How to enter an audio drama into the database the best?

MusicBrainz Style
101

If all of them are properly entered, quite a lot didn’t, most likely a lot still doesn’t. In addition to that, there’s no “starring performer” relationship, which makes taking a look at the credits field mandatory if you need order information.

And that’s stupid. The style guide should be the holistic guide of entering data into the database for different types of consumption with very little left for interpretation, not “this is how we’ve done it for a while, this is how it worked for [different thing]”. Based on your “No” vote, you’re also not fine with what the style guide enforces upon audio dramas.

102

What @Hawke is saying (I believe) is that a machine should not be reading the tag with the artist credit in it, it should be reading the tag with the bare artist information.

For example:
Artist = Jeff Beck feat. Imogen Heap (not so useful for a machine)
Artists = Jeff Beck/Imogen Heap (better)
MusicbrainzArtistID = 14a4bc78-1c2d-4ca7-8d1b-9b58076a2a17/328d146c-79f1-4eb6-9e40-8ee5710c14e5 (best)

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103

And what I’m trying to say is that both of them are quite useless due to the style guide if there are no relationships (which aren’t always entered due to the style guide not requiring that).

104

Not everyone has time for that. I add relationships to all the releases I add, and it’s only taken me 10 years to get up to the S’s in my collection.

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105

We’d need to fix these problems in the style guide, people’s interpretation of it and possibly MusicBrainz editor in order to actually properly enter audio dramas into the database without anyone objecting:

  1. What are “artists”, “narrators”, “voice actors”, “writers” when speaking about Audio dramas specifically? People here understand all concepts differently.
  2. What’s the actual ground truth for crediting?
    a) Is it the cover art (not everything has that)?
    b) Is it the webpage (not everything has that)?
    c) Is it the pamphlet (not everything has that), assuming there is a physical release.
    Should a pamphlet apply to both the digital and physical release?
    Which gets priority, why?
    People understand this all differently right now and it should be cleared up.
  3. Could the release (group) editor get two separate fields when entering an audio drama so that the entered credits are clearly either “writer”-people and “voice actor”-people relationships?
  4. Could the web UI display both “writer”-people and “voice actor”-people relationships with the needed join phrases, so that people can keep their workflow when using MB?
  5. Could the audio drama style guide be split apart from the audiobook one so that it could be fixed now rather than waiting for more data to fix?
  6. Some releases have multiple tracklists (BF gives you a release as per-track and as a continuous file if it’s the digital release), is there a nice way to enter those?

I’d love to get this sorted out so the database is more useful for everyone, but that’s impossible without the previously listed things answered/fixed.

106

Yes. If the people who know stuff about audio dramas put something together, and it’s different enough from the audiobook one, then it can definitely be made into a separate guideline. If it’s often the same but some things are different, then I’d rather have it be one guideline but with very clear indications of when it’s different between the two. I have never listened to either an audiobook nor an audio drama so I’m the worst person ever to work on this guideline though :slight_smile:

That’s unlikely to happen, since our line of thought is “credit is just that, and more detail belongs in relationships” (plus, we haven’t managed to get a different release editor for classical music in like 8 years, and more of us edit that).

You mean you buy one digital release and get two versions? If so, I’d add an extra digital medium for that, but you could debate that more while discussing guideline stuff :slight_smile:

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107

That seems to be the case for the majority of releases they’ve made, yes.

108

I came here because of this

I wanted to ask here what people think about it. I somehow understand to use a fictional character as an artist… but I’m here because of the Audio drama stuff. First thing I did after that find, I went over to discogs and looked at a cover.
Following the audiobook style the releasing artist should be Elfie Donnelly, but she isn’t even mentioned on the first Benjamin Blümchen RG. I don’t know about you, but for me that’s really strange. Elfie Donnelly isn’t credited with almost anything in the database, except of an annotation and lyrics for a song. That doesn’t make much sense to me. But before I start editing, I would like to hear an opinion or two… what do you think is the best approach here?

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109

It looks like there has been an attempt to group a series of Releases by using the central fictional character featured in the series as the Artist.
Maybe back when this was done there was no better way to achieve the desired end?

The ethics around not acknowledging the human Artists are interesting.

Given the multiple Editors involved I would suggest that you have some of them automagically advised of your interest by listing some of them in a new post in the following format:
@rey200
@mmirG
etc
etc
You can find the names of Editors for the releases by clicking “Editing History” on the left hand side of the Release page. Probably just pick 5 that have appeared as Editors on a few Releases?
This will give them an opportunity to be involvd in the discussion.

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110

Returning to this topic … while I appreciate the work @Avamander has done adding all the Big Finish releases; I disagree with their decision to add all performers (as well as the writer) to the artists credit.

To my thinking, the Artist Credit should be a human readable format allowing you to identify a release. This should (IMO) reflect the advertised artist credit designated by the recording label (e.g. what is displayed on the cover and/or website; while I understand your argument that sometimes this is unclear, with Big Finish it is absolutely clear (again IMO) that they want to credit the album (for eg https://musicbrainz.org/release/ec41f37a-8084-48b7-aaad-d924c339d4ca ) to “Lalla Ward, Luise Jameson and John Leeson” … I agree that the author should also be credited. This credit is clear not only on the website and printed material from the CD releases, but (consistent with releases where I have access to the downloads) reflected in their own tagging of the tracks.

There is no need to have all the performers in the artist credit as they are performers - if spoken vocal credits are updated for each performer (at a release level or - where multiple stories featuring different performers are on one release - track level); if people wish to update their own files with the full list of performers this can be done by the computer; however you cannot get an automated task to look at the long list of artist credits and say “oh yes Alan Barnes is the writer and the ‘stars’ are Lalla Ward, Louise Jameson and John Leeson” … its (IMO) the difference between human readable information, and machine parsable data.

Okay … so this issue has come up again as I believe the format used for Big Finish releases (every performer listed in the artist credit) makes a Artist Credit which is no use in a human readable format and as such I started editing Gallifrey: Chapter 1 “Weapon of Choice” here … Edit #70284260 - MusicBrainz

By “human readable format” I’m talking the way in which (most) people will use the data. The Artist Credit (IMO) needs to be somewhat concise. I admit I haven’t read the whole of this thread; but I see that classical music was raised as an analogy - well in that situation its clear; you don’t list ever single performer in the Artist Credit but the composer, orchestra, conductor and any principle performers - well with an audio drama you can follow the same pattern.

So in that edit above … @Avamander responded

with Big Finish it is absolutely clear

Well no, I definitely saw BF releases where this strategy didn’t work. The current style is the only one that worked consistently on every single one of the thousands of releases made by BF.

I would be interested in what releases don’t match this strategy. And with EVERY strategy there are going to be outlier cases.

if people wish to update their own files with the full list of performers this can be done by the computer;

Equally as difficult as having the computer tag your files using only the “starring artists”, or the audiobook style.

Incorrect: using Picard for example its impossible from the current Artist Credits “Alan Barnes, Lalla Ward, Louise Jameson, Hugo Myatt, Seán Carlsen, John Leeson, Trevor Littledale, Miles Richardson, Daniel Hogarth, Andy Coleman, Stephen Mansfield, Lynda Bellingham & Helen Goldwyn” to automatically pick out Alan Barnes as the writer and Lalla Ward, Louise Jameson and John Leeson as the “featured” or “starring” actors.

But should most of the performers be removed from the Artist Credit, I can still scroll down to the Performer [spoken vocal] tag and find all the performers, and should you so desire easily use a script to recreate your Artist Credit using eg…
$set(artist,%writer%; %performer%)

the difference between human readable information, and machine parsable data.

Either I’m not a human or it’s human readable, I’ve used the current credits for nearly a year now and it’s really good.

With respect… it appears its “really good” for you.

But a question: seriously do you really browse looking for what recording Joseph Lidster is on?

From a RDBMS point of view what you’ve done is shoehorned data where its not meant to be … the artist credit is a 1:1 relationship - 1 recording had 1 credit; while performers are a 1:Many relationship - 1 recording has many relationship. When you take the data outside of MusicBrainz web interface Alan Barnes, Lalla Ward, Louise Jameson, Hugo Myatt, Seán Carlsen, John Leeson, Trevor Littledale, Miles Richardson, Daniel Hogarth, Andy Coleman, Stephen Mansfield, Lynda Bellingham& Helen Goldwyn is a different “artist” to Stephen Cole, Lalla Ward, Louise Jameson, Daniel Barzotti, Daniel Hogarth, Lucy Campbell, Seán Carlsen, Joseph Lidster, Robert Dick, John Leeson, Miles Richardson, Jane Goddard. Trying to find related releases is difficult in that situation.

In addition; if you load those recordings into a music manager; it will see each Big Finish recording as having a different artist - that just doesn’t (IMO) make sense. If anything there should be less people in the artist credit not more … for e.g. arguable with the main Doctor Who range it makes sense to have just the doctor and companions - that way all releases with Peter Davidson and just Sarah Sutton are together.

Generally, this is a topic that should be discussed in the community forum for everyone to see and give their input on. If there’s a clear-cut style guide, every release can be nicely updated according to that. Alternatively, we open an issue in Picard’s issue tracker and request relationship-based credits and everyone’s happy.

I agree: best to discuss it here.

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111

I agree with the Good Omens example here mostly, though IMO the “work” level should relate each episode to a work. These should be written by Dirk Maggs and be “adapted from” the original Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman prose.

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112

(I wrote the same text to the edit notes, copying here so people see it)

with Big Finish it is absolutely clear

Well no, I definitely saw BF releases where this strategy didn’t work. (And won’t give you the results you’re hoping for) The current style is the only one that worked consistently on every single one of the thousands of releases made by BF.

if people wish to update their own files with the full list of performers this can be done by the computer;

To be fair, that’s equally as difficult as having the computer tag your files using only the “starring artists”, or the audiobook style.

the difference between human readable information, and machine parsable data.

Either I’m not a human or it’s human readable :P. I have used the current credits for nearly a year now, and it’s really good.

113

I see multiple possible solutions here:

a) There’s a clear-cut style guide for Audio dramas that does dictate some specific style and does work on every single release - writer, no writer? ground truth? which artists? etc. etc. - and let’s wait with the edits until it’s complete

b) Picard gets the ability to tag based on relationships - as the old Estonian saying goes: “Wolfs have eaten, the sheep are happy”

c) MB gets the ability to display credits based on relationships

Maybe someone has more ideas?

114

a) There’s a clear-cut style guide for Audio dramas that does dictate some specific style and does work on every single release - writer, no writer? ground truth? which artists? etc. etc. - and let’s wait with the edits until it’s complete

While there isn’t a clear cut style guide for audio dramas, there are clear cut guides for everything else which states “the release artist [or other information] will be sourced from the front cover”. It strikes me that, in the absence of other information, the front cover (or spine) is always the primary source of information.

b) Picard gets the ability to tag based on relationships

While not all relationships; the vocal performers, writer and producer are clearly available (yes we need a director relationship.

c) MB gets the ability to display credits based on relationships

I’m not entirely sure what you mean here … if performance credits are added to a release they are clearly visible on MusicBrainz.org

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115

This behaviour can already be achieved with a tagger script:

$if($inmulti(%releasetype%,audio drama),
   $unset(albumartist)
   $copymerge(albumartist,writer)
   $copymerge(albumartist,performer:spoken vocals)
)

Edit: The above is just a quickly written snippet that gives you a multi-value tag for the album artist. In case you want to follow this approach and have the tag values separated by commas and accompanied by a matching album artist sort name tag (as vanilla Picard does), there is more work to do. Just let me know if you are interested…

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116

I don’t want to join yet another argument. I agree with @eloise_freya, the cover does not list EVERY actor. But I can understand why @Avamander needed to enter the data in the manner it was entered as most of these Releases are copied from the website en-masse without any media in hand.

Example at random from Big Finish - https://musicbrainz.org/release/94ee3fb8-ccbd-4c2d-aff6-fd65aa95887c

Look at the cover - only Colin Baker and Maggie Stables are listed. But look at that huge list of actors. Why are they are they not added at Release Level like we do with the members of a band?

It was a brilliant job - I am not knocking the work that went into that mission. But the lack of actual Media to get tracklists from made it impossible to assign the Actors to the recordings. IMHO that is where the actors should really be in this database - attached to the Recordings. Just like the performers of a musical recording get a credit at Recording level.

OR attached at a Release Level, again just like when we don’t know which track a specific band member played on.

A worry I have about Picard is that it has a new habit of putting things into alphabetical order. Which is then going to loose who the Writer is. While these long lists may be “human readable”, they are not machine readable. A computer has a problem trying to separate the Writer from the Actors, Directors and the rest. This is why attaching them to the Release and\or Recording like with Music would be more database friendly. Real roles can then be assigned.

I also don’t understand why some people think Picard is the only program that uses MusicBrainz data. Many Many other projects use this database. Many media libraries and other taggers do lookups. This is why this database is so fantastic. It is so well used in so many places.

The fact that Picard can “use a script” to pull this data apart doesn’t really help the other people using the data. Also the above script, while neat, does not work on all those examples that lack detailed credits at a recording level like the example I picked above.

117

An interesting quote to pick. It also explains why I gave up the discussion. The wolf shouted louder and this sheep gave up and ran away. I thought this was a relational database and not a shouting match.

I really do think you have done a brilliant job in adding all of those releases, but the Actors should be credited at Release level and not in a long list as part of the title.

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118

Because it’s been addition of new data that is much better than no data I haven’t really taken much issue. But now that you’ve gone in to ‘fix’ the credits and there is dispute, it’s definitely worth weighing in on.

There is no precedent in MB to store everyone involved in a recording in the artist credit field, even if it’s convenient for a user.

Please do feel free to raise votes like this, maybe in Voting/Auto-editor Request Thread

119

There are covers where like a handful of artists out of approximately forty in a collection are mentioned. Seems really wrong, IMHO, which is why I really don’t like the dictated style. In a sense it would make those releases by-default rather, um, vague if not pointless? On the other end, there’s things like the Highlander series, where the cover contains no credits.

120

One thing is displayed when clicked upon and scrolled down, other is dynamically generating the credited artists list based on relationships. That’s what I meant.

+1

Can you clarify who actually gets credited then?