Quoting pompel9:

Quote:
I thought Ken said not to remove  birthyears allready in the database.

It wasn't all ready in the online database, that was the issue.

Before you come down on me, i already read the above quote of the rules, but in my case, and about a refusal of a new DVD, John Cleese is already used on other profiles with the birth year (which i think should be on every actor, not only as a mean to distinguish between otherwise identical cast and crew but for information purposes. I submited a profile for a new dvd and it was denied based on: "Please use birth years only to distinguish between otherwise identical cast and crew. New birth year submissions must be documented." Well, i used the actor from the actor database and it already had the birth year. If i remove it, i am afecting other profiles. And BTW is this open for discussion in any way? Is the fact that i have MORE information about an actor beeing "punished" over a actor profile that has LESS information. Unbelievable...

Quoting pmasl:

Quote:
Before you come down on me, i already read the above quote of the rules, but in my case, and about a refusal of a new DVD, John Cleese is already used on other profiles with the birth year (which i think should be on every actor, not only as a mean to distinguish between otherwise identical cast and crew but for information purposes. I submited a profile for a new dvd and it was denied based on: "Please use birth years only to distinguish between otherwise identical cast and crew. New birth year submissions must be documented." Well, i used the actor from the actor database and it already had the birth year. If i remove it, i am afecting other profiles. And BTW is this open for discussion in any way? Is the fact that i have MORE information about an actor beeing "punished" over a actor profile that has LESS information. Unbelievable...

Include the sentence I bolded in your contribution notes.  If you got the BY from another profile, that is a valid reason for including it in your contribution.

The birth year issue might need some review. As it has already been stated. For very popular actors most people will know if there are others with the same name. For the less popular, this will be more difficult. The way we have it now is, at some point a duplicate name will appear, birth years will be added. When you synchronize your database, the birth years will be attached, maybe even to the wrong one, requiring you to review all profiles for the actors.

I am not trying to impose to use birth years for everyone, but it may be wise to consider the pros and cons.

Pro: It does make for an more straightforward rule, namely always use birthyear.
      You do not have to check profiles once a duplicate name arrises.

Con: It will take a lot of work to assign the 100000+ birthyears
      It probably can't be done without using third party info.

Hope I don't get shot for sharing my opinion 

Quoting Staid S Barr:

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Quoting cvermeylen:

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The birth year issue might need some review. As it has already been stated. For very popular actors most people will know if there are others with the same name. For the less popular, this will be more difficult. The way we have it now is, at some point a duplicate name will appear, birth years will be added. When you synchronize your database, the birth years will be attached, maybe even to the wrong one, requiring you to review all profiles for the actors.

I am not trying to impose to use birth years for everyone, but it may be wise to consider the pros and cons.

Pro: It does make for an more straightforward rule, namely always use birthyear.
      You do not have to check profiles once a duplicate name arrises.

Con: It will take a lot of work to assign the 100000+ birthyears
      It probably can't be done without using third party info.

Hope I don't get shot for sharing my opinion 

I agree. Entering BY's is a lot of work, and hopefully we will not see contributions adding them one at a time. It can hardly be mandatory, since for many people the source will not be there. However, once a BY is in the database, it does no actual harm, other than annoying the people who don't want to have it in there.

Except of course when it gets assigned to the wrong person, which has already happened several times.  Once that happens, it propagates like VD.

The big problem here is that people are ONLY doing half the job, they aren't thinking. For example Harrison Ford (1942) to separate him from another Harrison Ford. They oinly do the ONE Harrison Ford, so now ALL Harrison Ford's will be 1942, have we accomplished the goal of separating actors...of course not. We are creating a MESS.

Bottom line, if you aren't going to do all of the work necessary to maintain the integrity of the Online, then don't do any of it because all half the work does is screw it up even more.

Skip

Quoting Staid S Barr:

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Quoting skipnet50:

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The big problem here is that people are ONLY doing half the job, they aren't thinking. For example Harrison Ford (1942) to separate him from another Harrison Ford. They oinly do the ONE Harrison Ford, so now ALL Harrison Ford's will be 1942, have we accomplished the goal of separating actors...of course not. We are creating a MESS.

Bottom line, if you aren't going to do all of the work necessary to maintain the integrity of the Online, then don't do any of it because all half the work does is screw it up even more.

Skip

It's not always that easy. In several cases, one of the actors is a celebrity where data are easily found, and other is rather obscure, and then what do you use for a BY? But I do agree, someone who does not actually have both actors in his collection, should not feel a need to enter any BY.

Well, the whole idea of using the birth year is bogus anyway.  It is highly unlikely for two actors to have the same name who are well known.  Since only the well known ones are likely to have that information available on their DOB, it becomes next to impossible to find that data on the other one, and that breaks the system.  Don't use it at all.

Quoting skipnet50:

Quote:
The big problem here is that people are ONLY doing half the job, they aren't thinking. For example Harrison Ford (1942) to separate him from another Harrison Ford. They oinly do the ONE Harrison Ford, so now ALL Harrison Ford's will be 1942, have we accomplished the goal of separating actors...of course not. We are creating a MESS.

Bottom line, if you aren't going to do all of the work necessary to maintain the integrity of the Online, then don't do any of it because all half the work does is screw it up even more.

Skip

In order to do what you suggest, one would have to add the BY to every single Harrison Ford film out there while, at the same time, creating a new 'Harrison Ford'...with or without the BY...and adding him to all his films.  I dont' see that happening.

But that is only part of the problem.  The bigger part of the problem is the way the local program handles the BY.  When I download 'Harrison Ford (1942)', the local program assumes that every 'Harrison Ford' without a BY is the same person and overwrites that name.