release should be in the annotation.
With the Internet Archive I have seen people uploading concert bootlegs in there. So there is a way of adding separate data. And it making me curious. I think a thwaller library is something that is possible and it is then “forever linkable”. Somewhere related to here: https://archive.org
I am starting to see this as well. I have seen audio material uploaded there that I do not believe should be. It is copyrighted material, although old. Example, Paul Simon’s release Still Crazy After All These Years can be downloaded in full from archive.org. I am a bit puzzled by such things… MB had to remove artist images from the system due to some complaints (as I understand it), but posting full copyrighted albums is ok.
I really need to look into that system. Regardless of what they allow, I wont be posting anything there that is copyrighted material. I do however like the idea of adding stuff that “MB does not want (lol)”, so it can be saved. I wonder if there might be a way to create a linking with MB for such things, similar to how they have the cover art done.
Well, the history is complex. I don’t want 50 screenshots that prove recordings should be merged instead
Have you tried the ‘filter results’ link at the top? You can filter for edits that just change the release date, for instance. Or take out recording merges (not that the UI couldn’t be more accessible/quicker…)
A bunch of images in the cover art tab don’t allow any of that functionality/can’t be filtered.
Edit notes being lost in merges is a ticket that should be filed for sure. Or is there one? I know some stuff gets lost but I thought it wasn’t the important ones
Merges in a database is a topic that I have battled with many over the years (not MB related). I have seen so much corruption and data loss from merges it blows my mind. There is a service similar to MB but for movies that is fairly popular. I have pointed out many times data loss due to merging, and my statements seem to get redirected to trash. I am actually able to prove my case, as I have API data pulls from my account that I can compare, clearly showing that data was there and now is not. Looking at it, the entity with missing data also just happens to be one that was a duplicate and merged.
MB seems fairly good as it relates to maintaining the old MBIDs, keeping them as a pointer to the new MBID. This is something that I would expect, although not many do this. In my job I am working on development of a web app, and the team is always annoyed with my data demands… things like no data can ever be deleted. You can mark it as “hidden”, “disabled” or what ever term you want to use that stops it from being seen, but the data remains.
I am not sure how to place the tracks with artists. The metadata I have in its complete state, but it does not really comply with MB rules/standards. This is a neat release, I think worth adding. Kindly share ideas on how to structure this.
