I could not resist posting (although i left off the octopus similie - no idea what that means! ) I thought it had a far amount of valid points worth saying.
I think no solution is ever going to be perfect here.
For the release method we are changing the way release groups are used a bit to make the current schema/design work with podcasts. Fitting a square peg in a round hole. But we sort of do the same with broadcasts that was used a starting point for this. Also some duplication of information.
For the series of recordings although functions and tge majority of info is there does not feel right.
Tagging is a pain/unavailable and I also think others use our data they will have to change how they organise it from the more established release group/release format.
There can be some information loss.
Changing the use of the âseriesâ behaviour .
But more discussion on this is welcomed.
What are the next steps?
I am hoping there is a desire to have âsomethingâ official style wise about podcasts.
Note that I donât really use or edit podcasts in Musicbrainz so take my opinion here with a grain of salt.
I do however like to tag stuff which is similar, namely tracks which are released over time in a blog-style format (e.g. Jonathan Coultonâs âThing a Weekâ, #13rootâs âEvil Morningâ, Party Benâs mashupsâŚ)
I think there are two things that would be most useful for this format:
Tagging of recording-series in Picard.
Giving a series entry a ânumberâ based on date rather than a serial number. This is probably technically possible now but the interface is not built for it.
But I think this reflects the reality best, in that there are often no good demarcation points (âvolumesâ or the like) to group the recordings into releases, and the release date is at best a fiction (I have used the date of the most-recent track but that doesnât really help for the others).
Treating them all as singles should also work, though some people likely wonât like how that clutters up the artistâs page. So probably some work on how such things are displayed would be in order as well.
[quote=âHawke, post:23, topic:5911â]
But I think this reflects the reality best, in that there are often no good demarcation points (âvolumesâ or the like) to group the recordings into releases, and the release date is at best a fiction (I have used the date of the most-recent track but that doesnât really help for the others).[/quote]
Not sure if youâre talking about blog-style recordings or Podcasts now, but Podcasts are always very clearly grouped, because of the nature of being played back through Podcast providers where users have subscriptions to series/volumes/groups.
Release dates are also always (in my experience) set in stone & easy to find
In this proposal each episode is essentially treated as a single release, the only âhackâ of the regular single treatment is to put them all in one release group. But that takes care of the mess and is helpful in the case of podcasts anyway (eg very convenient for tagging where it can take advantage of the two layers of information for podcasts - series information and episode information).
Overall this isnât really looking that positive I have to sayâŚ
When discussion in MB starts turning to coding in new features before making something work, I usually mentally bookmark it as âcheck back in five to ten years and seeâ
Are they? Most podcasts I have seen have been closer to a⌠channel or an ongoing series than to something like a TV âseasonâ. Occasionally you have something a bit closer to a miniseries, but even that seems iffy as a âreleaseâ.
For a concrete example, having a look at The Best of Car Talk : NPR I can see that the episode numbering follows a year+week format, but I wouldnât want to say that all the episodes 1501 through 1552 are part of the same release.
What would you say is the clear grouping for episodes of that podcast? What would be the release date? December 26, 2015 (because thatâs when the release is finished)?
Dates of individual episodes are generally solid and often easy to find, but not for anything that I would normally think of as a release.
This is why I lean toward treating them as singles.
Sorry if I wasnât clear!
What youâre describing is more or less what the Podcast style proposal does -
It groups a âchannelâ or âongoing seriesâ under a release group, and treats episodes as singles within them.
In some of the examples weâve split apart specific âseasonsâ into their own release groups, but thatâs just where thereâs a clear definition.
The proposal has examples (in this case âDr Karlâs Great Moments in Scienceâ) that represent most usage cases weâve come across. Feel free to take a look.
It was recently said in another topic, but I just want to reiterate: we should never, ever design our data around the software that uses it. It may be inconvenient that âOMG I canât use right now!!â, but in the long run it is much better to store data properly and have software adapt to that. I will vehemently be against any style guideline violating this principle.
Iâll be mostly off for the coming week, but if the discussion is still going when I get back, Iâll try and return and answer some of the questions/comments directed at me earlier.
