Open Discussions on MusicBrainz

[ijabz]

So i was trying to get a discussion on a real issue in MusicBrainz when it was closed down. I won’t discuss the details as it seems that is not allowed but I do understand the difference between disagreeing and ignoring and the key data integrity issue I was trying to explain has been continually ignored throughout the thread and remain ignored. I believe in discussion and I always happily admit my mistakes when I get things wrong but in this case my concerns have just been ignored. If you are right and I am wrong you should be able to explain it but you have not.

In the last post to prevent me answering the administrator also decides to bring up some complaint about me regarding Cover Art - I totally do not understand what he is talking about. This comes just days after the ‘community leader’ Freso also decides it okay to attack me. I remember in the past other people have been banned for essentially being a bit annoying.

Throughout the years of involvement with MusicBrainz I have always found it very difficult to challenge any of the accepted norms of MusicBrainz. Many of these decisions were made by just a few people but the mythical ‘community’ is always used to back up previous decisions. In Development meetings, In MusicBrainz summits and other discussions the plan always seems to be if we don’t get agreement almost immediately then we have to stop talking about it, some things are immediately taken of the agenda if a key developer doesnt like it.

MusicBrainz maybe an open database but often I find the people involved are very closed to any new ideas, this is very disappointing.

[derobert]

@ijabz

….I do understand the difference between disagreeing and ignoring and the key data integrity issue I was trying to explain has been continually ignored throughout the thread and remain ignored.

I’m pretty sure everyone else in that thread—and myself having read that thread—disagree with you there. They/we believe that data integrity issue argument be adequately addressed, or that the issue is not important. You stated your point several times; stating it again isn’t going to change anyone’s mind—continuing that thread just isn’t going to be productive.

(I have no idea what the issue with cover art is/was either, I wasn’t around for that.)

[ijabz]

@derobert

or that the issue is not important

If you think that issue is not important and don’t explain why how does that differ from ignoring it and FWIW there are at least three connected but distinct data integrity issues.

[aerozol]

In the thread in question, I think you were also burying the opinions of many other posters.

[chirlu]

The relevant earlier topic that was referred to:

The "When is it a soundtrack / when is it classical?" question

(this is a repost of a barely begun thread on MusicBrainz Forums → Style Discussion http://forums.musicbrainz.org/viewtopic.php?id=6307) Editor calestyo asked this question. And the issue was discussed. But I can’t see that it was resolved. Or that the style guidelines were improved. (This question is relevant to style standards because soundtrack releases and classical release have differing standards and so the correct metadata depends on which category the release is put in.) Can the ques…

[CallerNo6]

@ijabz

discussion on a real issue in MusicBrainz when it was closed down

I think “a real issue” is the key point here. As in “singular”. That thread started life asking how do you (as an editor) determine when to apply CSG or other ‘specific type of release’ guidelines?

I don’t think @reosarevok meant to shut down conversation. I mean, I certainly hope not. I think the idea was to keep the conversation focussed and on-topic. Everything we were saying was further obscuring the original conversation. (I should have realized that myself and split the thread—sorry everybody!)

Splitting topics when they start to digress is kinda the Discourse Way™.

I also think it’s a good idea to sometimes take a step back. We were talking past each other. At that point, there’s no reason to keep talking.

[chirlu]

[quote=“CallerNo6, post:6, topic:96349”]
I should have realized that myself and split the thread—sorry everybody![/quote]

There was talk about splitting it on IRC even, but it was unclear where good cutting points would have been.

[outsidecontext]

@ijabz

So i was trying to get a discussion on a real issue in MusicBrainz when it was closed down.

I don’t have the feeling this was closed down to prevent any discussion, the discussion really was getting nowhere with lengthy posts by both sides repeating the same arguments. There was basically only one point people agreed upon, and there is a ticket for this now.

@ijabz

In the last post to prevent me answering the administrator also decides to bring up some complaint about me regarding Cover Art - I totally do not understand what he is talking about. This comes just days after the ‘community leader’ Freso also decides it okay to attack me.

Not sure what you are referring to with the first thing, but @freso’s comment was really unnecessary. But I did not have the impression it was a targeted attack, rather a sneaky comment made without knowing the background. And it has been cleared up in the discussion.

@ijabz

I remember in the past other people have been banned for essentially being a bit annoying.

I agree somewhat on this, at least as an outsider of any particular case it often was a bit surprising. But there is always another side to the story, and one person being “a bit annoying” might as well be the reason for others to leave the community. I don’t think anybody was ever banned without serious considerations and lots of discussion. In either case I don’t think this is really related to the case at hand.

@ijabz

MusicBrainz maybe an open database but often I find the people involved are very closed to any new ideas, this is very disappointing.

Yes, but I think this is actually caused by the fact that the community has a big influence on things (rather than a sign of the community being just a “myth”), and I don’t mean that in a negative sense. While we all want to collect data about music in some way, we have very different reasons to do so. This causes lengthy discussions, but the result has shown to be pretty solid so far.

And also it always depends who is participating in any particular discussion. This is actually another reason the CSG discussion got stuck: The same people throwing the same arguments around without any new ideas coming in. Maybe we will have the same discussion again later on, initiated by other people with new ideas. The now closed thread will still be there for reference