Should "Add cover art" edits be auto-edits?

Currently, adding cover art to a release is not an auto-edit. Instead, it is a sort of hybrid between a conventional edit with a voting period and an auto-edit that is applied immediately: The cover art is immediately visible, but the edit itself stays open for voting for the regular waiting period of one week.

I believe we should make these edits full auto-edits for the following reasons:

  • They clutter up open edits searches (they can be filtered out, but they still appear as “Open edits” in e.g. the subscription notification emails)
  • They are not destructive and trivial to revert (by just removing the uploaded file again)
  • In my experience, they are very rarely actually voted on
  • When adding a release, everything is an auto-edit except the cover art (usually)

The only downside I can think of for this change is that it makes achieving the 10 accepted non-auto-edits required to graduate a beginner account to a regular account harder.

If you feel this is too radical, we could also have a system where it allows adding cover art without voting to releases that don’t have any yet, or to releases that were just added (similar to how you can make change edits to releases that you just added for a short while).

I already asked about this on IRC a while ago, but I wanted to get a wider perspective:

Should adding cover art be an auto-edit?
  • Always auto-edit
  • Auto-edit in specific circumstances (such as fresh releases or no cover art yet)
  • Keep voting period (status quo)

0 voters

5 Likes

I think if there’s no artwork, it could be an auto edit (already voted).

the only reason I can think of for not making all adds auto edits is if someone adds the wrong artwork to a release later, there’s a chance it could be noticed and voted down.

for what it’s worth, I don’t have an issue with any of the three options given~

4 Likes

Many new editors upload wrong cover arts.
When we notice it, we can block all their pending edits.

Removing a cover art from a release, does not tell it from the cover art archive.

There are many edit type like this, for which you immediately see the effect (all add edits, kind of), it’s quite convenient, I think.

10 Likes

Yup, this is overdue imo (and I’m a stickler for correct cover art!)

As I can always just remove the cover art again, these aren’t destructive edits, so don’t fit the model for edit types we vote on.

In fact I very rarely vote no even if it’s wrong, since we all know how demoralizing that can be for editors. Just replace with the better/correct one and move on.

For serial bad cover arters I do use no votes as a stick sometimes and I will miss that, but it’s not worth slowing everyone everyone else down for that imo.

3 Likes

I don’t think rejecting the edits removes the files from the CAA servers either, according to a search for failed “Add cover art” edits. As you can see, even old edits still have thumbnails, so the files must still be there.

EDIT: Actually, it seems the thumbnails remain, but the original file is deleted, but from what I can tell, it’s the same for successfully applied “Remove cover art” edits.

This… I agree with @jesus2099

The nice part of MB is anyone who uploads artwork, the art is available now. So allowing it to be checked is good. Instant availability means instantly usable.

Removing this check just to clean up what can be voted on is a little weird. That seems a backwards reason. Personally I do vote no on bad art as I check most artwork that appears in my subscribed list. Allowing us time for that No vote is a positive. It also allows us to talk to the editor about their art choice as the alternative will be deleting artwork after they have added it which seems more demoralising to me

9 Likes

It should be an auto-edit for me, but not for anyone else. :sweat_smile:

Seriously, I’m in the same camp as Ivan.

6 Likes

To piggyback on the concerns raised by @jesus2099 and @IvanDobsky:
If we’re going to make cover art uploads auto-edits by default, we should make edit notes mandatory for them. This will add a layer of accountability for new editors (be they genuine well-intentioned newcomers or throwaway accounts) and help ferret out bad actors.

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I get the concerns about new editors, but I don’t really see why it’s specifically necessary to special-case cover art edits in their case. Surely new editors add “bad” release information (e.g. labels or URL relationships) too?

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I’m worried that editors will take advantage of this change for malicious purposes. A few years ago, an editor vandalized numerous releases by adding a photo of himself as the front cover and setting the original cover art to Back. I don’t want a repeat of that, or potentially something worse (e.g. spam businesses copying this technique as a form of advertising).

12 Likes

While that certainly seems like a strange case, I don’t really see how the edits being voteable changed the outcome of this compared to the removing the files after the fact. It’s not like voting against their edits prevented them from creating new ones until they were presumably banned by a moderator.

4 Likes

Tbh I rarely vote on images because then I would have to check them.

I voted for “under circumstances” (the relative majority at the moment), but I didn’t think of potential misuse of this variant. Maybe it’s better to keep the current procedure.
However, I would certainly support mandatory edit notes, not only for image uploads.

1 Like

I have to wonder how the heck we managed to remove all the other non-destructive edit vote timers if this is the response here! :thinking:

Currently open cover art edits are pretty much the only edits that are open in my subscriptions, except for a ton of merges.

It can stay that way no problem, but it’s not very inconsistent imo!

2 Likes

No such thing. No moderators exists, no one is banning people. We are all just equally watching and checking the database.

Leaving artwork open but also immediately applied is a perfect combo. Why is scrolling past it in your “to be voted on” list such a hard task? Maybe I am odd, but I look at everything that comes through my subscribed list. Including everything that was AE’d. For me what is more arduous to scroll past are the long list of countries on a digital release. :rofl: That causes real scroll wheel workouts.

Being able to talk to an editor about the artwork while the edit is open is more engaging that deleting the artwork later. They may not even know it was deleted. I do agree with @HibiscusKazeneko that we need better edit notes on art.

Artwork is at least nice to see. Makes me smile.

3 Likes

Account administrators can remove the editing privileges of editors who are reported as violating the Code of Conduct or otherwise acting in bad faith (i.e. spamming). I assume this is what @elomatreb means.

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You can still leave an edit note on an auto-edit though. Making the editor cancel the open edit seems a bit like pointless busywork for me, and I would imagine it’s more annoying than me just fixing the problem and leaving a note about it.

As I understand it, abuse of the system is a different and extreme thing. Not really what is being talked of here. I assume this is more about those people who think this is a tagging database and upload images from Google.

1 Like

I periodically look at all the edits in my subscriptions too, but I would like to check the edits that require closer attention more frequently. Relying on “Open edits” for this almost gets me there, where anything that isn’t a cover art edit (or a beginner that checked the “make all edits voteable” box) is something destructive or potentially impactful to existing data.

1 Like

The line between those two groups is often razor-thin. I’ve seen editors misuse the CAA to show off their image editing skills.

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I’m a big believer in muscle memory. If an editor fixes their own mistakes, they retain the memory of it better than if they were simply told about it.

If incorrect artwork is auto-added, it’s more likely to be overlooked by those who might correct it. So it’s conceivable that wrong artwork could be in the DB for weeks, or even years. If it’s open for voting, it’s much more likely to be seen sooner rather than later.

3 Likes